With debates raging on about whether or not wearing masks can impair lung function or cause other health problems, one thing is clear: we should all be doing our best to promote lung and immune health right now, and nasal humming is an excellent way to do exactly that.
In my article ‘4 Evidence-Based Methods to Boost Your Immunity’, I outlined several easy, free techniques that anyone can use to enhance immune function, the most interesting of which was nasal humming.
“What in the heck is nasal humming?” you might be asking.
Simply put, it’s breathing through your nose while making a humming sound.
Although it seems a bit bizarre, nasal humming was actually demonstrated by researchers in the 1990s to massively increase the quantity of nitric oxide produced in the paranasal sinuses, which is a major finding because nitric oxide is critical for healthy immune function and circulation.
What are the paranasal sinuses and what do they do?
Ever felt extra pressure and discomfort in your face during allergy season? Part of what you were feeling were your paranasal sinuses flaring up as a result of histamine running amok.
Here’s a picture of what they look like:
The paranasal sinuses are crucial in that they act as a barrier between the outside and inside of our bodies, trapping toxins and microorganisms and preventing them from going deeper where they can cause issues.
Nitric oxide, which is essential for healthy immune function, increases significantly in these sinuses when you perform nasal humming.
If you’d like to know more about nasal humming, how to do it, and the science behind it, Dr. Van Dyken’s YouTube video on the topic can be found here:
Do masks actually help as much as we’re being told?
As mentioned, although it’s common for most conventional information resources online to claim that masks are 100% safe and have no drawbacks, some researchers disagree, observing significant drops in blood oxygenation and increases in headaches.
The most intellectually honest way to answer this question is that the jury is still out. We’re not yet at the point where we can claim that we have enough evidence to draw final conclusions.
It all depends on who you listen to, and what their assumptions are. We have yet to reach a true scientific consensus.
The actual evidence on the safety and effectiveness of masks is mixed, but it seems that both sides of this argument have made up their minds that they’re either 100% infallible in their ability to protect us or 100% worthless and downright harmful.
We live in a time of extreme division, fueled by black-and-white, us-versus-them, zero-sum thinking. Oversimplifications abound, and nuance is in short supply.
This means that making sense out of reality is harder than ever because people are being trained to only look at one side of an argument and blatantly disregard anything that doesn’t agree with their viewpoint.
No matter what your belief about the use of masks is, breathing exercises are here to help you.
If you’re interested in learning about a variety of different breathing techniques and how they can benefit your immune health, reduce stress levels, and support mood and focus, you will likely enjoy my article “Breathwork: Why You Desperately Need it in Your Life”.
We’re extremely passionate about giving you powerful solutions for immune health, optimal histamine levels, and a healthy inflammation response, which is why we offer products like Armor and APEX Glutathione, which I personally formulated. Taken together, these two supplements are an extremely potent total immune + detox system that can easily replace five or six different supplements.
Regardless of whether you have the money to invest in supplements for your health, though, you can always learn techniques like nasal humming and boost your immunity and circulation naturally.
