Maintaining Health (Formerly Health and Efficiency)

by Rasmus Larssen Alsaker

There are many breathing exercises, but every intelligent being can make his own exercises, so I shall describe but one. Have the hands hanging at the sides, palms facing each other. Inhale slowly and at the same time bring the arms, which are to be held straight, forward and upward, or outward and upward, carrying them as far up and back over the head as possible. The arm motion is also to be slow. About the time the arms are in the last position a full inspiration has been taken. Hold the position of the arms and the breath a few seconds and then slowly exhale and slowly bring the arms back to the first position. Repeat ten or twelve times. If while one is inhaling and raising the arms, one also slowly rises on the toes and slowly resumes a natural foot position while exhaling, the exercise will be even better.

Hollow-chested young people can attain a good lung capacity and good chest contour in a very reasonable time. Persistence in proper breathing and proper exercise will have remarkable results in even two or three months, and at the same time nature will be painting roses on pallid cheeks. It is easy to increase the chest expansion several inches. Those who expand less than three and one-half inches should not be satisfied until they have gone beyond this mark. Elderly people can also increase their chest expansion and breathing capacity, but it takes more time, for with the years the chest cartilages have a tendency to harden and even to ossify. The less breathing the sooner the ossification comes.

Many people are afraid of night air, for which there is no reason. The absence of sunshine at night does no more harm than it does on cloudy days. During the night, of all times, fresh air is needed, for less is used, and what little is breathed should be of as good quality as circumstances permit. Open the windows wide enough to have the air constantly changing in the bedroom. During the winter it will be necessary to put additional clothes on the bed, for no one can obtain the best of slumbers while chilled. Some may find it a better plan to use artificial heat in the foot of the bed. At any rate, during cold weather better covering is required for the legs and for the feet than for any other part of the body. People with good resistance can sleep in a draught without the least harm, but ordinary people should not sleep in a draught. It is easy to use screens so that the wind does not blow upon the face. If the air is kept stirring in the chamber the sleeper gets enough without being in a current.

Some are in the habit of closing their bedroom windows and doors at night and opening them for a thorough airing during the day. If the bedrooms must be closed, close them during the day and open them wide at night, for that is when the pure air is needed. It does not make much difference whether they are open or closed while being unoccupied. It is actually sickening to enter some bedrooms and be compelled to breathe the foul air.

When people are ill the rooms should have fresh air entering at all times. Sick people give off more poisons than do those in good health and they need the oxygen to burn up the deposits in the system.

An early morning stroll while most people are in bed is very instructive. It will be found that some houses are shut up as tightly as possible and that only a few are properly ventilated. A person who insists on keeping his window open in winter is often looked upon as a freak. What is the result of this close housing? The first result is that the blood is unable to obtain the required amount of oxygen and is poisoned by the rebreathing of the air in the room. In the morning the sleeper wakes feeling only half rested, and it takes a cup of coffee or something else to produce complete awakening. The evil results are cumulative, and after a while the bad habit of breathing impure air at night will be a great factor in building disease of some kind.

One reason why some are so afraid of fresh air, especially at night, is that they become so autotoxemic through bad habits, especially improper eating habits, that a slight draught causes them to sneeze and often catch cold and they believe that the fresh air causes the irritation. This is not so. The irritability comes from within, not from without.

After becoming accustomed to good ventilation at night it is almost impossible to enter into restful slumbers in a stuffy room.

Savages are singularly free from respiratory diseases, and the reason is without doubt that they do not house themselves closely. In some parts of the world they fear to let civilized men enter their abodes, for they may bring respiratory diseases.

Not only the homes, but public places, such as street cars, theaters, schools and churches are too often poorly ventilated. Sleeping, or rather dozing in church is so common that it is a matter of jest. My experience has been that drowsiness comes not from the dullness of sermons, but from the impossibility of getting a breath of good air in many churches.