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Learning how to breathe better may not receive the same attention as eating more plants, exercising regularly or getting enough sleep, but science journalist James Nestor argues that it belongs alongside them as a foundation of good health.
In a recent episode of The Doctor’s Kitchen, physician and YouTube host Dr. Rupy Aujla speaks with Nestor, an American journalist who has spent years investigating the evolution and science of breathing. Their wide-ranging conversation explores why dysfunctional breathing may begin in infancy, how modern food has changed our faces and airways, and why nasal breathing, humming, and even chewing could make a meaningful difference.
Read more: Why Eating Earlier May Be Better For Your Health
Nestor’s central argument is simple: Breathing is automatic, but that does not mean we are doing it well.
Breathing dysfunction may begin in infancy
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Nestor, the author of Breath: The New Science of a Lost Art, believes dysfunctional breathing often begins during the earliest stages of life, when the mouth, jaw and airway are still developing.
He stresses that the conversation should not be used to shame parents, particularly mothers balancing work, health, feeding difficulties and the demands of caring for a baby.
“Mothers are amazing,” Nestor says. “I’m not shaming anybody by saying this.”
However, he says research indicates that breastfeeding and bottle-feeding can place different physical demands on a baby’s developing mouth. Breastfeeding requires sustained muscular effort while encouraging the infant to breathe through the nose. This mechanical action can encourage the palate to develop more broadly and create more room for the teeth and airway.
“When you are breastfed, it pulls the face out,” he explains. “The palate is able to grow more flat. The mouth expands.”
Bottle-feeding generally demands less muscular effort. Pacifiers may also place pressure on the developing mouth in a different direction.
“With bottle-feeding and with pacifiers, the opposite happens,” Nestor says. “The mouth tends to cave in,” potentially producing “a different facial profile and a different profile in their airways as well.”
This does not mean every bottle-fed child will develop dental or breathing problems. Aujla shares that his own family used a hybrid approach, combining breastfeeding with bottles so his wife could rest and work.
Nestor calls that “a beautiful approach” and suggests looking for bottles designed with myofunctional principles, which require more work from the tongue and jaw. Parents can also focus on reducing pacifier use when appropriate and introducing safely prepared foods that require chewing.
“Having that early mastication, that chewing, that stress on the face opens up the palate,” he says. “It opens up the airway to allow this kid to breathe better.”
Oral posture matters, too. At rest, the tongue should sit gently against the roof of the mouth, the lips should remain closed, and breathing should happen through the nose.
“Real foods, chewing real foods, oral posture, in and out through the nose,” Nestor says. “If you can do that, you’re about 80 percent there.”
For children struggling with swallowing, speech, tongue posture or chronic mouth-breathing, he recommends visiting a qualified myofunctional therapist.
What happened when Nestor stopped using his nose
To test the effects of mouth-breathing, Nestor and another participant completed an experiment with support from a Stanford University rhinology researcher.
For 10 days, they blocked their noses and breathed only through their mouths. They then spent another 10 days breathing through their noses while health measurements were collected.
The mouth-breathing phase led to higher blood pressure, fatigue, stress, poor sleep, and significant increases in snoring and sleep apnea.
“I went from not snoring to snoring four hours a night within three days,” Nestor says. By days seven and eight, “we couldn’t wait for it to be over. We were just counting the minutes.”
The experiment involved only two people and was not a large clinical trial. However, Nestor says its results reflected earlier research into the effects of chronic mouth-breathing.
Mouth-breathing dries the oral cavity and can make it more acidic, creating favorable conditions for harmful bacteria. It also bypasses the nose, which filters, warms and humidifies incoming air.
“This is our filter. It’s our first line of defense when we’re breathing,” Nestor says. “It filters out allergens [and] dust. It helps kill bacteria and viruses.”
Why humming could help clear the nose
The sinuses produce nitric oxide, a molecule involved in blood flow and immune defense. Nestor says breathing through the nose delivers significantly more nitric oxide than breathing through the mouth.
Humming may increase it further.
“When you hum, you increase it 15-fold,” he says. “That vibration helps to release it.”
Nestor has heard from people with chronic rhinitis and sinusitis who report that humming for around 10 minutes, three or four times a day, helped clear their noses. The tune is irrelevant: People can hum a favorite song or even hum sentences to themselves.
