Cold water……
Most of us avoid it like the plague.
It’s uncomfortable….it’s…….cold.
But….it’s TRANSFORMATIVE.
What if I told you that training your body to withstand cold water has some amazing health benefits?
Here are just a few:
-Increases alertness
At first, it’s going to be hard to breath when the cold water hits your skin. Force yourself to stay under it counting down the seconds. The deep breathing created by the cold will force more oxygen into your system then normal and increase your heart rate. This natural energy boost will most likely last all day.
-Improves immunity and circulation
A study done in England showed that regular cold showers increase the amount of white blood cells you have floating around your system. This lends itself to a direct increase in your bodies ability to fight off invading germs and bacteria. By exposure to cold, your body will automatically send blood rushing to your internal organs to keep them warm. After the cold shower, the blood rushes back through out the body. This back and forth strengthens the tiny capillaries and blood vessels adding to an increase in circulation.
-Refines hair and skin
Cold showers cause your skin to close it’s pores and tighten up. Not only does this make the appearance of the skin look better, but it also stimulates the production of natural oils in the skin which lead to greater elasticity and suppleness.
-Stimulates fat burning and the production of brown fat.
Brown fat is the good fat in our bodies. When it’s activated by cold water, it increases energy production by burning calories stored in white fat, the bad fat of our bodies. Cold temperatures can increase brown fat by 15x the normal amount. This activation creates in internal furnace of fat burning!
-Speeds up recovery of muscle soreness
If you’re an athlete, you know one of the best things to do for recovery is to take a nice short ice bath. Cold water increases circulation and pulls lactic acid out of the muscle tissue. Not only does this make the muscle feel better, but it also reduces any inflammation that is associated with an over worked muscle.
-Eases Stress
Along with increasing your adaptation to stressful situations, they will lower levels of uric acid, and boost levels of Glutathione in your blood – making you less stressed in general.
-Relieves depression
Cold showers increase the neurotransmitter nor-adrenaline which has a direct impact of depression. Not only that, but the extra electrical impulses created in the brain from exposure to cold water has an anti depressive effect as well. When people are depressed they have decreased brain activity. Cold showers directly increase this activity relieving a depressed state.
-Boosts testosterone
Our testicles like to be cool. That’s why they hang OUTSIDE of the body. Hot showers put a drag on testosterone production by heating up the testicles too much. By exposing your boys to cold water, you do the exact opposite creating a nice surge in the juice.
-increases and builds willpower
When you do something that at first, you are very resistant to, every single day, you start to build mental toughness and fortitude the longer you go about doing it. The more you do it, the easier it becomes. This strength and discipline will become an automatic habit after awhile and will start to carry over into other areas of your life. This is a very easy way to build your will power.
All of these things from a short amount of time under a freezing cold shower. I’d say it’s more than a fair trade off. It’s just a matter of building yourself up to withstand the cold.
How to proceed
What you need to do is to increase your exposure on a daily basis, slowly over the course of a month. Start out with your normal shower on regular temperature, then at the end, turn the knob ALL THE WAY to cold and stand under it for 15 seconds. Do this for one week.
Yeah….it’s gonna suck. But by the end of the week, it’s not going to suck as bad.
On the second week, you’re going to increase the amount of time to cold exposure to 30 seconds.
Third week, go to 45 seconds.
Once you hit the fourth week, you’re going to increase your time to 1 minute. Stay here for a week and then on the fifth week, try taking a cold shower right off the bat with no hot water in the beginning.
At this point you should be well trained to not jump and scream and curse. Let the water wash over you and keep yourself calm. A funny thing will happen when you stop yourself from freaking out about the cold water…..your body will produce a shot of adrenaline, which will actually make you feel warm on the inside.
Once you master staying calm during this adrenaline rush, you’ll be able to stay under the cold water for as long as you like. This is a VERY powerful position to be in and a very important part of self mastery. you’ll be surprised at how this one simple practice will carry over to other parts of your life.
By maintaining your composure under such intense circumstances, you’ll find that things that used to bother you in your everyday life, don’t really do so much anymore.
This simple daily act is the best way to build your constitution so that you become almost impervious to the little annoying things in life. With continued practice, you can get to a point where almost NOTHING bothers you.
Master this while doing everything else you learned here, and you’re well on your way to becoming an alpha male!
“At any moment, the decision you make can change the course of your life forever.”
-Anthony Robbins.