BAKERSFIELD, CA – Gamers who have ever read a review they disagree with know that the pain of disappointment is real, especially when a reviewer violently and cruelly has a different opinion of a game. Here are six breathing exercises to help you cope when IGN gives a game you’re excited about an 8.
1. Supine Diaphragm Breathing
As the name suggests, this exercise starts with you lying on your back. This is convenient because the shock of IGN’s disappointing score almost certainly put you on your back to begin with. Focusing on your stomach as it rises up and down will help you both get in touch with your body and fight the temptation to go to Metacritic to confirm that IGN is alone in their awful rating.
2. Lion’s Breath
This technique, where you stick your tongue out and breathe through your mouth like a lion, helps relieve tension, which you surely need to do after reading that flop of a review. Breathe in, fight the temptation to go complain on Reddit. Breathe out, don’t hit send on that comment on the review itself.
3. Pursed Lip Breathing
Pursing your lips to limit the amount of breath going into and out of your mouth helps you stay focused on your breath. This will help keep you from continuing to harm yourself by seeking out Polygon’s review of the game, which would be a totally useless endeavor since they stopped giving numerical scores years ago, and numbers are the only thing that matter.
4. Alternate Nostril Breathing
Covering one nostril while breathing through the other, and then switching, helps one see that there are two sides to every situation. As you breathe through one nostril, you understand that seeking validation from external sources like an IGN review is a fool’s errand. As you breathe through the other, you understand that in this specific case, the IGN reviewer is a liar who was paid off by the competition to smear a game you haven’t played but know in your heart is at worst a 9.5.
5. Humming Bee Breath
This tranquility-inducing exercise involves placing your fingers to the cartilage surrounding your ear canal as you hum aloud with each exhale. This exercise might feel a little silly, but find peace in the fact that it can’t feel as silly as not appreciating innovation and beauty in a video game while working for the most popular video game site.
6. Matching the Inhale and Exhale Breaths
You can help your whole body relax by sitting in an upright position, inhaling through your nose, and mentally counting to eight. Actually, wait, no. Don’t count to eight. Count to seven. Seven is what we meant this whole time. So like we were saying, you will start to relax when you mentally count to seven, which is the highest number.
THE TAKEAWAY
These six exercises should help you overcome the disappointment and rage you feel after IGN gives a game you’re excited about an 8. While it is perfectly normal to have those feelings, it is important to work through them with proven breathing techniques so you don’t find yourself writing unhinged diatribes on social media that will later be used against you in a court of law.
