Rebirthing-Breathwork, also called "Conscious Breathing", is a branch of alternative medicine which postulates that specialized breathing techniques may have theraputic benefits. In Rebreathing-Breathwork, the patient makes a connected breath where the breather does not pause between inhale and exhale. This causes a build up of oxygen in the blood and, according to practitioners, a build up of prana or life energy. Breathing sessions are done laying down and usually last one to two hours.
It grew from the work of Leonard Orr. It was so named because when he first started doing this kind of work he noticed that he would often have what he describes as memories of his birth. Orr developed his process between 1962 and 1974 as he (without any (then) awareness of yoga or breathwork disciplines) discovered that modifications to breathing practices could bring about improvements in health, mental clarity and emotional well-being.
Development of Rebirthing as a therapeutic modality in its own right peaked in 1974, and has been extended from that point since. Orr, accompanied by fellow researchers, refined it into a system that can be practised in the context of a professional therapy session and taught to clients over a series of sessions, ten being the recommended minimum.
Proponents estimate that, since 1974, more than ten million people worldwide have learned the process, with more than one hundred thousand people completing practitioner training.
Orr's work was influential in the development of the more general topic of Rebirthing. In contrast to the narrow definition of Orr's "Rebirthing-Breathwork", "rebirthing" postulates that human birth is a traumatic event. Therapies associated with the more general "rebirthing" include breathing and focus sessions such as are discussed here but also often including a re-enactment of the birth process. No such re-enactment is generally associated with the narrower treatment of "rebirthing-breathwork".