Cold thermogenesis for mental discipline

Everybody comes to yoga for different reasons. However, I think a common theme for most of us is wellness. We come to practice because it helps our bodies become healthier; it helps our minds become calmer and sharper, it helps us with our balance, it helps us sleep better, and it overall just improves the quality of our lives.

Now we all know the yoga is much more than just a physical practice. Yoga is a full system which also includes breath work, meditation, visualization, and discipline alongside the study of spiritual philosophies.

Due to this, there are many practices from around the world, which can be considered yogic practices. Today I want to share one of these practices because it has helped me with everything from meditation to physical recovery and so much more.

This is the practice of cold thermogenesis: a practice in which you consciously expose yourself to the cold for two main reasons: mental discipline and physical benefits.

In terms of mental discipline, exposing yourself to the cold for longer periods of time can be extremely meditative because it forces you to be in the present moment and to get in touch with what is going on in your body. When you are immersed in the cold, it’s very hard for you to be concerned with anything other than the present moment. It also really builds mental resilience. It helps you understand what you are truly capable of.

Once you realize that you can with stand the cold for 5 minutes on your bare skin, you begin to understand that you can actually do so much more in life than you thought was possible. It gives you a sense of accomplishment that carries in other areas of your life, therefore building mental resilience.

Mental resilience, improves every area of your life because it helps you get comfortable with the uncomfortable. In live, we face many situations which make us feel uncomfortable and challenged. This practice helps us get through those situations with a deep sense of mental peace. I find it especially nice for people who have a hard time sitting still for meditation, because the sensation of extreme cold forces you into meditation.

Now in terms of the physical benefits of cold thermogenesis, I could write a whole book, but I will try and keep it short and sweet for you guys. Thermogenesis is the way we produce heat to keep our bodies warm. Cold thermogenesis kicks this process into overdrive. The reason we want to kick this process into overdrive is because your body has to produce more energy to stay warm, burning calories to produce that heat. This stimulates metabolism and turns on your body’s ability to burn fat.

Cold exposure helps boost immunity in three different ways:

1. The cold increases white blood cell count as well as cytotoxic T lymphocytes, both of which have been proven to be important mechanisms to fight against cancer cells.

2. Cold thermogenesis also boosts immune function by decreasing inflammation and allowing the body to heal more quickly.

3. The cold helps stimulate norepinephrine release. This causes an increase in natural killer cell count and activity, and a rise in circulating levels of interleukin 6, all of which can improve your immune system functionality.

Personally, with regular practice of cold thermogenesis in my life, I have noticed that my sleep has improved ten-fold and that my recovery time after workouts has shortened. Due to the anti-inflammatory effects of the cold your body can recover much faster which means you can do more physical activity with less soreness or pain, you can help heal injuries faster and it can help you manage chronic injuries. Also, having less inflammation makes it easier for your body to fall asleep and stay asleep which increases the total time spent in deep sleep each night and that is the sleep stage where we undergo physical recovery in our muscles, joints, organs and other tissues.

Cold thermogenesis has many more benefits but even for the main benefits which I have written about here; weight loss, immune system boosting, better sleep, faster recovery and mental toughness, I think making peace with some uncomfortable sensations is worth it. This practice of cold exposure can be brought into the yoga classroom where, for example, the teacher asks you to do a pose, or a stretch or a meditation that you are uncomfortable with. Practice the same mental technique that you do in your cold exposure session and use in the classroom: be present, breathe deeply and remind yourself that it is only temporary.

Here is how you can start the practice of cold thermogenesis at home, in these four easy steps:

1. Turn your shower on the coldest setting and start with a 30 second cold showers. When you are able to comfortably withstand 30 seconds, start growing the time longer and longer until you can get to 5 minutes.

2. While you are exposing yourself to the cold, make sure that you breathe deeply and slowly to send signals to your nervous system to stay calm. The more you can stay calm and breathe, the longer you are going to be able to sit comfortably in the cold. The longer you can comfortably sit in the cold, the more health benefits and mental benefits you will receive.

3. If you start shivering or shaking, you have gone too long. Please listen to your body and remove yourself from the cold before this happens!

4. If you want to do more than cold showers, you can start doing ice baths, dipping into glacier fed lakes, or finding a cryotherapy clinic near you.

I hope this article has helped you add another tool into your wellness toolbox and I hope you see it for the beautiful meditative yogic practice that it truly is. Give it a shot and see how you feel!