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The essence of the information that I have gathered — over my many years of investigating, experimenting and refining different concepts since 2015 in my study of natural healing — is that we are blessed to harness the power of Mother Nature within the natural phenomena that already exist. At its best, natural healing is simply allowing the natural order to rebalance itself and ourselves with it.
Such is the case with hot and cold temperatures. In this world, there are good stressors and bad stressors. A bad stressor would be an unhealthy relationship with an individual who is abusive, staying in a job that is a dead-end, bending over backwards just to appease an unfair boss or customer, or depriving yourself of sleep. A good stressor would be exercise, loading weights onto the muscles and bones, pumping the heart rate and working the lungs, abstaining from food for a period of time, or putting yourself through a challenge that allows you to grow and evolve.
Stress gets a bad rap, and rightfully so in many cases, because in the modern world some of today’s corporate jobs, relationships, and/or lifestyles are basically just repetitive stress injuries, over and over again. But at the same time, generally speaking, individuals in the modern world — with all our abundance of creature comforts — have in many cases grown too comfortable, and exist in a very comfortable space where their bodies and minds are not really challenged or pushed to the limits of what we are able to accomplish.
Exposing yourself to extreme temperatures of cold or hot is a way of taking yourself back to ancient nature and our more anthropological roots. It applies a positive stressor on both the body and the mind. The body, in its own anti-fragile manner, will respond to that input by strengthening itself (and so too will the mind).
There are of course some caveats which are basic common sense. You don’t want to put yourself in such a hot temperature that you bake like a pizza in a brick oven, and you don’t want to make yourself so cold that you develop frostbite or hypothermia. Make sure you are hydrated. If you are nursing an injury or physical weakness, you would be wise to approach these modalities slowly and ease in so as to avoid shocking the body.
The hot methods which have been in use for thousands of years throughout human civilization are things like:
— Saunas
— Steam rooms
— Hot yoga
— Exercising outside in the hot sun
Potential benefits of hot temperatures can include:
— Detoxification of toxins via sweating out of the skin
— Increased heart rate, blood flow, and cardiac output, promoting overall cardiovascular health
— Heat shock proteins being excreted which can accelerate protein synthesis
— Stimulation of hormone production which can also assist with maintaining better muscle mass
— Cleansing and rejuvenating to the skin
— Reducing and balancing inflammation levels
— Statistical correlation with longer life expectancy
— Increased levels of norepinephrine which creates more alertness and focus
— Promotion of self-discipline, self-confidence, and self-efficacy
— De-stressing and calming
Hot and cold are like yin and yang — the heat will naturally open up the body, whereas the cold will constrict tissues. By using heat, the body loosens up and opens up. Just to feel the body sweat out so much fluids can feel very cleansing.
Personally, I greatly enjoy a good sauna. The steam room is nice as well, but I am wary about the public tap-water, often containing chlorine and other toxic chemicals, which is used to create the steam which gets breathed in. I find the cleanest and most intense benefits to be in the high dry heat of the sauna. I actually joined a gym initially just to enjoy the benefits of going into a sauna.
Do be cautious about infrared saunas and please take my advice and avoid them. While there are no doubt benefits of infrared saunas, in my view the potential risks of harm outweigh the known benefits. As opposed to irradiant heating which heats up a sauna room from a traditional central heat source, an infrared sauna uses microwave radiation which heats up the body’s cells from the inside out! As somebody who is highly aware about avoiding EMFs and electronic radiation, this source of radiation in my view is intense and highly risky. Find a sauna for yourself which uses a central, metal irradiant heater to heat up a room the old-fashioned way.
Aside from the physical benefits of heat, it is also very soothing to the mind as well. Going into a sauna and trying to hold out for 20 or 30 minutes is a great test of willpower and strength not just of the body but of the mind. Although many people that I observe will actually bring in their cell phones into the sauna, I don’t recommend this. Let your mind go and see what happens when you just sit there. Your mind will be forced to figure out something to do in order to avoid the temptation to get up and exit the hot room, and you will likely discover new territories of consciousness while experiencing the benefits of the heat. Personally, I like to practice Transcendental Meditation while in the sauna (more on that in another segment).
