Grab your favourite Gala or Honeycrisp—National Apple Day is on October 21st! For this week’s Work-in of the Week, we’re celebrating nature’s easiest desk snack. It’s a workplace classic for a reason, and swapping out your usual afternoon trip to the vending machine for a fresh apple might be the simplest performance upgrade you make all week.
So why a whole apple and not a glass of juice? It comes down to fibre. A medium whole apple packs over 4 grams of fibre (mostly pectin), which slows digestion and keeps your glycemic index low at around 36. Processing that same fruit into juice strips the fiber away, spiking the glycemic response and packing the sugar of up to four apples into one glass—a fast track to a 3 PM energy crash.
According to the World Health Organisation, optimizing your workplace nutrition can boost overall productivity by up to 20%. The steady, slow-release energy from a whole apple keeps your brain fueled without the sugar jitter, while natural antioxidants like quercetin help push past mental fatigue. Plus, taking five minutes away from your screen to actually crunch through piece of fruit gives your eyes and mind a genuine reset.
Work in of the week - Nose breathing to reduce stress and recover better
Optimise oxygen delivery, sharpen executive focus, and improve sleep recovery to build sustainable work capacity.
Why it matters
Breathing is not just a passive background process—it is the master control switch for human performance. Most corporate professionals function in a state of chronic, subtle mouth breathing. This triggers a sympathetic nervous system response, ramping up stress hormones, fragmenting focus, and degrading nighttime recovery.
Switching to purposeful nasal breathing acts as an immediate physiological governor to upgrade both work output and long-term health.
1. Productivity Impact - Cognitive Drive & Output
Mouth breathing dumps Carbon Dioxide (CO2) too quickly, disrupting the balance needed for haemoglobin to release oxygen to brain tissue (the Bohr Effect). Nasal breathing creates natural back-pressure, maintaining optimal CO2 levels, lowering respiratory rate, and boosting oxygenation.
Neurobiologist Dr Andrew Huberman highlights that the cadence of nasal inhalation directly synchronises neural activity across the brain's focus centers, dampening stress signals and locking in sustained attention.
The Science: A study published in Physiology & Behavior found that breathing route directly affects mental processing, with nasal breathing demonstrating superior performance in memory consolidation and task execution compared to mouth breathing.
(Source: Physiology & Behavior)The Performance Gain: Research on ventilatory efficiency by Dr George Dallam showed that adapted nasal breathers achieve identical physiological output while dropping their breathing frequency by roughly 22%. Lowering respiratory rate conserves energy, preventing mid-afternoon burnout and preserving high-level decision-making capacity.
(Source: Journal of Kinesiology & Sports Medicine)
2. Health & Sleep Impact - Reducing Sleep Apnea & Stress
Nasal breathing is the body’s primary defense against nocturnal airway collapse and chronic inflammation. During sleep, mouth breathing causes the airway to narrow and the tongue to drop backward, directly worsening Obstructive Sleep Apnea (OSA) and fragmenting REM cycles.
By training daytime nasal breathing, you strengthen airway dilator muscles, humidify incoming air, and increase Nitric Oxide (NO) production—a vasodilator that boosts blood oxygenation by roughly 10%.
The Science: Clinical research published in the American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicinedemonstrated that forcing nasal breathing during sleep significantly reduced the Apnea-Hypopnea Index (AHI)—the key metric for sleep apnea severity—and lowered nocturnal micro-arousals compared to mouth breathing.
(Source: American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine)Expert Insight: Sleep specialist Dr Steven Park notes that restoring nasal patency and daytime nasal habits is a foundational intervention for reducing snoring, mitigating sleep apnea, and ensuring deep, restorative sleep necessary for physical recovery.
Points of Performance
Nose breathing at the desk (Resting / Deep Work)
Habit Anchor: Set a calendar notification 5 minutes before your high-stakes meetings or use the act of sitting down at your desk after getting up as your trigger.
Setup: Sit upright, feet flat. Place the tip of your tongue against the roof of your mouth, just behind your front teeth.
Execution: Inhale quietly through the nose for 4 seconds, allowing your lower ribs and diaphragm to expand. Exhale smoothly through the nose for 4–6 seconds.
Scaling: Under heavy pressure? Perform a "physiological sigh"—two quick nasal inhales followed by one long, slow nasal exhale to reset your nervous system instantly.
Nose breathing in movement (Zone 2 Cardio / Walking / Workouts)
Habit Anchor: Tie your breath protocol to going for your lunchtime walk (or run) or walking up the stairs to go to your next meeting.
Setup: Establish a cadence. Match your breath to your stride (e.g., inhale for 3 steps, exhale for 3 steps).
Execution: Seal your lips. Drive air strictly through the nose. If you feel the urge to gasp through your mouth, your output has exceeded your aerobic threshold—slow your pace slightly until nasal control is regained.
Common Faults & Corrections
Fault: Upper-chest breathing (trapezius shrugging up toward ears on inhalation).
Correction: Keep shoulders pinned down and back. Drive inhalation downward into the lateral ribcage and belly.Fault: "Air hungry" panic when starting movement with nasal breathing.
Correction: This is CO2 buildup, not oxygen deprivation. Scale back workout intensity by 10–15% until your physiological tolerance adapts (typically takes 2–3 weeks of consistent practice).
Control your breath to control your executive state. Master nasal breathing during simple tasks, maintain it during movement, and harness it at night to drive top-tier productivity, reduce sleep apnea risks, and protect against burnout.