Transcript

Mike Maher: (0:00 - 3:17) Hey everybody and welcome to the Take a Deep Breath podcast. My name is Mike Maher and today I am bringing you Mr. Anders Olsson. If you've seen or read the book Breath by James Nestor there was another guy that he did the nose blocking experiments and all this stuff with who also guides breathing at the end.

That's this guy, that's Mr. Anders Olsson. James refers to him as one of the most knowledgeable people when it comes to breath work and I love speaking to Anders. This is the second podcast.

So in this podcast be prepared to have your mind blown when it comes to all things CO2. I'm now referring to Anders as Mr. CO2. We're talking about the diaphragm, we're talking about how to get a really good exhale.

We go deep into Anders experiments when he did block up his nose for 10 days what actually happened to him. We've heard a lot about James and there's many articles and interviews about what James did and how he felt and his metrics but let's hear what happened to the other chap that went on this as well. But also what I just get fascinated now is carbon dioxide.

So Anders is looking younger every year. Go back and look at my first podcast with him like three years ago. Look at him now.

He's doing CO2 baths. Have you ever heard of a CO2 bath? In essence it's like dipping your face in fizzy water with a straw.

There's another way you can make it yourself with some basic household ingredients but essentially you're putting your skin in CO2. Anders has CO2 suits that you're kind of floating. He also has a device that you can up your CO2 limits to raise your tolerance to CO2 and he's republished a load of books as well about CO2 therapy in breast cancer, CO2 therapy for panic attacks.

Old books like over 100 years ago books about how we were using CO2. We often think about the oxygen canister being brought into the hospital or by the fire brigade or the ambulance but it actually used to be a CO2 believe that or not. Incredible.

So we get into all of this today. This is one of my favorite podcasts. I filmed this a little while ago and I was just so desperate to share it with you because this is wonderful and I think if you're like me after this you'll want to be doing some CO2 bathing as well.

So without further ado I'm going to get on with the podcast but before I do if you haven't done so please please subscribe to this podcast. 50 plus percent of you are watching and not subscribing you little sneaks. So please just pop that subscribe button if you're on iTunes and Spotify and all those beautiful places and you can leave me a review that would be so so helpful.

Our goal this year is to grow bigger than ever. This is the year of the breath. This is the year of breathwork.

Things are already hottening up and it's only early early January 2024 as of recording this so it's a very exciting year that's coming. I am taking on clients. I'll talk about that later if you're interested in work with me you can do but for now let's just think about our friend Anders Olsson, conscious breathing, Relaxators, all this good stuff.

Here is my friend Mr. Anders Olsson. Cheers. So I'm wearing your Relaxator.

Can you just share with me a little bit of the history? How did you come up with this and just explain to people what are the benefits of using this might be?

Anders Olsson: (3:19 - 4:11) So I came across a similar device actually it was from Russia and I thought what a ridiculous little piece of equipment. I don't need that. I know how to breathe but after some time I took actually it I think it took six months before I even put it in my mouth and when I did I had to climb down from my high horses because I realized that when I was concentrating in front of my computer I was holding my breath so much and that made the device starting to sound so I become aware of my breathing of my poor breathing at the time and then I ordered I think all the different devices out there on the market 10 or 15 of them and tried all of them and realized that I didn't like them so much so then I decided to make my own.

That's now 12 years ago.

Mike Maher: (4:11 - 4:31) Yeah I really like I recommend this to all my clients and I just find it so simple I find it so effortless it's you know like the plastics really nice so can you the thing that people often say is oh my god I thought we're meant to be nose breathing but you're asking me to breathe through my mouth now so can you just demystify that a bit for people because I think it sometimes confuses them.

Anders Olsson: (4:31 - 6:14) It does I mean that's the most common question we get you keep talking about nasal breathing and then you show us this and we're going to well what you do is you inhale through the nose and out through the Relaxator but still so I think we have to look at it as we are on training arena when you put the Relaxator in your mouth you train your breathing and then as soon as you stop using the Relaxator you go back to nasal breathing so with the Relaxator you set a resistance so that you prolong the exhale slightly and my explanation for it is that when we inhale that is activation exhale relaxation so if we find want to find relaxation we can go to our exhale and prolong it slightly and when you do you will end up activating your diaphragm more your most important breathing muscle and you will increase the pressure slightly in your lungs you will improve the muscle tonus in your throat area which for many people is a problematic area which becomes specifically evident when they go to bed and they start snoring or get sleep apnea and this slight increased pressure when you prolong the exhale also makes the air circulate better in your nose and sinus cavities so the advantage that the Relaxator bring the low slow rhythmic breathing that ensures a steady supply of oxygen to the brain in the other parts of your body is is a lot more than the potential negative effect of exhaling

Mike Maher: (6:14 - 6:33) through your mouth interesting and so so you you have um found this to be useful for people with sleep apnea yes absolutely yeah yeah and and how long would they need to i know everybody's different but what would you recommend somebody with sleep apnea do how often should they use

Anders Olsson: (6:33 - 7:36) something like this for how long well we recommend doing 10 to 15 minutes per day with the Relaxator and depends on the person in the situation but for most people they can fit it into their daily life whether they're sitting in the car or in front of the computer or when watching tv or cooking or cleaning before getting up in the morning before falling asleep in the evening usually people can find quite easily i would say 10-15 minutes yeah and and of course with everything you you can't go to the gym once and and say no there's nothing for me I'm not stronger I'm not fitter we know all of us we have to repeat it over and over again and it's the same with the Relaxator so you need to give it some time so if you have a sleep apnea for example that won't go away just like that i think you need to stick with it for a few months at least