Sauna is one of those things which can be considered a luxury, because it does require money and time. Check out gyms in your area and investigate whether they have a steam room, an infrared sauna (avoid), or a traditional irradiant heat sauna, and see what their pricing is like. If you can help it, invest in yourself, as there is no greater investment than your own health, wellness and energy.
The cold methods which are also engrained within ancient human cultural behavior include things like:
— Standing out in the cold air
— Cold showers
— Cold baths
— Ice baths
— Sleeping in a cold temperature
— Therapies where cold air is blown on the body
Potential benefits of cold methods can include:
— Increase of immune function
— Assistance in exercise recovery
— Naturally anti-inflammatory
— Improvement to circulation
— Increase of dopamine output
— Release of adrenaline, epinephrine and norepinephrine, stimulating the mind and body
— Acceleration of metabolism, activating thermogenesis which burns fat
— Acceleration of weight loss and fat burning
— Cold shock proteins being excreted which act beneficially towards nervous system cells
— Enhancing to mood and brain function
Using methods of cold are in a way more — much more — uncomfortable than using the heat which is more relaxing at first. It can be harder to get started in this area, and it seems to take more willpower. The cold methods go hand in hand with deep breathing methods which are also covered in another segment in greater detail.
What I have learned is that it gets easier — much easier. The hardest part is actually just getting started. Start off by taking a warm shower, and at the end, switch it to cold. Run the water first over your chest, then head, then shoulders, arms, legs, and then turn over and let the cold water run over the top of your head, down your neck and down your spine. You can start off using water that is more on the cool side, and then gradually run it colder and colder. You may find that you grow more tolerant as time goes on and can withstand colder and colder temperatures. You can also work your way up in terms of how long you can stand a cold session, going as little as 30 seconds or a minute or as long as 5 to 20 minutes. Eventually, as strange as it sounds, your body may even start to crave this.
A cold bath or ‘ice bath’ — where you keep the water at a very cold temperature such as 50 degrees Fahrenheit — is the ultimate in cold immersion. Cold water is much more influential on the body than cold air. Cold methods especially involving cold water are one of the quickest ways to strip excess fat tissues off the body, as your body will burn these fat stores to generate calories of heat. Professional athletes and many others also attest to the power of ice baths or cold baths for recovery and resiliency in their performance.
I also have been sleeping in a colder temperature for years and can attest to how much more rested I feel when this is the case. Personally, I do also notice that my waistline stays more trim whenever I subject myself daily to a cold shower for a couple minutes and it also seems to energize me and elevate my mood. I am like you, I am sure, in that I resist the extreme discomfort of the cold, but I do aspire to be able to discipline myself to put myself through the ultimate methods of benefiting the body. I am not quite there yet, in terms of routine ice baths and so forth, but I’m constantly getting stronger and better in terms of my tolerance, abilities and also my practice of breath work which integrates with the ability to withstand and benefit from the cold — and so too will you.
A lot of things described within Rapid Regeneration require a significant financial investment. But, it takes only pennies to switch your shower knob all the way to the cold position and stand there practicing deep breathing techniques for a minute or two (or longer if you’re up for it). The sauna of course cost more, and so does buying bags of ice from the store. Compared with other therapies though, these are relatively low-cost activities you can commit to practicing with potential huge upside for your own health.
If you are in a phase of cleaning out your body, detoxing, regenerating, and self-healing, then these methods of hot and cold truly are your friends. These are ways to really provide a positive stressor to your body, forcing it to reach deep within and change for the better, which is what self-healing is all about. Don’t be scared of nature, as our planet was created with these extremes on it and we as a creature are created to withstand them and not just survive but to thrive. Give it a try!