Yes. A sigh is an exhale and the spontaneous breath we are talking about comes on the inhale. A sigh may be the exhalation of a spontaneous breath though.

There can also be deep breaths that are actually a management strategy, which happen because something is arising in our system that isn’t comfortable, and these are often followed by sighs.

It can take practice to discern the difference, but the spontaneous breath we are talking about has a quality of expansion and true relief, along with a sense that something has shifted. A deep breath that is being used to help keep something packaged up will feel more like we are pushing something down, and then there’s relief because we pushed it down — that’s the best way I can describe it.