Mike Maher: (7:37 - 9:30) and how um how hard should we be blowing and i hear some people say the cheeks shouldn't be expanded other people say that you should keep the cheeks like still so how can you maybe demonstrate for little a little bit how it should work hope you're enjoying the conversation with Anders as i alluded to in the intro um i am taking on clients for 2024 so you already are watching a breathwork podcast you already know the power of breathing but my question to you is what are you doing this for is it to lower stress is it lower anxiety is it to improve focus is it to work on back pain is it to feel karma is it just to find a space of spirituality so what is it that's attracted to you to the breath and if we go a layer deeper why so if we wanted to reduce stress why is it a problem because actually stress is really good is stress showing up in a bad way in your life um are we struggling to find time for practice what what is it that you really are looking for um and I would love to have a conversation with you about this I've worked with many many clients now over the last few years and we go deep my program is bespoke for you so I build it from the ground up we'll go through assessments application process really understand you and what you need this isn't about me I'm finding out exactly where your breathing is right now and where you want to be and why and I build a program around you um it's had an incredible uh reception incredible feedback reviews I can share all of these with you and I'd just love to have conversations if you're serious and there is an investment involved so I'm going to link everything down below if you're serious about taking your health to the next level this year making 20 24 different to 2023 not letting it stay the same actually making that change now you've been watching me for probably a while you know who i am what I'm doing I'm interviewing all these people I'm building my knowledge to better and improve your life um and so if that sounds interesting to you the link is is down below back on with Mr. Anders Olsson cheers

Anders Olsson: (9:30 - 13:05)  yeah so the thing is it's not to go about it as I did when I started out i thought it was a competition okay I'm gonna have the world's best breathing in the shortest period of time so the smaller the hole is open the better my breathing is but what i didn't realize was that i had this wrinkle between my eyes probably blue in the face really pushing myself very hard the key is relaxation so that's what we want to achieve so we're talking about a slight relaxation our lungs they are delicate tissues it's not like going to the gym and doing more push-ups or whatever it's it's about just finding the slight increase in the exhale so I you recommend people to set it at level three and then adjust smaller or a bigger hole open depending on where you are and your level of fitness that could differ from day to day or there is also a big difference whether you are sitting down or if you are walking around so try to hold it with your lips that it tends to make us most relaxed and then you just inhale through nose and some people when they use it they for some reason i don't know why for example my mom when she puts it in the mouth she starts to go like this so that's not the way to do it we should not change our breathing the only thing we do is that we focus on prolonging the exhale slightly and then we just let the air in okay yeah so it's much more gentle than i think a lot of people might think yes yeah of course you can also use it push it use it harder i mean sometimes i use it on with a very small hole open just to for example do some diaphragm exercise and and we have developed this we call it the coxy test carbon dioxide oxygen balance test similar to the the ball score and the but take a control pulse so what you do is then that you use the Relaxator at the highest level number five so a small hole open as possible and then you inhale through the nose while taking six steps so you try to fill up your lungs as much as you can yep and then on step number seven onwards you exhale through the Relaxator and then you take as many steps and as you can on the exhale and the total number of steps the six on the inhale and the rest of the steps that's your coxy score then okay and the test is over when you run out of air when you can't exhale longer yeah so you're not allowed to to inhale of course you're not allowed to swallow so when you can't exhale any longer then you stop and you continue to have the Relaxator in your mouth so that you don't go like that because it's both an assessment of your lung function and it's also a a great exercise to help you restore the balance between oxygen and carbon dioxide by slowing down your breathing.

Mike Maher: (13:05 - 13:12) I love it what what does good start at so where should where should we aim for at the very beginning of good steps wise? 

Anders Olsson: (13:13 - 13:17) I think 50 is is a good start absolutely. 

Mike Maher: (13:18 - 13:22) How high have you seen it go with people? 

Anders Olsson: (13:24 - 13:26) Maybe above 100.

Mike Maher: (13:27 - 13:30) Okay yeah yeah yeah okay.

Anders Olsson: (13:30 - 13:34) You have to practice a bit to get there but let me know.

Mike Maher: (13:35 - 13:39) Do you do you have like a chart that rates like? 

Anders Olsson: (13:39 - 13:47) Not at this point no we just came up with the this not so long ago so we haven't collect that much data.

Mike Maher: (13:47 - 13:59) Sure okay well I'm happy to do it and I'm happy to ask my clients to do it because all my clients get one of these so I can get you some data from I mean you've probably got lots anyway to be fair but I'll ask around anyway okay I'll have a plan.

Anders Olsson: (13:59 - 14:00) I'd love to have data yes.

Mike Maher: (14:00 - 14:19) Okay cool okay so anybody else watching we're going to put this down below in the link so you can literally just click and get yours if you haven't got yours already and then you can send us some data. Okay so do you ever recommend that you would inhale through it as well would we ever suck through it to increase the inspiratory muscles?

Anders Olsson: (14:20 - 14:48) You can do it and there are devices out there that do inspiratory muscle training and studies showing the benefits of it. I don't do it at all I think our nose is far too superior when it comes to inhalation but for some people it may be beneficial. If someone asks about it I just say to them to yeah give it a try but I don't do it myself.

Mike Maher: (14:49 - 14:55) Okay but your whole thing is let's get the exhale really good it's a really good exhale really full exhale.

Anders Olsson: (14:55 - 15:22) I think a key is in the exhale yes and while full exhale that could be interpreted like you are emptying your lungs so that's not what we are saying either you just prolong the exhale slightly so that you get a little more of this relaxation and a little higher pressure in the lungs so that you open up the airways a little more open up the alveoli a little more.

Mike Maher: (15:23 - 15:33) Okay yeah I love it cool thank you thank you for sharing yeah I honestly I can't say enough good things about this I have it with me all the time when I'm traveling all my clients get one.

Anders Olsson: (15:34 - 15:41) I'm really glad you say that and I know that I'm biased but I also actually love it I really do.

Mike Maher: (15:42 - 16:41) I've tried loads I've bought different ones off Amazon they were like nasty plastics they were not as good to use this one looks pretty it feels good in the mouth on the plastic so yeah I'm not biased I just think it's the best of all the things that I've done and it's very affordable for people because you can spend hundreds of dollars on these things they've got Bluetooth and don't get me wrong for some people they really love that level of data but I find for most of us you can have this on your desk you haven't got to charge it up it just it just works so so thank you for for giving that to us yeah thank you so I want to ask you before we start talking about the world of co2 which I cannot wait for I realize I never asked you for your version of the story with James Nesta when you taped up your your nose so maybe could you just walk us through what that was like how did he convince you to do this because I'm sure you probably had some thoughts about this and then maybe talk us through what those 10 days looked like and what you and what your results were as well would you mind just giving us that story.

