MysticMag chats with Anna Parker-Naples, founder of Influential Breathwork®, a transformative hub where the power of breath intersects with the art of coaching. This academy is dedicated to guiding individuals through self-discovery, personal growth, and professional mastery using breathwork. Anna’s extensive background in entrepreneurship and personal development, combined with her studies under renowned experts, has shaped Influential Breathwork™️ into a space where holistic transformation thrives. As a bestselling author, podcast host, and award-winning coach, Anna’s diverse expertise enriches the academy’s comprehensive programs, empowering participants to unlock their full potential.
Anna, what makes breathwork such a powerful tool for emotional release, stress relief, and holistic well-being?
What makes breathwork so powerful is its ability to impact five distinct layers of our being. This is a core element of our methodology, which we refer to as the “Five Layers of Release™.”
Firstly, breathwork can affect physical change, often resulting in significant health improvements within just a few weeks through targeted exercises. It also has the potential to alter cognitive processes—your decision-making, focus, and conscious thought can transform almost instantly.
On a subconscious level, breathwork reaches deeper aspects of the self, akin to what one might experience in hypnosis. This allows for the reprogramming of limiting beliefs, facilitating a deeper, more profound shift.
What excites me about breathwork, and distinguishes it from traditional talk therapy, is the somatic release it provides. Trauma research over the past decade has shown that emotional residues are often stored in our muscles. No amount of talking or reprogramming can fully address this stored tension, but breathwork can help release it.
Lastly, breathwork offers an energetic release. Many individuals, whether spiritual or not, report profound shifts that leave them feeling more energized and limitless in their daily lives.
I’ve been training others in breathwork for two years now, having discovered it myself just over three years ago. My journey began after a significant period of burnout—being a type-A personality, I found that I couldn’t sustain that lifestyle forever. Breathwork became the key to my own rescue and transformation.
How does the holistic approach of Influential Breathwork® address the physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual dimensions of well-being in your coaching practices?
Our primary methodology is the BreathHealing Release™ Method, which comprises five distinct layers. With over a decade of experience in subconscious reprogramming, I have found that integrating this method with a somatic approach truly makes a difference. Addressing both subconscious patterns and physical issues in the body is crucial. From a biomechanical perspective, posture plays a significant role; often, we are unaware of our posture or the fact that we might not be breathing in anatomically optimal ways. While we may be surviving, we’re only utilizing a fraction of our body’s potential. By combining these elements, transformative changes become possible—something that is often lacking in other coaching approaches.
How do you approach the process of integrating breathwork with subconscious reprogramming modalities in your coaching sessions, and what specific techniques do you find most effective in facilitating deep, lasting change for your clients?
Our unique approach, known as the BreathHealing Release™ Method, involves teaching our students and graduates to use breathwork to deepen the trance state of their clients. This allows clients to better express and access the sensations within their bodies, tapping into their felt senses. Often, we overlook these bodily signals in our everyday lives, only to realize later that we should have heeded them. By increasing bodily awareness through breathwork, we help clients become more attuned to these signals.
Additionally, we integrate techniques such as embedded commands and linguistic structures from neuro-linguistic programming (NLP). Once clients emerge from these deeper states, we use Emotional Freedom Techniques (EFT) tapping to help them ground and stabilize.
The Breath Healing Release Method merges these effective body-focused techniques with subconscious reprogramming, creating a powerful combination. Many clients experience significant changes even after just one 90-minute session. We’ve had clients who, after years of talk therapy, turn to breathwork and are amazed by the profound impact. They often feel that the root of their issues has been addressed and that these issues have been significantly alleviated, as if another layer of their emotional onion has been peeled away. Healing is an ongoing journey, and our method supports this transformative process.
What inspired you to integrate breathwork with other coaching modalities, and how has this combination enhanced the effectiveness of your programs?
What inspired me was my first deeply transformative breathwork session. I was drawn to it during a particularly challenging period of burnout. Despite my extensive background in business and various other fields, I knew I needed a new approach. After that initial breathwork session, I experienced a profound shift and received a message that my diverse background and training had led me to this moment.
It became clear that combining my experience with breathwork was my true calling. Reflecting on my journey, it’s fascinating to see how all my past training and experiences now align and make sense. I feel as though I was guided to integrate my knowledge and skills in a meaningful way. It’s as if I was given a roadmap to merge my experiences and qualifications into something new and impactful, and now, I am bringing this synthesis into the world.
Can you explain how the Influential Breathwork® Coach Certification program empowers individuals to create profound transformations in their lives?
To begin our certification program, we emphasize the importance of a personal journey with breathwork. You can’t effectively share these practices if they haven’t deeply impacted you first. We encourage our trainees to adopt daily breathwork practices, which may include simple techniques like box breathing or more extensive breathwork sessions. Over time, these practices can lead to significant changes in physical health.
For instance, one of our current students, who had been reliant on an inhaler for asthma for years, experienced a remarkable transformation. After six weeks of practicing a specific functional breathing exercise, she hasn’t needed her inhaler for seven months. Similarly, we’ve seen individuals with high intelligence and capability who struggled with confidence and old patterns find breakthroughs. Through breathwork, they’ve been able to release limiting beliefs and overcome obstacles.
The somatic changes that occur during breathwork, including the release of toxins, underscore its profound effectiveness. We start with this personal journey so that our trainees can authentically share their own transformations with clients and audiences. Breathwork isn’t just an addition to one’s life; it’s a transformative way of living.
If you would like to find out more about Anna Parker-Naples, please visit https://www.influentialbreathwork.com/
