In this blog I will try to clarify what are the main differences between resting heart rate and heart rate variability (HRV), and why we consider HRV a marker of parasympathetic activity and therefore of your stress response when measured under certain conditions.
When we do morning hrv I believe you tell us to breath normally however it appears that just by concentrating on exhale we can increase our hrv. Why shouldn’t we do that?
On the other hand, if you want to possibly train your parasympathetic system using a slow breathing exercise, as in HRV biofeedback, then breathing at your resonant frequency is ideal to acutely increase your HRV. See this blog to learn more about this application: https://marcoaltini.substack.com/p/heart-rate-variability-hrv-biofeedback
Hence:
- for a morning assessment of your resting physiology, relax and breathe naturally (we do this just once per day, first thing in the morning)
- to train your parasympathetic system via a biofeedback exercise, use slow breathing (we can do this anytime, outside of the morning assessment)
When we do morning hrv I believe you tell us to breath normally however it appears that just by concentrating on exhale we can increase our hrv. Why shouldn’t we do that?
hi Conrad, thank you for your message.
When the goal is to assess our resting physiology, as in a morning measurement, we do not want to artificially impact the data (otherwise you could also just swallow repeatedly: https://marcoaltini.substack.com/p/a-quick-note-on-continuous-heart ).
On the other hand, if you want to possibly train your parasympathetic system using a slow breathing exercise, as in HRV biofeedback, then breathing at your resonant frequency is ideal to acutely increase your HRV. See this blog to learn more about this application: https://marcoaltini.substack.com/p/heart-rate-variability-hrv-biofeedback
Hence:
- for a morning assessment of your resting physiology, relax and breathe naturally (we do this just once per day, first thing in the morning)
- to train your parasympathetic system via a biofeedback exercise, use slow breathing (we can do this anytime, outside of the morning assessment)
I hope this clarifies