Modern health often asks us to outsource the body before we understand it. Wim Hof brings the conversation back to something older and more direct: breath, cold, attention, and the nervous system we live inside every day.
Full transcript with clickable timestamps linking back to the source video.
we are made to be dependent on pills medicine pharmacy mcdonald's television and at that system it has to change so so what happens when we're exposed to cold like to really cold conditions what are the benefits why why should we be even thinking about it because levels feel like the last thing i want to do is jump in a high school bath or give me an ice water i say always gradual cold exposure gradual first take a cold shower and a cold shower does wonders miracles our biggest enemy within our western society the killer number one is cardiovascular related diseases and anything that has got to do with the quality of life is a bad blood flow too much stress inside because the condition of the millions of little muscles in our 100 000 of kilometers like 70 000 miles of vascular channels and capillaries they contain all these little muscles when they are stimulated through cold showers they help the blood flow go through then the heart rate goes down 20 to 30 beats a minute 24 hours a day that means stress is out and the blood flow is guaranteed going better to all cells so oxy nutrients vitamins get better into the cells you get more energy and less stress that's what the body wants that's the natural state of our body to have sufficient energy for anything because that's the influencing into the mitochondria the the energy factories through aerobic dismalation oxygen oxygen getting in because the blood flow is being helped through the stimulation of those millions of little muscles and a cold shower a day keeps the doctor away in this case the doctor is arrived
away in this case the doctor is arrived okay so how long do you have to stay in the cold shower it begins with 30 seconds you got to take the shower anyway to cleanse yourself and and you know to be clean and everything so at the end just put the cold on yes 30 seconds seconds and naturally you will feel a boost naturally you will feel the effect of the stimulation on the millions of little muscles inside the interior of your this is the greatest vascular fitness exercise ever a cold shower and 30 seconds then it goes very fast because the condition of the vascular system system it goes very fast to its natural state which should be much better than the way we are because of our destinative behavior wearing clothes over our biggest organ all the time yeah that is it's for the body it's not logic so a cold shower a day it is the best exercise to train all these little muscles then you get a lot more energy you feel yeah a boost of energy yeah because it gets better into the cells and it produces more molecules more energy atp it's all logic yeah then naturally people are very fast able to uh prolong in inside the cold shower go for 45 seconds to one minute so when it arrives at three minutes there you go you got so much more outcome in energy in the day than the investment is by far it's nothing and you know what a cold shower is addictive yeah well i like the cold bath so i do the steam then i jump in just the cold water in the bathtub and i lay there for a bunch of minutes and it's
there for a bunch of minutes and it's it's incredible you literally feel your whole system come back online your brain come back online your energy increase uh it's pretty amazing um you know so so you created this this wim hof method activate your full human potential the book is incredible i encourage everybody to get a copy it's it's really not just about a simple technique to jump in cold water it's really about reclaiming your health your life your happiness your control over everything i mean it's not just a little technique to get in cold water that's the the side effect of of uh doing that is is your life right so you've learned how to control your breathing your heart rate your circulation to withstand really extreme temperatures to actually be injected with like infectious agents that would kill people and subdue them with your immune system under your conscious control and you've developed this into a teachable method that everybody can learn so it's not oh here's this cool guy who can do these party tricks it's like this is a gift you're giving to the world it's sort of it seems like a little bit of a shortcut than living in a cave and meditating for nine years instead of cheating but it really isn't and you've really developed these three simple pillars cold exposure conscious breathing and the power of your mind so can you talk about the method and how it works and what we should be doing doing first of all in the new book of scott carney he is an investigative journalist and he wrote that book uh what doesn't kill you right which has been sold in 34 languages all over the world very successful successful new york times bestseller blah blah the whole thing and he was to debunk me uh six years ago you know along with that yeah he is an anthropologist and uh an investigative journalist he was paid to debunk me and then two days later he was standing in the snow and barefoot doing
instead you know like like a clown he was standing in the snow it was making himself ridiculous almost no he he saw there that that it is real and in his new book he tells and he was investigating a lot of doctors and one of them is a psychiatrist doctor who's into brain scans and all and he tells that's a professor music and who is a professor music music states wim hof has found the secret of placebo placebo what we see as mind power and but we don't know where it is placebo now it isn't too it's an entity and we are able to connect with our will with that uh power of the mind and to intensify even even the placebo effect and to make it even stronger even for people's minds aren't disciplined or trained you're saying this is possible yes yes absolutely because they are born with it only if you are schooled all the time saying hey that you are not mark hyman but that you are peter franklin then at a certain moment you become peter franklin because mark ryman is not accepted it's not the way you cannot do this you are crazy if you are marker i mean and all those things you know we have been schooled and we are not able to tap in with at will with our mind into our bodies and to deal with stress and that's the way we are taught yeah and now i i teach the people within one weekend weekend within one weekend i teach them to change the paradigm man you can do whatever you want but you are built to be able at will to control yourself so much
