This is the part of the course people push back on hardest. School taught us oxygen good, carbon dioxide bad. The real picture is more precise than that.
How oxygen reaches a cell
Oxygen travels through the blood bound to haemoglobin. To cross into a cell, the haemoglobin has to release it.
Carbon dioxide is what triggers that release. When blood CO₂ runs too low, haemoglobin holds on — there is oxygen in the blood, but the cells never receive it.
So breathing harder does not mean more oxygen. Usually it means less.
Vessels narrow
Carbon dioxide dilates blood vessels. Breathe too fast or too deeply, lose too much of it, and the vessels constrict.
Dizziness, tingling hands and feet, a pounding heart — the symptoms of a panic episode are frequently the result of over-breathing.
The receptor in the brain
Carbon dioxide receptors sit in the brain, near the amygdala — the region that governs emotion.
When those receptors become oversensitive, a small rise in CO₂ triggers immediate panic. Practice desensitises them gradually, which is one reason breathing work helps people who live with anxiety.
Balance is the whole point
None of this says carbon dioxide is good. It says oxygen and carbon dioxide have to be in balance.
The goal of the exercises is not to breathe more, and not to breathe less. It is to breathe correctly.
