Workshops · Retreats · Corporate Events
Breathwork for real life
Take off the armour.
Drop the mask. Breathe.
My name is Daniel Gaitau. As the founder of The Locker Room Barbershop and MĀNAVA Breathwork, I would like to extend a warm welcome to our community.
Since opening in 2020, we have held spaces for hundreds of people through workshops, retreats, corporate events and festivals.
Why these spaces exist
Closing the gap
Our mission is to create spaces that feel safe enough for you to take off the armour and drop the masks we all wear, closing the gap between who you are and who you want to be.
I wouldn’t have found this tool if I wasn’t introduced to it by a friend because of the stigma that surrounds it. Images of people with their eyes closed and legs crossed made me feel like it wasn’t for me.
But this tool is far too valuable to be held behind that image. Because of this, my intention is to reintroduce these tools to the community in a way that feels “I could try that”. A tool that increases your capacity, builds resilience, and reduces stress, anxiety and depression for everyday blokes.
Close the gap between who you are and who you want to be.
For the everyday bloke.
The practical explanation
What is breathwork?
I breathe every day — how is this any different?
Your nervous system has 2 modes: One prepares you for action. The other allows you to recover. Modern life keeps many of us living in the ‘action’ mode. Breathwork is one of the fastest ways to signal to your brain you are not in danger and therefore don’t need to be in the ‘action mode’. When that happens, your body knows its safe and can finally enter its enters “recovery” mode.
By deliberately changing your breathing, you are able to change between these modes to improve performance, manage stress, process emotion and increase capacity to face life’s challenges.
These aren’t attributes you’re born with, they’re skills. And like any skill, it can be learned.
01
Capacity
Create more space between what happens and how you respond.
02
Resilience
Become more steady when life gets heavy.
03
Patience
Spend less time in your head and more time in your life.
Ways to work with us
Spaces built for connection
Each event is intentionally designed to suit the needs of each group, the environment, and purpose for coming together.
For teams
Corporate
Practical group sessions designed to help teams learn science backed breathing techniques to enhance wellbeing, team culture and performance.
For the community
Workshops
Empowering workshops that encourage men to reconnect with themselves, deepen self-awareness, and build healthy coping strategies to thrive in all areas of life.
For transformation
Retreats
Transformative retreats that invite men to disconnect from the demands of everyday life and reconnect to what matters most in a safe environment over 4 days and 3 nights.
Show up better as a man
Why I use breathwork
Every man wants to stay calmer under pressure. Every dad wants more patience. Every partner wants to communicate better.
Breathwork helps me practise doing exactly that, so I can show up as the man I want to be for the people I love.
When you’re angry, anxious, or stressed, your breathing changes. Breathwork turns that relationship around. Instead of your emotions controlling your breath, you deliberately change your breathing to influence your emotional state, teaching your body how to respond rather than simply react to life’s challenges.
For me, breathwork is more than a ‘woo woo’ ritual. It’s a tool that helps me stay connected to myself, present with my family, and grounded when life gets hard. It creates the space between what happens to me and how I choose to respond. That’s why I practise it, and that’s why I share it with others.
What that can look like
A less reactive man.
A man who can hold the emotions of his family.
A home that feels safe when he enters the room.
A healthy husband.
A man who respects the person staring back at him in the mirror.
Come breathe with us.
To ask about an upcoming session, workshop, retreat or corporate event, send us a message at [email protected].
See you in the chair.
Dan