Anders Olsson: (16:41 - 20:29) Yeah absolutely well he didn't have to convince me actually as soon as he popped the question my immediate answer was no I don't want to participate in that awful study but I'm way too curious to to not do it so when do we start and yeah it was a three-week study at Stanford and the first 10 days we blocked our nose we have had all kinds of things we put in the nose to ensure that we could only do mouth breathing around the clock day and night in 10 days it's quite a long time actually specifically when you start to feel your energy is going down your stress is going up your anxiety is going up and your sleep is getting worse and worse and worse get to the point where I didn't even want to go to sleep and there we were sitting James and I three hours per day we were doing all these kinds of tests and yeah at the end of the 10 days both of us we were really not in the best mood so we were we were very happy when we could remove it from our nose so that we could start using our nose again but we measured all these kinds of things from different things in the blood adrenaline and blood pressure we measured nitric oxide in our airways we did push-ups and measured our heart rate variability we stood on one leg we went out we went to the gym many times and then we had a lot of nasal examination brain scan and smell tests and by far the most negative effect was the sleep that went from no snoring at all to three hours of snoring per night and yeah that's a lot and I was twisting and turning we filmed ourselves when we were sleeping and we recorded our sound as well so you could see how we were twisting and turning and you know the restless sleep we've all been through and we had that every single night and I woke up five six times every night and many times many of these times I had to go and pee a lot more than usually normally I don't wake up at all or maybe one time per night and have to pee but this time I had to pee three four five times which can be explained from a carbon dioxide perspective we also measured carbon dioxide in the outbreath and the curve was it went down and down and then when we reverted to mouth breathing it started to go up again and came back to the level before we started so that was really a reflection as well of the state of our health and also an interesting thing when we came there to Stanford and they did all these kinds of tests lung function tests etc all we heard was it's okay it's fine it's within the range you're good no but look at us we look like shit and we feel like shit but apparently we weren't sick enough to to show up on their radar so that's also interesting what we should bear that in mind when we go to the hospital and they do all kinds of tests that it's not necessarily a a a full picture of what's going on.

Mike Maher: (20:31 - 20:33) What did the brain scan show?

Anders Olsson: (20:38 - 21:12) It showed that there was a slight or maybe that was more the the actually the brain scan I think didn't show much and but the nasal examination showed slightly more constricted airways but from that perspective I guess 10 days is not enough in order to see real changes but still there was some change but not not huge changes.

Mike Maher: (21:12 - 21:18) Did your blood work reveal anything after the 10 days was there any any changes in the blood?

Anders Olsson: (21:18 - 24:37) I had three times as much adrenaline and the what you call it the the dopamine was six times as high do you know why and I can just describe how I felt I felt that the adrenaline I I came from the place where I used to have this racing mind had problems calming down so it was like I did a time journey traveling back in time to my previous stressful life I remember several times actually cooking I had all the time in the world but still I was chopping to cook a cucumber as my life depended on it I had to check one two three okay my fingers are still there because I was really stressed out and and that was really interesting which showed in my blood the adrenaline went up and I assume my body needed to compensate for the poor sleep so more adrenaline came into the system and sugar cravings increased that was one we measured a lot of things just our own view from one to ten how was my sleep how is your energy etc and also our sugar cravings so they were for me I started actually four days prior to the study and they were at I had no sugar cravings and also a couple of days into the study no sugar cravings but the last four days it was seven between seven and eight from a scale from one to ten so I had beer and pizza and alcohol sorry and and chocolate and ice cream all these days and that's normally not something that's in my diet so that was a profound again it was like going back in time to my previous life so I can clearly see how that relates and it they also studies confirming this you have low energy so then you you are more stressed and also when your airways are tighter you have more stress and then we have more cravings for quick energy whether that is an ice cream or alcohol they are both quick energy and I have done the journey where I have seen how that has decreased as I'm have become more and more calmer so I think the dopamine has to do with that because I found that the last four days there when I had this high cravings for sugar and fast energy a lot of my thoughts were circulating around food oh soon I'm going to have that pizza don't take that pizza away from me it's mine don't you dare I felt a big need to reward myself like I hadn't achieved anything but still I needed to reward myself this is I'm worth this it was very important.

Mike Maher: (24:37 - 24:44) wow any changes to blood pressure? 

Anders Olsson: (24:45 - 25:59) for me it wasn't much I'm no for James it changed yeah but not for me that much no 

Mike Maher: And did they measure cortisol levels in the blood?

Anders Olsson: I'm not sure actually I think we missed that one that's unfortunate yeah because cortisol also is there when you do mouth breathing you have a tendency to get more inflamed airways so then the cortisol comes in to reduce the inflammations so no unfortunately I think you have to go and do it again well I can I send you this time I'm good but one other thing which was really interesting standing on one leg I was surprised we counted we closed our eyes stood on one leg for one minute on each foot so a in total and 20 minutes during the 10 days right and then we counted how many times we needed to put down the foot so 20 days with sorry 20 minutes with the the nose blocked so mouth breathing I had to put down the foot 120 times and then when we did the 20 minutes with the conscious breathing with low slow rhythmic nasal breathing I only had to put down the foot 20 times so sixfold difference.

Mike Maher: (25:59 - 26:06) Why would that be why would mouth breathing affect your balance do you think.

Anders Olsson: (26:06 - 26:38) I think the tongue is is like you you go out in a ship and you cruise around and then you have the I don't know the English word the rudder yeah what it's called a rudder I think the steering yeah yes yeah I think the tongue is is affecting that I think the tongue in the roof of the mouth just the key yeah probably probably other effect as well how mouth breathing affects the nervous system and the balance.

