Sauna/ Breathwork/ Cold Exposure Protocol:
Sauna/Breathwork/Cold Exposure Protocol:
Sauna: 15-20 minutesExfoliate after 1st Round. See Exfoliating Salt Glow. Breathwork: 1-2 Rounds of Activation breath (Wim Hof inspired). Cold Exposure: 2 seconds to 5 minutes.
Repeat 2-3 Rounds
Final round: Finish with cold exposure during the day to stimulate the nervous system. At night finish with a short (2-5 min) warm exposure (Sauna or warm shower) to calm the nervous system.
Pro Tips:Find Your Flow. Customize your protocol to keep yourself safe and meet your individual health needs.
- Hydrate. As you sweat out the metabolic wastes you want to replenish your body with electrolyte rich drinks or mineralized water. A pinch of quality Sea salt works well.
-Exfoliate once a week after your first round of heat to get rid of any dead skin and open up any clogged pores. Rinse with warm water to wash the toxins away so your skin does not reabsorb them. A dry brush routine or Salt Glow works well. See Exfoliating Salt Glow.
- Watch your heart rate. Sauna or heat exposure is considered a light to moderate cardiovascular workout. 4-7 saunas a week provides the best cardiovascular protection. As your exposure to heat increases so does your heart rate. Be cautious not to overdo your sauna time. Watching your heart rate can be an easy tool to see how your body is responding to heat in each session. This will change depending on many health factors.
Be cautious pushing your heart rate anywhere above 80% of your Max heart rate.
220-age= max heart your.
220-40=180 bpm max.
80% of 180=144bpm.
-It’s essential to start slow with any extreme temperature changes. If you are new to cold exposure, sometimes stepping outside of a sauna on a cold day will be enough for you. You will see some people spending several minutes appearing to be relaxed in the cold ocean. This is not for everyone. Start acclimatizing to the cold by putting your feet into the cold water. Maybe it’s up to your knees or your waist. “Find your Flow.” What works for you today, may change from day to day. Finish your cold exposure by letting your body reheat naturally rather than immediately heading to a warm shower or sauna.
This will force your body to generate heat on its own and activate burning brown fat to produce internal heat. Brown fat thermogenesis regulates your core temperature and supercharges your metabolism which will induce fat burning and improve your metabolic health, making it effective in addressing metabolic disorders like Type II diabetes.
-The Soeberg Principle suggests that a 11 min of weekly combined cold exposure is the ultimate amount to maximize the health benefits. Integrating the Wim inspired breathwork will dramatically minimize the discomfort of the cold and speed up this process.
The therapeutic use of saunas has been considered an essential component of health and lifestyle in many parts of the world for hundreds of years. Sauna's recent popularity in North America is allowing many of us to experience its benefits first hand. For many people having a sauna feels good and that's all you need to know.
Fortunately for those of us who are curious about the greater benefits of sauna and improving our health, there has been a substantial amount of research that’s gone into not only sauna bathing, but the combined benefits of cold exposure and breathwork as well.
Contrast therapy is a deliberate practice of alternating between heat and cold which trains your nervous system to effectively handle stress and more importantly shift between the Sympathetic Fight and Flight into the Parasympathetic Rest and Digest.
Asian cultures bath communally daily and cleans away toxins. Romans soaked in hot baths before plunging into cold pools. Scandinavians have been running from saunas into snow for centuries. Eastern Europeans built entire social rituals around the practice. What they discovered through experience, research now confirms, the power isn't in the heat or cold alone, it's in the transition between them.
During a sauna or any hot exposure, our blood vessels vasodilate, increasing circulation throughout the body. Then our heart rate and the blood flow to the skin increases and eventually we start to sweat. Our nervous system becomes balanced moving towards the parasympathetic rest and digest response.
With cold exposure, our blood vessels vasoconstrict causing our blood to move from your extremities back to our core and visceral organs. Initially, our brain releases norepinephrine and activates our sympathetic nervous system. As we adapt to the cold exposure, something our brain shifts us into the parasympathetic nervous system to rest and digest. Repeating this process overtime is training our autonomic nervous system to respond to different stressors more efficiently. The repeated vasodilation and vasoconstriction of our blood vessels is an effective form of circulatory training.
For individuals suffering a trauma or chronic inflammatory conditions, you can expect the body to become more efficient in dealing with its inflammatory response