He is careful to acknowledge that evidence for relieving chronic congestion remains limited. Much of what he has heard is anecdotal, and he would like to see a controlled study involving 20 or 30 participants.
Persistent nasal obstruction should be investigated rather than ignored. The cause may be inflammation, allergies or a structural problem such as a severely deviated septum.
“You have to find the core issue,” Nestor says. “Is it structural? Is it inflammation?”
People with serious difficulty breathing through the nose may benefit from seeing an ear, nose and throat specialist.
Use the diaphragm and finish the exhale
Learning how to breathe better also means paying attention to the diaphragm, the large muscle beneath the lungs that drives respiration.
“Most of us use about 10 percent of the movement of our diaphragm,” Nestor says. Mouth-breathing often encourages shallow breaths into the chest, while the diaphragm “is just barely moving at all.”
To reconnect with it, he recommends placing a hand below the belly button and inhaling gently through the nose. The abdomen should expand slightly as the diaphragm moves downward.
Exhaling fully can be more challenging. One exercise involves inhaling and then repeatedly counting aloud from one to 10 during the exhale. As the air runs out, the voice becomes quieter until the person is only mouthing the numbers.
“By vocalizing this, this nudges the diaphragm up even more,” Nestor explains.
The exercise should be gentle. People with serious respiratory conditions should begin very slowly and ideally seek professional guidance.
“The body doesn’t like to be jolted,” he says. “Go slowly. Go carefully.”
Nestor also recommends breathing slowly and lightly through the nose during the day. He describes the contrast by asking listeners to attempt a snoring sound while taking a heavy breath through the mouth, then repeat it while breathing softly through the nose.
“Close your mouth. Breathe through your nose very slowly, very lightly and try to make that sound,” he says. “You have to struggle to make even the slightest sound.”
Modern food may be too soft
Nestor believes the shift toward soft, industrialized food has reduced the amount of time people spend chewing, contributing to smaller jaws, crowded teeth and weaker airway muscles.
“How much chewing is involved in your day-to-day life?” he asks. “The answer for most people is basically none. Chomp, chomp, swallow.”
Even nutritious diets can be extremely soft. Smoothies, oatmeal, yogurt and ripe avocado require little effort from the jaw. Raw carrots, celery, apples, nuts and other firm plant foods demand considerably more.
“We’re exercising every other part of our body,” Nestor says, “but we’re not exercising the airway.”
He also describes wearing a professionally fitted palate-expansion device almost every night for a year. Before-and-after scans indicated that his upper palate had widened and bone had formed in deficient areas.
“You can change your facial structure and your airway health at any time of your life,” he says, although making structural changes is considerably easier during childhood.
He believes hard, sugar-free gum could offer a convenient form of jaw exercise, but stresses that controlled human studies are needed. He is even more cautious about unverified online trends involving people forcefully pulling on their palates.
“I am not condoning any of these practices,” he says. “Be careful. Beware. Be skeptical.”
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Build the foundation before trying extreme breathwork
For anyone wondering how to breathe better, Nestor recommends beginning with nighttime breathing.
Snoring, choking sounds, and sleep apnea should not be dismissed as amusing habits. They may indicate that the airway is becoming obstructed when the body is supposed to be resting and recovering.
Nestor suggests using a sleep-recording app to identify snoring or disrupted breathing. People who suspect sleep apnea should seek medical assessment.
He also discusses mouth tape, which some people use to encourage nasal breathing at night. His advice is to test a small piece of skin-safe surgical tape briefly while awake before considering nighttime use. Mouth taping is not appropriate for anyone who cannot breathe comfortably through the nose, and it should never replace evaluation for sleep apnea or airway obstruction.
Only after establishing nasal breathing, healthy oral posture and efficient diaphragm movement does Nestor recommend experimenting with more vigorous practices involving deliberate hyperventilation or breath holds.
These techniques may temporarily move the nervous system between stress and relaxation. Research cited during the conversation has linked structured breathwork with improvements in anxiety, heart rate variability and stress regulation, though results vary by method and individual.
“The first step to all this is to become normal,” Nestor says. “Once you’re normal, we can play around with it.”
Ultimately, learning how to breathe better is less about mastering exotic techniques than noticing what the body is doing all day and night: keeping the mouth closed when possible, breathing gently through the nose, using the diaphragm, chewing real food and treating snoring or chronic congestion as health issues worth investigating.
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