at will to control yourself so much better inside your own body and it's only logic that our will which is already inside of our body that is able to control systems in our body to push buttons whenever is necessary necessary that that is a of course it's a complete different paradigm than up till now we thought it is possible we are made to be dependent on pills medicine pharmacy on uh or mcdonald's on television and all that that is our system yeah and that system is it has to change because that system is is polluting the world sodomizing the planet exploiting the planet and we become insensitive to ourselves and to others this is the time for awakening to our inner mechanisms our potential the way nature meant to be the way nature gave it to us at birth and and we have to listen to that it seems like there's little doorways that you've created right the cold exposure the breathing techniques the meditation mindset mindset that you use in the book these are the sort of doorways that people can access these abilities that help them manage their own minds and manage their own happiness and well-being and their health in ways that are pretty striking and i i think you know i want to just chat with you for a minute about this experiment that you did which i still find mind-blowing which is you willingly let doctors inject a known biotoxin from e coli into your bloodstream knowing that this is something that would kill a normal person and yet you were able to overcome this using your techniques and manage your immune system what i'm curious about is did you
curious about is did you consciously go okay i'm going to direct my immune system to fight these bacteria or these toxins or neutralize them or were you just dropping into a state of meditation like how did you how did that work i mean it just it seemed particularly this time of coronavirus we're all wanting to strengthen our immune system we're all wanting to make sure we are able to fight whatever we're exposed to how how can this play a role for us and what did you do and tell us about that study because it's so fascinating to me exactly exactly the same inflammatory markers that are the damaging factor in covet what is happening now that is the cytokines number one number six number eight number eleven i suppress them within a quarter of an hour hour and this was known not to be possible by humans humans i did my uh breathing i did my i changed my biochemistry and i do it willfully and of course i know oh the doctor is going to inject me with the endotoxemia now the e coli okay then the e coli is working now not the effect after one hour then it is at a then you begin to notice i began directly to fight the e coli uh reaction upon my immune cells with the immune system inside the cytokine storm and all that yeah i began to fight it directly by alerting my body body through my mind that was one and through the breathing breathing specific breathing exercises and they are within the method they are very accessible for everybody and they are very effective not only with me then i said oh but you are the ice man you can do this you can uh yeah get these sides against down where or 16 000
these sides against down where or 16 000 people could not you are the first one to show a complete different uh uh yeah a completely different picture you oh you have gone into the autonomous nervous system you have been influencing into the endocrine system into the immune system thought of all not possible and you have done that but you are the iceman then i said no i'm the iceman no at the most maybe you can say i'm a nice man that is nice for my ego but i'm just a simple man nice man but let me tell you there is we can do so much more than what you guys are thinking of in the science we are built to be able to tackle disease to prevent from disease for that we have our will and our our ability through our breath manipulation of our breath to go deeply within and to change the biochemistry to be on the alert to activate the adrenal access to the utmost and then danger can be emotional danger emotional stress mental stress uh bacterial stress viral stress any stress in the end is cell biological stress which is danger and then the adrenal access activation takes care of that wow there it is but you did but you also you said you you did also the study with people who weren't you and i read that they actually were also able to do the same thing you did even though they weren't the ice man they were like four other volunteers who were agreed to be injected with these toxins exactly 18 other or 18 others wow yes and 12 randomly chosen of those 18 after four days of training
after four days of training were exposed to the e coli bacteria as well well and they are all showed 100 percent uh being able to control and suppress decide to kin storm the inflammation they all felt good they made jokes they said they didn't uh injected us with e coli but with sugar water water that's unbelievable and they measured the cytokine and they measured all of that and they saw that change in your biology which we only see often with medication or not at all i mean it almost seems like this is such a simple technique to everybody to learn to help fortify them against coronavirus right i mean even if you have coronavirus do you think you could actually help to reduce the inflammation as a result absolutely especially when you feel the symptoms and i heard many already but it is not medically researched i don't know why maybe they are not interested like yourself in your position with integrative medicine you cannot make the money out of that so yeah but oh yeah it doesn't matter let's go past and let's get back to the facts facts the fact is that the uh the cytokines the internal key number one number six number eight and eleven are the damaging factors of the covet and we showed in 2014 in a comparative study with in groups we showed to suppress it within a quarter of an hour when you feel symptoms of covet then get into the breathing and you will be effectively able to suppress these cytokines cytokines that's it that's unbelievable so share with us what a technique of breathing that you teaches you just lie on the sofa or in bed bed and then relax
and then relax a relaxed body is able to store up oxygen in the tissue so relax there's nothing going on nice there you take a full breath in from the belly chest and you let it go [Music] [Music] and once again boolean letting go keep on going i explain what is happening yeah we are blowing up the carbon dioxide but it becomes very alkaline more than normal and that is a sign within the brain the a two alkaline adrenal axis activation and then the adrenaline pumps in it peaks peaks and anything that should not be in the inside of the body is going to be eliminated suppressed and what is it in covet cytokines so if you activate the adrenal axis through doing this 30 times then we go after 30 times because the oxygen trigger the trigger to breathe is carbon dioxide but it's blowing off body is very alkaline your biochemistry is great it's great and you just exhale you hold after the exhale so only a residual amount of air is left in the lungs and you stay in that uh in that condition and then easily you're able to go one
