In “The Way of the Superior Man,” David Deida emphasizes that masculine spiritual development isn’t merely conceptual—it’s fundamentally embodied. Among the most practical and powerful practices he teaches is the cultivation of breath and conscious presence through the body, particularly along the front centerline from head to genitals.
The Constricted Front
Most men walk around with chronically contracted fronts. “All men tend to have blocks in the front of their body, along an imaginary line that runs from the top of the head, through the tongue, throat, heart, solar plexus, navel, and genitals, down to the perineum,” Deida explains.
This contraction happens gradually throughout the day. When you’re nervous, your stomach tightens. When saddened, a lump forms in your throat. When threatened, your solar plexus feels queasy. When thinking hard, your forehead wrinkles. “For much of the day, you are tightening, tensing, and contracting the front of your body.”
This chronic tension has profound consequences. “If the front of your body has accumulated tension, throughout the day and throughout the years, you will hardly be able to sit up straight. Your belly and chest will be tight. Your thoughts will center on yourself. Your energy will remain constricted in your head.”
The Power of an Open Front
Contrast this with people who command presence. They enter a room and everyone notices, even though they’re not doing anything obvious to attract attention. “The front of their body is so open that their energy flows freely through the room, magnifying their presence.”
These people are remarkably relaxed, poised, and attentive. They’re not hunched over a sunken chest, gritting their teeth, and barely breathing. “Your powerful presence won’t fill the room at all. You might not even be noticed.”
An open front is the foundation of masculine power—not aggressive domination, but natural authority that comes from fullness of being. “When the front of your body is open and relaxed, your power flows freely, and your presence fills the room.”
The Practice of Breathing Down
Deida teaches a specific breathing practice for opening the front: “Inhale deeply, through your nose, and breathe through whatever tensions you notice in your body. Inhale deeply into your lower belly.”
The practice proceeds systematically:
- First breath: Inhale into your lower belly, then exhale
- Second breath: Inhale into lower and upper belly, then exhale
- Third breath: Fill belly, then solar plexus and lower chest, exhale
- Fourth breath: Fill belly, solar plexus, and entire chest, exhale
“For several breaths, inhale fully in this way, filling your belly, solar plexus, and finally your chest. Then exhale fully, slowly, and smoothly.”
This isn’t merely a meditation technique—it’s a moment-to-moment practice. “Throughout the day, practice this kind of breathing in random moments. Pay special attention to any part of your body that seems particularly tense or closed.”
Breathing as Service
One of Deida’s most innovative teachings concerns using breath to serve others. When you notice tension in yourself, you can breathe into it to open it. Similarly, you can breathe into others’ tensions to help release them.
“Suppose you are with a person who seems a little tense. You can allow yourself to feel his tensions, and then inhale into his tensions, just as if they were yours,” Deida instructs. “Inhale and open his knots with the force of your inhalation. Then, exhale and release all tensions, yours and his.”
This practice works without physical contact or the other person knowing what you’re doing. “You could do this practice at work, with your lover, or with a whole crowd on a bus.”
By practicing this form of breathing, you simultaneously uncurl your attention from self-concern and assume your true status as servant to others. “You uncurl your attention from yourself, alleviating the knots of contraction in the front of your own body.”
The Source of Contraction
Why does the front contract in the first place? “The main way you generate bodily tension is by turning your attention back on yourself in self-concern, curling into yourself so tightly you feel all knotted up,” Deida explains.
Self-concern creates a feedback loop. Worry about yourself creates tension. Tension feels uncomfortable, creating more worry. This cycle continues until you’re chronically contracted, cut off from the world and your own depth.
“Your tension is only the energy of a gift that has become backed up, unexpressed, in your body.” When you’re meant to give but withhold, that unexpressed energy accumulates as tension in the front of your body.
Converting Tension Into Gift
The antidote is obvious but difficult: give yourself to others. “Whenever you notice that you are mulling over your own problems, knotting energy into your body as tension, take that energy and create a gift for others.”
This could be as simple as doing the dishes or as complex as building a business that serves others. The key is shifting from receiving mode (what can I get?) to giving mode (what can I offer?).
“Convert into service the energy that is knotting up the front of your body,” Deida instructs. This immediately begins relaxing the front as energy flows outward rather than imploding inward.
Breath and Sexual Energy
Breath is particularly important for managing sexual energy. Men often accumulate excess sexual energy in their head (as obsessive fantasy) or genitals (as ejaculative urgency) because they don’t breathe fully throughout the day.
“Therefore, if you have not breathed fully during the day, by the time you approach your sexual partner you will be filled with fantasies and ejaculative urge,” Deida explains.
The solution is circulating energy through full breathing. “Your inhales should feel like they are drawing energy down the front of your body, filling your belly and genital region. Your exhales should feel like they are moving energy from your pelvic floor, up your spine, into your head.”
This circular breathing pattern—down the front, up the spine—prevents energy from getting stuck. “By breathing fully in this circle, down your front and up your spine, your internal energy can flow freely. Your head and genitals don’t get clogged or tense with energy.”
