Mar 23

Mar 23 Change Your Breath. Change Your Life.

30 Day Practice, Mindfulness, Breathwork, Business

"If you can change your breath, you can change your life."

That's one of the most essential learnings I've taken to heart from my teacher, at home in Atlanta, and it was on my mind as I prepared my notes for our WOTVS session. Breathwork was the focus of Beck's side of the presentation, and it's the foundation of... well, everything.

Here's something in your professional life that changing your breath can change: your ability to express yourself confidently. It's something that came up during the Q&A part of our session, when I mentioned this article I wrote about being nervous before giving a presentation.

It happened to me -- I sounded nervous when I really couldn't afford to, that is, during a major presentation. I was so disappointed at what happened that day. And then I got curious. Why does it happen? And what could I do about it, to prevent it from happening again?

I think you know where this is going.

It comes back to the breath.

Have a look at the article, and the three suggestions for what to do if you find yourself in this situation.
Kyndal Kennedy did just last week. Kyndal is the Director of Operations for WOTVS, and she was nervous before presenting to the audience. Here's what happened.

Attending Rebecca’s Breathwork class during the Mindful Monday Workshop at the Women of the Vine & Spirits Global Symposium opened my eyes to how breath can alter your state and calm the mind AND, it paid off almost immediately when I was about to go on stage the next day. I was very nervous backstage practicing my lines minutes from walking on, but I remembered Rebecca’s class, and focused on the intention of my breath and my inhales and exhales and felt immediately better and more focused. I kid you not.

Give it a try. Let it work for you.
Namaste,
Cathy

PS We're posting the whole 30-day practice over on Beck's blog, for you to page back through, revisit, and take your time.

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Cathy Huyghe

Cathy Huyghe is a dynamic media professional with a special interest in wine and the spirit of hospitality. She is also an effective, engaging public speaker on subjects ranging from wine and gastronomy to digital media and entrepreneurship.

Cathy is the co-founder and CEO of Enolytics, a big data startup providing business intelligence for the wine industry. She also currently writes for Forbes.com about the business and politics of the wine industry, and for Inc.com about entrepreneurs with a special focus on women. She is the author of the award-winning book Hungry for Wine: Seeing the World through the Lens of a Wine Glass; she was a finalist for the 2016 IWSC Wine Communicator of the Year award; and she won the 2016 Innovator of the Year award from Diaz Communications.

Cathy's writing has appeared in print and online for both general-interest and wine industry publications including the Harvard Business Review network, The Atlantic, Decanter, Food52.com (where she was the "Wine, Unfussed" columnist), DailyBeast, The Boston Globe, the Washington Post, Wine Enthusiast, GlobalPost, Grist.org, and Daily Candy. She has also been featured on the BBC, WNYC, WGBH, and Nevada Public Radio.

Cathy is the founder of 365daysofwine.com and Red White Boston, a digital media company for the wine industry. Red White Boston produced daily content, monthly tasting events, and a location-based iPhone app of video wine recommendations from their network of 30+ local partner stores. While in Boston, she also managed the wine cellar at WGBH public broadcasting station and managed wine events for donors and the public.

Cathy’s restaurant experience started when she knocked on the kitchen door at Chez Panisse in Berkeley. She also has worked for Jean-Pierre Vigato in Paris (at Natachef bistro and at his two-star restaurant, Apicius) and for Thomas Keller at Bouchon in Las Vegas. She studied at La Varenne École de Cuisine in Burgundy, France; she completed the Wine Studies program at Boston University; and she received Advanced Certification from WSET (Wine and Spirits Education Trust).

Cathy received a master’s degree from the Graduate School of Design at Harvard in 2004 and a second master’s degree in Journalism in 2010, also from Harvard. Before that, she received a master’s degree in comparative literature from the City University of New York in 1998 and a bachelor’s degree from Bucknell University in Lewisburg, Pennsylvania in 1995. She is also a trained mediator, and worked for two years at the Program on Negotiation at Harvard Law School on a project in the Middle East.

In April 2008 she founded the Harvard Alumni in Wine and Food special interest group, which provides educational and networking services to the Harvard alumni and current students. She has also served as the President of the Harvard Club of Georgia, and she has begun a term of service on the Board of Directors for the Harvard Alumni Association.

Her other non-profit involvement includes the Women's Solidarity Society at the new National Center for Civil & Human Rights (Atlanta), grant reviewer for the Food Well Alliance (an Atlanta-based organization that supports the local network of 350 urban farms and community gardens), Coach at GOTR (Girls on the Run) in Atlanta, Board Member at the Greening Youth Foundation (Atlanta), Board Member at The Food Project (Boston), and Mediator at the Neighborhood Justice Center (Las Vegas).

She lives in Atlanta with her husband, their twin boys, and their Bernese Mountain dog, Coco.

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