Mike Maher: (26:40 - 26:46) what was the first nasal breath feel like was your nose was it really hard or was it like was the nose

Anders Olsson: (26:46 - 28:05) open straight away how did that go oh my god it was it was fantastic and then when we came out of the setting there in the hospital because that was where we removed the stuff from the nose I felt like I'm going to do everything I can in my life to never ever return to hospital again that was I felt so motivated I formed my health vision I want to live long and be healthy and die healthy basically and not being dependent on the pills and surgeries and other things they give you at the hospitals and so that was a a really good takeaway from the study to to really realize I don't like any of this at all this is a depressive environment I have full respect absolutely for what they are doing no doubt that's not what I'm saying right I'm just saying it for me it installed a huge motivation to do my outmost to take care of my body and mind and emotions to not being dependent on what they have yeah that's good you said something

Mike Maher: (28:05 - 28:11) a few minutes ago about going to pee more and carbon dioxide so what why do you think you need 

Anders Olsson: (28:11 - 29:11) to pee more when your mouth breathe what's going on there so carbon dioxide has this effect on our smooth muscles so we are basically like a a bunch of tubes in our body we have the airways they are very long tubes and we have the blood vessels we have the intestines the stomach the bladder for women the uterus they are all surrounded by smooth muscles and when these smooth so we have three types of muscles we have the heart muscle we have the skeletal muscles which are the ones we can control by will and then we have these smooth muscles surrounding these tubes and they when they live in an environment that is low in carbon dioxide they have a tendency to constrict go into spasm so when the bladder it becomes smaller than right so it fills up faster

Mike Maher: (29:11 - 29:18) so then we need to go to pee after more often okay so it's actually got less space to hold liquid.

Anders Olsson: (29:18 - 29:32) yeah that's that's probably one of the reasons yeah as always there are many reasons yeah but it was quite evident there that i needed to go and pee a lot more. 

Mike Maher: (29:32 - 29:44) yeah so i never thought about that actually so when you're in a low co2 environment even your guts your intestines are tighter in theory yeah so it's affecting how you go to the toilet the other way.

Anders Olsson: (29:44 - 32:11) yeah so if you think about it if you have asthma it's the airways constricting right then you definitely there are studies showing how you over breathe how you lower the levels of co2 so it's called bronchospasms right if you have angina pectoris it's the blood vessels that goes into spasms if you have stomach cramp you could hear that in the name right it's it's the intestines going into spasm of course if you eat something that is not very good for your stomach that may also lead to to stomach cramp so again it's not only low levels of co2 but it's a probably major contributor or if you have well we can't have but if a woman have pms issues studies shows that progesterone that a hormone increases in in the the second phase of the hormonal cycle and when you when in studies when progesterone has been given to cats and to men they have started to breathe more so that makes sense because progesterone increases because the there is more activity in in the the female body so then you need to breathe more in order to that your metabolic requirement will increase and if the the egg is fertilized the progesterone levels will stay high because again then the the fetus is growing then the metabolism there is a higher demand so it makes sense to to breathe more but of course if we go into the second phase of the menstruation cycle with slightly elevated stress that will then take us to to to new levels that mean that the slightly elevated stress means that we are over breathing as well right so so then that slight over breathing will be amplified in in that second phase and then the c2 levels will go down more than necessary so that could be a major contributing factor to pms issues.

Mike Maher: (32:11 - 32:55) oh wow okay that's really interesting, again there's like so many factors isn't there that's affecting everything um I'm really excited to talk co2 with you but i just wanted to ask you one last question about the body really um so i think some people sit in the camp that you know nasal breathing is most important thing and then you've got other people saying no no it's ribs diaphragm you know you've got to get that right and i kind of think it's both but i know that people lean more to where do you sit on that scale of you know which bit's more important should it be that focus on nasal breathing first or focus on getting your rib cage nice and strong and you're flexible and making your diaphragm nice and strong where do you sit on that can i add a third one please

 

[Anders Olsson] (32:55 - 37:00)

no but but i think the rhythmic breathing is something that is completely forgotten you you talk about the coherent breathing right yes yeah i talk about the prolonged exhale so if we go for a walk if we go for a jog even if we have sex if we do these things in an unrhythmic fashion it's not so nice you go for a walk and then you stop and then you start it's not very nice you want to get into the rhythm in order to um feel harmony feel that okay this is something nice I'm jogging here now rhythmically and and i think that is a key so many of us i would say we have a chaotic breathing and it is possible to do nasal breathing fast to breathe high up in our chest with the nose and it's possible to breathe chaotically using our nose and so in that sense i agree with you the nose and the diaphragm they are equally important but we should also add in that equation the rhythm in itself so nasal breathing helps us to a better rhythm the diaphragm helps us to a better rhythm this chest breathing and mouth breathing tends to be more chaotic and unrhythmic yeah but you can breathe out through your mouth and also have a rhythm you can have a rhythm higher up in your chest not using your diaphragm so much so so i think those are the key three things in in our teaching the nose and the diaphragm and the the rhythm and then we add the the low and slow or the slow breathing but yeah the thing is when we what it seems like most people do is that they shift from either forget to breathe they hold their breath when checking the mobile or watching the news or an action movie or whatever it is concentrating at work and the next second we move to a little faster breathing so both of those those will will affect the delivery of oxygen to our brain and that is a major reason why i like this so much when i sit there in front of the computer and i want to focus and concentrate and be creative what our brain needs and wants more than anything is oxygen and that is a major reason i think why we need so many breaks why we can't stay focused and concentrated is because we switch between either we breathe too fast and shallow or chaotically holding our breath that will deprive the or it will disturb the oxygen delivery to the brain and the brain says okay we need to break this state we we need a coffee we need to go to the toilet we need to call our best friend we need to tons of different things so that is what i find when i use this the Relaxator that it ensures this low slow rhythmic breathing which in turn then ensures a steady supply of oxygen to the brain and if we think about it the brain want to predict the future want to check what's going on be on top of things make sure we survive and we are staying safe and the most important thing for the brain is oxygen and if that is altered if the the brain can't trust me that i will deliver that oxygen in in a good way then it will start to get stressed and and that i think is when we have problems focus and concentrating yeah okay that's

 

[Mike Maher] (37:00 - 37:12)

a lovely segue then into co2 and oxygen now then so i can't wait to talk to you about some of this have you seen people with these oxygen cans that they have now on amazon and they yes oxy boost yeah

 