Breathing During Lovemaking
During sex, the same breathing principles apply but with greater intensity. “Sex intensifies the life force in your body. As you become more and more stimulated, your breath quickens and your body begins to writhe with energy.”
Without conscious breathing, this energy builds in the genitals and creates ejaculatory pressure. “Unless you are careful to move this energy with your breath, it will build up in your genitals and cause a pressure that wants to be released through ejaculation.”
The practice is to breathe energy down your front and up your spine continuously during lovemaking. “While you are having sex, but before you are close to ejaculating, practice contracting your pelvic floor… While you contract it and pull upward, breathe the energy up your spine.”
This converts what would become ejaculatory tension into full-body orgasmic energy that deepens rather than ends the sexual session.
Breathing Into Your Woman
You can also use breath to open your woman during sex. “When sexually embracing your woman, use your breath to open her body and heart, in exactly the same way,” Deida instructs.
Feel into her body as if it were yours. Inhale down through the front of her body, filling her genitals, belly, and heart with love energy. Then exhale, letting both of you dissolve in the ocean of loving.
“Always pervade through her with your breath, inhaling and exhaling, so that her tension and closure dissolve in the force of your loving, and you dissolve in the giving.”
This isn’t visualization or imagination—it’s tangible energetic practice. With time, you’ll feel the actual movement of energy through your body and hers.
Daily Practice Structure
Deida recommends making breath practice as routine as brushing your teeth. Set aside at least ten minutes daily for formal practice, but more importantly, bring conscious breathing into your daily activities.
When sitting at your desk, pause periodically to take several full breaths down your front. Before entering a meeting, spend thirty seconds breathing deeply into your belly. While walking, practice breathing into any tension you notice.
“Throughout the day, as soon as you feel tension in the front of your body, inhale into that area and open it,” Deida advises. This prevents the accumulation of chronic tension that deadens presence and vitality.
Breathwork and Meditation
Breathing practices naturally lead to deeper meditation. “If you are alone in your home, you could imagine all the tension in the world and inhale the force of life into this tension to open it up. Then exhale, releasing the tension into love to be dissolved.”
This form of breathing meditation serves triple purpose: it opens your own body, cultivates your capacity to serve others, and connects you with the larger field of consciousness that includes all beings.
“By practicing this form of breathing, you uncurl your attention from yourself, alleviating the knots of contraction in the front of your own body. And at the same time, you assume your true status as servant to others.”
The Front as Energetic Interface
The front of your body is where your energy meets the world’s energy. “The front of your body, especially your belly, is the place where your energy meets the energy of the world,” Deida explains.
When this interface is open, you’re in dynamic relationship with life. Energy flows freely in and out. You receive the world’s gifts and offer your own. When contracted, you’re cut off—unable to receive or give fully.
Warriors in many traditions understand this principle. Before battle, they expose their belly to show fearlessness. A man who protects his belly shows he’s afraid of being penetrated, of being hurt, of dying.
Breathing and Presence
Ultimately, breathing practices serve presence. “Presence” isn’t an abstract spiritual concept but a tangible quality of being fully here, now, in your body, available to whatever arises.
“Spend time every day in solitude, with no distractions. Just sit, for ten minutes. No fidgeting, no channel surfing, no magazine thumbing. Just be, exactly as you are, not trying to change anything.”
During this sitting, practice full breathing down your front. Feel whatever arises—boredom, restlessness, fear, sadness—and breathe into it. Let your breath open whatever is contracted.
Over time, this practice reveals that you are the openness in which everything arises. Your breath moves not because “you” are breathing, but because life itself is breathing through you.
Integration With Other Practices
Breath practice enhances every other aspect of The Way of the Superior Man. When practicing sexual energy cultivation, breath circulates the energy. When opening your woman’s heart, breath penetrates her closure. When giving your gift in the world, breath prevents the accumulation of tension.
“Your breath is a primary expression of your personal energy. Therefore, your breath is one of the primary ways to give your gift to the world,” Deida writes.
Consider combining daily breath practice with other disciplines:
- Morning meditation with breath focus
- Breathing during exercise or martial arts
- Conscious breathing during difficult conversations
- Sexual practice with coordinated breathing
- Evening practice of releasing the day’s accumulated tension
Conclusion: The Breath of Life
Breathing seems simple, even mundane. Yet Deida reveals it as fundamental to masculine spiritual development. Through conscious breathing down the front and up the spine, you open the constricted body, circulate blocked energy, serve others’ tension, and establish yourself as presence itself.
As Deida concludes: “Make love with the world in this way, all day, pervading and dissolving all unease. Feel the world against your body like a naked woman, vulnerable and alive, and allow the front of your body to press into and through the world’s body, liberating the knots of accumulated pain.”
The superior man breathes fully, feeling into and through all contraction, offering his breath as a gift that dissolves boundaries and reveals the single heart beating in all bodies.
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