The New Thing is Cold Exposure and Meditation (well, two new things that go together).
In early November 2023, I began a regimen of a 3 min outdoor meditation. I only wore a t-shirt and shorts and stood on my front porch, focussing on my breathing. The breathwork was based on what I had learned during my Tai Chi training years ago. Qigong breathing has the following components: feet shoulder width apart, knees slightly bent so you are on the balls of your feet, hands by your sides, shoulders back, tongue lightly touching the roof of your mouth, and the breath originating deep in the belly. I inhale 5 s, exhale 5 s and hold 5 s. That rhythm focusses my thoughts (most of the time) and I can feel my energy sinking into my lower body. As a result, my upper body is very relaxed.
It’s now late January 2024, and I am going outside every day for my meditation. I no longer use a timer and I’m out there for 5-7 minutes. I could probably do 10, but we’re getting ready to go to work. It’s been cold, so I go out in my hoodie and then take it off after a couple of minutes. The cold air is refreshing and energizing on my skin. The deep breathing seems to stop the shiver reflex, which I find very interesting from a physiological perspective.
The best meditation happened on Saltspring Island. I could see the brilliant sunrise over Ganges Harbour and smell the scent of the sea and the tall trees. THAT was relaxing.
Cold water is the second part. I don’t have a bath, so I started with a 1 min cold blast in the middle of my shower. I then built it up to 3 min. Then I started with 3 min cold. Sometimes I end with 3 min cold. The day before the polar dip, I did a 5 min straight cold shower. Oh wow….I was feeling that for a few hours! Very tingly skin, deep breathing and calm. My skin turned red across my upper chest and back and upper legs; this would be due to cold-induced vasodilation, where the blood vessels in your skin dilate in response to the cold. Now, after my swim, I start with a 3 min cold shower, then do my regular shower, and sometimes end with 1 min cold. It makes my body feel alive and calm at the same time. It seems to trigger the deep breathing, which accounts for the calm feeling. I can see why it’s all the rage!
I have also tried a cold bath. YOWZA! It’s different from the shower! That total body immersion had me numb all over! I stayed in the bath for 3 min, but was careful to leave my feet and hands out because of Reynaud’s. No warm shower afterwards… I just warmed up without one. It was a very pleasant sensation feeling the warmth returning to my skin.
So these have been my experiments with cold exposure and deep breathing. I’m finding the cold water rather addictive, in that I think about the cold shower after I exercise. On days I don’t exercise, I use the cold shower just for a sense of calm. I think it might also help with the menopausal heat (although the night sweats are still happening).
This experiment will be ongoing this year, hopefully for the whole year. I don’t know what kind of outcome to anticipate. The friend who got me on this said that it’s brought calm and focus to them and some joint pain is gone. There have been lots of claims made by social media influencers on health benefits of cold water immersion, everything from immune system modulation to improving mental health to boosting metabolism, but the actual science does not provide good evidence for any of this. For me, it seems to provide a sense of calm, and just makes me feel good. That’s good enough! The video below provides a good overview
What about you, dear readers? Has anybody tried any cold baths/showers/meditations? How did it make you feel? Are you a newbie or have you been doing it for a while?
You are inspiring me to add back in a cold part of my shower. I ended all my showers with a good long blast of cold for a year, as an annual challenge, quite a while ago and have not gotten back to it. Until now.