It is a conceit to think that you are breathing, even though we say it all the time: “I am breathing.”
Of course you are breathing.
But let’s face it. If it were really up to you to keep the breath going, you would have died long ago. You would have gotten distracted by this or that, sooner or later … and, whoops, dead. So in a sense, “you,” whoever you are, are not allowed anywhere near whatever it is that is responsible for your body breathing. The brain stem takes care of that very nicely. Same for the heartbeat and many other core aspects of our biology. We might have some influence on their expression, especially the breath, but it is not fair to say that we are really doing the breathing. It is far more mysterious and wondrous than that.
As you shall see, this brings into question just who is breathing, who is beginning to meditate and cultivate mindfulness, who is even reading these words? We shall be visiting these fundamental questions with a beginner’s mind in order to understand what is really involved in the cultivation of mindfulness.