[Anders Olsson] (37:12 - 40:59)

what do you think about all of this i think that we are a little too obsessed about oxygen in in our society to be honest i mean at the end of the day the whole conscious breathing concept is about increasing your oxygenation but via uh increasing your tolerance uh tolerance for carbon dioxide and actually reducing the intake of oxygen because we must ask ourselves the question why in the world do we store so little oxygen in our body that we can only go by for a few minutes without breathing if we compare to all other things we have we have huge reserves fat water carbohydrates but oxygen that we are so extremely dependent on we can just survive for a few minutes in my view the only possible explanation is because oxygen is toxic if you take a bite in an apple and put it down it will turn brown within minutes right and the reason is because it's exposed to oxygen that's why we protect food from oxygen i was in in china just came home a couple of days ago there they even put plastic around bananas i thought maybe that was a bit overkill but that is what we are doing right we protect food from oxygen because when it's exposed to oxygen it starts to react with the oxygen and exactly the same processes happen in our body and we call that free radicals that is short for a free oxygen radicals and that if we have too many of those i don't believe in bad or good i believe in balance so free radicals are good but too many are not so good and and that is the free radicals basically is ammunition for the immune system to create inflammation so we if we have a problem we have a any an infection we have an injury we have an intruder the immune system attacks and and usually an inflammation occurs and free radicals are important in that process but too many free radicals is not so good so across the line you would see when it comes to symptoms and diseases that a increased levels of inflammations or too high levels of inflammations are are there in in every single case when we have health issues and oxygen is the the main creator of these free radicals so the term is oxidative stress when we have too much of it so when we take in too much oxygen it it may feel good if you do the oxy boost but that is the short term we always need to evaluate what happens long term but if you drink a a red bull or eat a chocolate bar that's also good for a short term and many say they take a cigarette that's also they like it short term but we we know with these kind of things that long term it's necessarily it may not be beneficial to us so we're talking here maybe about over breathing

 

[Mike Maher] (40:59 - 41:18)

breathing too shallow breathing too fast using the wrong hole taking in too much oxygen messing about with co2 levels what first of all how do you measure respiratory rate with people do you just count it when people are there or do you have a device that you use how do you measure and what is a good respiratory rate that you would recommend i know it's different men women

 

[Anders Olsson] (41:18 - 46:14)

age but we'll talk a bit about that please so yeah i i do it manually these days i don't see that many clients i just don't have the time but but but it's also about checking the do they move looking at the face you can spot quite a bit in the face and understand and these kind of things and how you're talking the talking speed and and the and clearing of throat and things like that so i i try to put the piece of puzzle together so respiratory rate is is one thing there so in terms of the optimum i i think i've counted the number of breaths on hundreds maybe maybe even thousands of people these days but but um what i find is that they usually take quite a lot of breaths usually 18 to 20 or even more and i think we have an inflation going on there actually i think if we had studies 100 years ago we would have found that people were breathing less and my belief is that it's the increased exposure to carbon dioxide that leads to that we know from the global warming data that is out there that the carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere increase at least we have a data from the last 60 years i think from hawaii and the increase is about 40 percent so from 0 0 32 to 0 0 42 something like that which is not lots a lot so if we talk in ppm parts per million it's around 400 ppm in the atmosphere but still the increase is there whether it's low levels or not the increase is around 40 percent in the last 60 years and since it is it is carbon dioxide that drives breathing it is not lack of oxygen that makes us take the next breath it is the build-up of carbon dioxide in the body so when we are exposed to more carbon dioxide in the atmosphere but also because we are more people if you look at the population it's an exponential growth so if you live in in cities you are exposed to more people and we are all carbon dioxide factories if you sit in a meeting room there will be more carbon dioxide in that room and in general when we are indoors and most of us we spend 90 or even more of our life indoors we will get exposed to higher levels of co2 typically they are two to three times as high as the atmospheric air which is around 400 ppm and if you're in the bedroom they could typically be 3000 ppm at four or five in the morning if you sleep two people in a normal size bedroom and doors and windows are closed yeah and if you're in a car they could also be quite high there was one study showing that one person one hour in the car i'm not sure exactly how they did with ventilation i don't remember but they showed that they were around 3000 ppm as well about seven eight times as much as normal and when it comes to wearing a mask the the ppm levels could be five six thousand typically in a mask it makes sense right when you wear a mask you will exhale a lot of co2 and some of that co2 gets trapped in the mask and you will then re-inhale it so in all these situations where we have increased levels in the atmosphere we spend more times indoors our house becomes more insulated we we drive in the car we wear masks so and i'm talking about a perspective of tens decades and and centuries we are slowly slowly increasing our exposure to co2 so it's kind of like a divider either you learn to tolerate it or if not you will be ending up in a continuous stress loop where the exposure to more co2 that you can't tolerate will start to drive faster breathing and you will reinforce that

 

[Mike Maher] (46:14 - 46:48)

stress so yeah sorry no no please go ahead i i just had a like i think it just made sense to me so please tell me if i've got this right or i've got this wrong so when the co2 is higher in the room it forces us to breathe a bit quicker yeah we end up over breathing even though the co2 in the room is higher my co2 my body has now dropped because i've been over breathing because i've been thinking why if it's high co2 in the room surely i've got high co2 but no actually now i've got constriction of all of my smooth muscles yeah because the co2 is that right have i got that

 

[Anders Olsson] (46:48 - 47:48)

right yeah yes exactly yeah so yeah so but if you learn to tolerate it on the other hand if you become aware okay i'm exposed to more co2 i need to breathe consciously to to maintain this low slow breathing then when i learn to tolerate the higher levels of co2 that means that my airways will be more open my blood vessels will be more open so i will reduce friction in my body my body will start to function better i will spend less time in survival and i will then increase my consciousness so that's the reason why the name conscious breathing become aware and conscious of your daily breathing habits be able to maintain the low slow rhythmic breathing more often it will help you to increase your consciousness got you thank you by the way you've

 

[Mike Maher] (47:48 - 48:18)

really helped my brain understand that at a level that i just couldn't get before so let's now talk about the other side of this because you've got a mask there and this is what's going to blow people's minds a little bit so we've got what i would describe as like low level radiation of co2 levels everywhere that's causing problems but then there's the other side which is an acute blast of co2 so talk to us a bit about what's going on with the masks with the bottles you've got and why that's different from having a higher level of co2 in the bedroom right so it's important

