For when you need to calm down or wake up and can't hold the count yourself.
Focus — box breathing, 4-4-4-4. Inhale four, hold four, exhale four, hold four. Equal phases keep the pattern symmetric and easy to track, which is the point: it gives attention a fixed, predictable target when nothing else will hold still. Five cycles is eighty seconds.
Relax — extended exhale, 4-6. Inhale four, exhale six. The asymmetry is the mechanism: a longer exhale than inhale shifts autonomic balance toward the parasympathetic side. Use this one when you're already past the linear range and the cognitive tools have stopped being available.
Balance — 4-2-4. Inhale four, hold two, exhale four. Box breathing without the second hold: the short pause at the top gives you a moment to settle, and skips the empty-lunged wait some people find uncomfortable. A cycle is ten seconds.
Restore — 2.5-2.5-5. Inhale into the belly for two and a half, carry on into the chest for two and a half, exhale for five. The two-stage inhale fills from the bottom up rather than from the chest alone, and the exhale runs as long as both halves together. The orb pauses half way — that is where you switch.
Energize — 4-2. Inhale four, exhale two. The asymmetry reversed: a longer inhale than exhale shifts balance toward the sympathetic side. The shortest cycle of the six at six seconds, and the only one meant to lift you rather than settle you.
Unwind — 4-7-8. Inhale four, hold seven, exhale eight. The longest and the most demanding: nineteen seconds a cycle, with an exhale twice the length of the inhale. For the end of the day rather than the middle of it — the seven-second hold is a lot if you are in a hurry.
Why open loop matters. None of the six patterns asks anything of working memory, planning, or self-talk. It's a fixed sequence applied without feedback — it runs whether or not you can think, which is the only reason it's useful at the moment you'd need it.