on breathing II

I breathe shallowly, from habit. Rarely do I draw a breath of air deep into my lungs and feel its force enter my body like a tide. When I do the experience is electrifying, and a sense of lightness overtakes me. One can imagine being so filled with air that one would float away, like a balloon, way up high.
I wrote that I wished that making art could be as simple and elemental as breathing, that images would flow forth as air eases out of the lungs, as much a part of one's functioning as drawing and releasing breath. But the process of making art, like the process of breathing, has to be learnt. One has to learn how to breathe. And having learnt, one must exercise, drawing deep breaths as well as habitual shallow breaths which do little to invigorate the body. Breathing deeply takes effort, the rib cage expands reluctantly at first; it is only after holding one's breath for a short while before releasing it slowly, that one experiences that euphoric lightness.