 

[Anders Olsson] (48:18 - 57:26)

this is a bit of a education here i think because the question i often get is but wait a minute you just said that carbon dioxide was bad in my bedroom and now you're saying i should go ahead using this carbohaler and inhale extra co2 i just don't get it so we have to understand that it's about the dosage if i'm going to the gym and i'm not very fit and i try to do 100 push-ups it's not very smart i need to take things step by step if i give my car more fuel it doesn't go better it needs the right amount of fuel so it's about balance so when i try to increase my tolerance for co2 i need to take it in steps so for example if i'm going from being a a normal breather and then start to wear a mask maybe that step is too fast and i'm trying i'm going from from one to to eight so the better way to learn a new habit to to increase your tolerance or whatever it is we want to achieve is to take it in small steps so that is important to understand so that is when it becomes bad if i have 4000 ppm in my car and i can't tolerate it or in my bedroom in the early morning hours then i may lay there and hyperventilate and actually when you look at the data when do we die we die usually most of us die in the morning hours it could coincide with these higher levels of co2 that we cannot tolerate because they are too high for us and then we end up over breathing and then the body will react to us being in a constant state of fight flight so using this the carbohaler then it's a device you hook up to a soda stream cylinder or a co2 gas tank and you maybe expose yourself for three four or five minutes to higher levels of co2 which could then be a 2000 ppm to with this you can deliver up to 8000 ppm i normally go for 4000 ppm which is four percent co2 so 100 times more than the atmospheric air and what we notice is really really cool and we we see that the airways open up so people who have blocked nose narrow nasal passages problems with their airways or lung function they start to notice that they they feel a freer it's easier to take a breath that's one aspect another aspect is that we feel stronger i think more than 50 percent that i've asked to do push-ups after trying the carbohaler and i've only asked the people who know how many push-ups they can do which is not the average but we we asked about 20 people and more than half of them can do more so my own journey i could do 49 in the study we discussed earlier with in stanford with james nester one of the things we did there was doing push-ups and then we checked our heart rate variability there was a really big difference on the heart rate variability with mouth breathing where it was much lower compared to nasal breathing but i'm quite competitive so i had decided in that study since we're going to do push-ups every day i want to do 50 push-ups that's my ultimate goal with this three-week study i don't care about anything else but i want to do 50 push-ups maybe i'm exaggerating a little bit but i only reached 49 i was so pissed off and so i actually started several weeks before the study to to get to that point to the 50 but i could only do 49 so we if we put that in perspective and now since i started using the carbohaler i can do 75 and i'm five years older my partner she can she went from she started at 25 she can do 55 now so she's crushing it even more and so this is really interesting and the explanation for that that i have discussed with quite a few people now and we we tend to agree on it is that because our nose is connected to our brain our amygdala which is our fear center and our hippocampus so studies have shown for example when you're exposed to different pictures and then they measure the activity in the amygdala and hippocampus they see that there is a huge stimulation in these areas when you expose to the picture when you inhale at the same time so the air we inhale will reach the brain and when you inhale extra co2 you will expose the brain to to more of that and there are quite a few of these different modalities where you hyperventilate in order to get in touch with your traumas so when you hyperventilate of course you lower the levels of co2 so the amygdala is sensitive to changes in carbon dioxide levels so what we do with the carbohalor we expose the amygdala to more co2 and without the negative effects of hyperventilation so what we see is that the amygdala starts to basically we all go around with these survival programs many of them installed in our childhood we try to understand the world and our nervous system is there to keep us alive and keep us safe and we then tend to install too many programs that are red-coded and that tells us we have to be afraid of that worried of that and they are actually not in line with the reality it's our limited ability as children to to make a good understanding of what's going on so we end up as adults repeating those program we're just like a computer someone push a button and that program is played out so if we look at our red-coded survival box we find that we have way too many of these survival programs and when you expose the amygdala to some extra co2 we're able to go and look in that box and realize which those programs are oh I don't need to be afraid of this and this and that so then we recode them put them green-coded and put them in the safe and secure box so what that means then is that I mean most people don't care how many push-ups they can do that's not the point but the point is since our nervous system only allowed me to do 49 push-ups before it's not that I'm going to the gym more it's not that I'm exercising more but probably it is that my nervous system thinks that I have more resources yeah okay let him do 75 that's fine he can do that he has the resources for that because holding on to all these fears and and unhealed traumas worry etc stress that costs a lot of energy so when we can reduce that when we can let go of these fears we basically have more resources available and studies confirm this one study they did where they had the participants going to see a video and one group they were seeing a film at the cinema one group they were allowed to express all their emotions and the other group was not and then they did this normal hand strengthener afterwards and the ones who could not express their emotions they was a lot weaker and and yeah that makes sense it costs a lot of energy to hold on to these survival programs always checking out for the dangers right so when you can reduce those again as I said earlier we don't need to spend as much time in survival we have more resources to evolve increase our consciousness or doing push-ups if that is what we want that's fascinating

 

[Mike Maher] (57:26 - 58:17)

just a quick side question on this yeah so I you know I've done oxypotyco all these different things and you know I help clients get their control paws up the steps up we do a steps test and all these different things and chemoreceptors make people more tolerant to co2 slow light gentle breathing however recently what I've seen a number of times is people that do hyperventilation breath work not even with breath holds a conscious connected breathing whether you know doing this conscious breath maybe not every day but very regularly some of these people not doing much exercise either and yet when I did the tests with them on steps how many steps they could do breath oh they had a really good co2 tolerance so do you have any idea why that might be the case

 

[Anders Olsson] (58:17 - 59:18)

when they're doing hyperventilation work well I mean if if I do something that stress my body I challenge my body right and I force my body to adapt probably that could be something that is going on similar to I mean I go to the gym and I stress my muscles or I go out for a jog and that will make me stronger and and fitter yeah I've done a lot of hyperventilation during the years but not so much these days but more to get the experience to to notice how it feels and and I I have always ended up feeling that no I don't think this is how it's supposed to be I think there are better ways to to evolve yeah I think you're right I I do very little these days I I

 

[Mike Maher] (59:19 - 59:50)

James Nesta the same question yesterday and his he he had a theory which was these people they they get rid of all of their stress in like 30 minutes and then for the rest of the day they're so chilled and so relaxed that they're breathing so light and so slow that their respiratory rates a lot low I don't know it was just a theory but yes I don't know if there's any science I need to keep finding out but I mean and I don't think it's a hard rule but I've definitely seen like Wim Hofers and all these different people that have really good bolt scores control pauses and

 

[Anders Olsson] (59:50 - 1:00:50)

it's always been a bit of a head scratcher yeah probably that that could be a case then but we should also bear in mind when we do the hyperventilation exercises we lower the co2 right and studies have shown that when we lower co2 we increase adrenaline right so it could be that we reach those states almost like with with clenched fist I'm I'm calm but I reach it via via fight and flight worry and hurry I think it's more exciting to investigate and play with how can I feel strong coming via parasympathetic yeah by more like the calm breathing like more the meditation route but yeah again we are different right and and we should explore different things and different things fits different people yeah no for sure can you

 

[Mike Maher] (1:00:50 - 1:01:08)

can you talk a little bit about the use of co2 many decades ago because I heard that you know firefighters would use it so can you talk about like how we used to use co2 as first responders and a bit of the history of what it was used therapeutically for yeah so I've actually

 

[Anders Olsson] (1:01:08 - 1:08:02)

republished a book on Amazon and it's called two cases of ulcerated breast cancer treated with carbon dioxide published by a UK doctor in 1794 wow that's a long time ago and then there there is another book that we republished it's called carbon dioxide in medicine it was published in 1905 in the book they have pictures of people taking a full body bath in carbonated waters and actually having a cover over the bathtub so that the co2 shouldn't escape they did also dry co2 baths they did a rectal co2 insufflation they did vaginal co2 insufflation and I think in the book that the doctor mentions that 95 success rate with dysentery that is diarrhea right nowadays in the western countries it's not much of a problem but still millions of people die every year in the underdeveloped countries and and hundred years ago it was probably a problem also in the west and they noticed that women during childbirth again if we come back to the smooth muscles the woman having problems to deliver the child these there is a cramp going on so when they deliver co2 the cramp goes away and the child could be delivered at that time it was many women who died at childbirth right so so the history I mean if we look at the big history of carbon dioxide one of the main thing is the the hot springs where people go for for a healing since centuries thousands of years maybe and they've noticed that it has a positive effect on the skin on the circulation on the heart on the stress and what they have found is that more than anything the most active ingredient is carbon dioxide they these hot springs have high levels of co2 and when you mentioned they they had equipped firefighters had equipment to inhale extra carbon dioxide just like the carbohydrate healer device we talked about a few minutes ago and what they saw if you get you're in a fire and you're exposed to all this smoke and this comes down in your lungs and it replaces the oxygen so you you suffocate so what they saw the reason why they equipped that was in u.s and and the the man behind it was professor Yandel Henderson who saw that inhaling extra co2 he started off doing studies on pneumonia and noticed that when they inhaled extra carbon dioxide the airways opened up so it was a lot easier to to heal and treat pneumonia and again at that time it was a lethal disease for sure so they then also equipped the firefighters with the this equipment to inhale extra co2 because they noticed how it helped get rid of the carbon monoxide faster the the gas you get poisoned with and they have shown in studies what actually happens it's called isocapnic hyperpnea which is basically controlled hyperventilation so it's used in in success when you are exposed to too much smoke it's also used if you drink too much alcohol and it's also used if you have had a surgery and being anesthetized and when you wake up you want to get rid of the the anesthesia gas sooner than later so basically what they do with this technology knowledge then is that they recruit the lungs to filter the blood to clean the blood so in if we drink too much alcohol for example it's the liver's task to to break down the alcohol and if the liver can't cope with if we drink too much it calls in the lungs and I think that's a major reason why we wake up with a hangover because the the when we drink too much the the what happens is that we start to breathe faster we recruit the lungs so when we wake up the next day we have a headache we are tired we we may have an anxiety I think it has to do with low because the lungs has been recruited to clean and filter the blood so anyway studies show that we get sober three times as fast I think when we do the control hyperventilation where we inhale extra co2 so normal hyperventilation then we have the side effects which we can spot in the hangover but also we know that adrenaline increases the airways and blood vessels constrict so we get less blood to the brain so we get more anxious we we constrict the body we induce friction so with the control hyperventilation you then don't get the negative effects of low co2 so you sober up faster yes you clean your blood from the the toxic carbon monoxide when you're poisoned by by smoke and also when you're anesthetized and want to get it out of your system you can get that out faster so that's really interesting studies showing how beneficial the lungs can be actually in cleaning the blood at the end of the day that's the main point here I think we may not realize that that it probably since all the blood passed through the lung the the lungs probably have a very important function of keeping the the blood clean yeah

 

[Mike Maher] (1:08:02 - 1:08:12)

wow that's really interesting because I know that when the police pull you over if it's been you've been departed they make you you know go into a machine to test your alcohol level so I

 

[Anders Olsson] (1:08:12 - 1:08:24)

never thought about it no so that makes already there we know that we exhale alcohol right and if if we start to exhale more well obviously we will exhale more alcohol so yeah fantastic

 

[Mike Maher] (1:08:24 - 1:08:45)

wow and just just on the co2 bath I want to obviously be respectful of your time so just last couple of quick questions if somebody wants to make a co2 bath at home what would they what would the ingredients be and what what would be the reason to put your foot in a co2 bath or your hand what what sort of reasons do people use co2 baths all kinds of reasons because the as soon as

 

[Anders Olsson] (1:08:45 - 1:12:10)

you you will absorb carbon dioxide through your skin which the body then will perceive as when there is excess co2 the body will perceive it as lack of oxygen so body will direct blood to that area which contains then it will bring nutrients and oxygen so that area will be more alive so if you have problems with circulation to your hands or your feet or your whole body then you can do you can do a foot bath you can do a hand bath you can do a full body bath in a bathtub and what we use when we create those is simply a sodium bicarbonate or it's also called I think a US baking soda so that's the part we all we actually have a lot of bicarbonate in our body the majority of the carbon dioxide that is produced in our body is converted to bicarbonate and travel around in our body and then when it reaches the lung it's converted back to carbon dioxide and we exit it so anyway you you put in a sodium bicarbonate or baking soda and then you also need an acid whether it's you can use citric acid or ascorbic acid so we typically use ascorbic acid and and sodium bicarbonate so if I want to do a foot bath I may have five six liters of of water and then I have a a tablespoon of bicarbonate and then I pour in the ascorbic acid little by little because if I pour in everything at once all the bubbles will be formed and go out in the atmosphere and and the effect won't won't last that long so you should make sure that you have bubbles on your feet that then you have the right levels cool and we there are many studies actually showing how extremely beneficial it could be we got a testimonial from a doctor in German earlier this year who attended our class and and he instructed his client that had had severe hand issues the skin on the hand it was white it was like crocodile skin almost able to peel off parts here and there and they just looked awful and two weeks later it was like baby hands it was crazy to see and he said the doctor I'm speechless this I haven't seen anything like it we may think that it has to be a lot harder than that and you can also do a face bath so I put my face in carbonated water I do that I then use a soda stream but you can do the sodium bicarbonate baking soda and and the ascorbic acid as well but I use a soda stream so I fill up two bottles with carbonated water I pour it in a bowl and then I I put a straw actually in my mouth and put down my face and I stay there for around six minutes that's usually how long the the co2 lasts your skin looks great

 

[Mike Maher] (1:12:10 - 1:12:15)

by the way your skin looks really good I was going to comment on that oh thank you thank you I'm glad

 

[Anders Olsson] (1:12:15 - 1:12:43)

to hear that yeah wow you know actually I don't know if I should mention it because I don't believe in it but it's not a bad thing but someone actually two people in in the last couple of months have said you know I've seen videos of you and photos 10 years old and I must ask you are you doing something because you look younger now yeah it doesn't hurt to hear that it's nice to hear

 

[Mike Maher] (1:12:43 - 1:13:08)

but no but I because we we did our last interview I think three years ago when you were on this channel and I was thinking your skin looks fantastic and maybe it's like I thought maybe he's got a new camera new lighting but it looks very very smooth yes I'm going to try that and can I just use a bottle of fizzy water can I just get like carbonated water yes okay fantastic I love that um what about muscles I've got like really tight muscles with co2 therapy help with

 

[Anders Olsson] (1:13:08 - 1:14:41)

with that sort of thing do you know I think so yeah my weak spot is my calf so when I go out for a jog sometimes they don't like that and they give me aches and pain and one thing I realized when I grew up I had this a lot of stress and I had allergies and one other thing I also had was cramp during the nights and my son had the same when he grew up and when he started taping his mouth it disappeared completely so I'm mainly talking about the smooth muscles and the effect that co2 has on those but I think potentially it may also have an effect on the the skeleton muscles so interesting yeah we have seen the relaxation the ability to relax your body when you expose it to co2 so we haven't talked about it much but we have developed this other product called the the body stream right where you put on like a a an astronaut suit almost and and and then you fill it up with carbon dioxide and then you absorb it yeah through the skin and yeah that is what people say as well that they notice that they feel an effect on the skin that it gets smoother softer and

 

[Mike Maher] (1:14:41 - 1:14:47)

yeah have you ever combined the two together where they put the suit on and then use the

 

[Anders Olsson] (1:14:47 - 1:15:25)

inhaler or is that too much now of course I have but yeah I don't know if if there is a benefit of doing that I went in the suit I tend to rather than use the Relaxator or I just put on an eye mask and some nice music and just relax and not try to overdo it stacking I guess is a popular concept these days but also I think it's nice to unplug what we can't be too effective all the time either sure yeah fantastic oh I've got I've

 

[Mike Maher] (1:15:25 - 1:15:39)

got one last question for you and it's a bit it's a bit cheesy um so you get you get stuck on the desert island and you're there for one year and you can only bring one device or one breathing technique with you what what are you going to bring from your collection to spend on this

 

[Anders Olsson] (1:15:39 - 1:15:59)

island for a year you said breathing techniques it doesn't have to be a device right it doesn't have to it could be a breathing exercise yeah so despite all the devices I love to play with those I would just bring the nasal breathing and physical activity okay that is by far my best tool tips.

 

[Mike Maher] (1:16:00 - 1:16:12)

Love it um so I'm going to link people your website down below so they can pick up these devices and learn more um do you have any final words for us and there's anything to close us off with.

 

[Anders Olsson] (1:16:12 - 1:16:57)

I'd like to share our tagline change your breath change your life change the world love it so that is the major reason why I'm so passionate about this because if you can find a piece a little more often on the inside that will be reflected in in the way you talk in in how you act and I think both conflicts and harmony and peace starts on the inside if you're a person that doesn't feel well you may end up starting a war if you're a person that having a lot of harmony inside you may affect many other people 

 

[Mike Maher] (1:16:57 - 1:18:28)

that's beautiful thank you for that I love I love that thank you um thank you so much for coming back thank you my pleasure always love talking to you and everybody click on the link below follow Anders get all of his wonderful products and uh maybe we do a part three in another couple of years thank you so much cheers everybody cheers Anders bye cool hey I hope you enjoyed that conversation with Mr. Anders Olsen um I don't know about you but I'm going to go and have a co2 bath now I think the skin's getting a little old needs a little little rejuvenation um as I've already mentioned I have a number of slots available for 2024 breath coaching so the link is down below I would love to meet some of you on zoom it's a not obligation quote it's to discuss if the coaching is right for you where are you right now where are you trying to get to can I be of assistance getting you there let's make 2024 the year where we use breath to move ourselves forward I still have some spaces available and I would love to meet you and have that conversation so consider that um if you're not quite in that position right now there's a link below for a seven essential free breathing exercises my favorite breathing exercises you can go and play with straight away now as always in this podcast uh I put a breathing exercise at the end so here is one of my favorite breathing exercises of course we're going to be doing some more beautiful coherence breathing so let's do that now together so get yourself nice and comfortable and uh we'll do 10 minutes of beautiful coherence breathing thank you so much for being part of the podcast and if you haven't done so please please subscribe to the channel thank you so much cheers.