and then easily you're able to go one minute one and a half minutes maybe two minutes if you have done well the 30 deep breaths two minutes without with a residual amount of air in your lungs for two minutes without breathing and that what happens of course they brainstem the the primitive oxygen parameters they say there is no oxygen and they get shoot into the adrenaline it's all reactive so the brain stem the reactive part of our brain it's just the buttons are pushed and then the adrenaline shoots out a bit of frame shoots out over all the body and this is very good to detoxify so people with a hangover if they do this 20 minutes they detoxify they can go for a drink again so the idea is you 30 breaths then you hold your breath for a minute or two and then you do it again exhalation exhalation after the exhalation and then at the end or when you feel the urge of breathing again you take them fully in you hold for 15 seconds fully impulse and squeeze a little bit to your head because it's nice you bring in cerebral spinal fluid to the head then it gets into the brainstem and into the limbic system into the midbrain where we normally don't have so much blood flow because we overthink think think is where the blood flow goes now we push it from the inside inside the deepest part of the brain and then suddenly it begins to become an early alive alive and then we are able to connect at will because that's neurology so we are and then we get a sense of control over our mood
over our mood that is mood absolute mood regulation in case of people with uh depression mostly it's caused by inflammation and stress and emotional deprivation all that creates a biological or a biochemical deficit deficit and through doing this you feel you're filling up the attack and you feel that you are in control and nobody wants to feel bad then they feel good again that's incredible so basically the technique is 30 breaths hold for a minute or two take a breath hold for 15 seconds and then repeat yes repeat and you will see find out that every time it goes and easier and longer longer so do this for 20 minutes a day is what you're saying that's it that's what we do right now in san francisco big study on the dna with this method with this breathing and it's amazing the results are amazing on the dna so let's see two or three minute cold shower and 20 minutes of breathing and you can give up all your winter clothes you can hit the road at any time without car car you can fight coronavirus you can feel happy empowered in control of yourself you feel the connection and then when you need it you know what to do you just go within and then you learn about the lost connection within because of our exterior way of gaining information control over the world etc and that the control inside we lost and now it's back and we don't need to sit for nine years in a cave that's incredible it's incredible to me because i've always thought that you need to practice and meditate for decades in order to yeah
in order to yeah you know what mark they compared 10 minutes of this breathing specifically breathing it brings people deeper in the brain than people who are doing exercising for four hours a mindfulness a day four years wow all right i'm in i'm starting tomorrow anybody can do this i'm starting today i'm so excited about your book because your book the wim hof method achieving full human potential is exactly about teaching you how to do this it's not just the theory it's not just all the stories of how you have these superhuman feats but it's really about about how you as an individual can overcome some of the challenges we face as human beings that feel us make us feel powerless over our own minds over on happiness our own life our own well-being our own health and this is a very very empowering idea especially right now with all the turmoil the confusion the anxiety and the helplessness against the covet man there is so much more within us and it's time to wake up yeah it's so beautiful it's like you're the unlikeliest guru i love this like this crazy guy from the netherlands is just like found some doorway into something that was obscure to most of us for thousands of years and i'm just so grateful for your work and your commitment and you know i know you've got i i'm honored to be your guest on your podcast thank you very much of course you are a great bloody great guy guy thank you we have fun together when we're together yeah that's for sure and i'm coming i want to go as soon as uh kobe lightens up i want to go do one of your week-long what is it week-long workshops in poland you go to the ice in the winter it's like four
to the ice in the winter it's like four or five days and yeah in the end you will be exposed to the elements of cold wind wind that is wind chill and and all for five hours in your shorts and you're going to have a great bloody great time oh my god i need it you know why because i love swimming and there's lakes here and i i went in yesterday it was a little chilly and i was like i came out freezing i'm like oh no wim's gonna be mad at me i was so cold i had to come and take a hot shower i don't like yeah i i love hot showers showers but i also love the you know the cold gives you such a power and and if you do the cold on a regular basis like daily daily you become when you get older and uh you know so many people get old and get so many inflammation and deterioration of the condition and this will never get sick no more it's amazing yeah i know speaking of that i i think looking at the studies you've you've done done um and combining cold exposure and breathing meditation and your mental attitude has had huge effects on people's health and there are many students that you've had who are practicing this method for years and able to reverse diseases things like diabetes and parkinson's and lose weight and do incredible feats of that system how does that work i mean can you share some of these stories because this seems like a revolutionary approach to to treating illness yes autoimmune diseases is inflammation based on inflammation cytokines cytokine storms storms a over reactive immune system and we had no control over this so so when you begin to do this you learn to tap into the adaptive uh uh immune system you learn to go into the
system you learn to go into the uh uh the innate immune system both and and suddenly suddenly your rheumatism arthritis psoriasis a disease of crohn's parkinson's parkinson's all these things begin to become within your control you sense it you feel it you don't need to know what is all happening it you simply sense that you are in control over the inflammatory markers the inflammation doesn't happen anymore how is that possible now that is what is happening and that it needs to be researched researched and into the research right now with the rubber university here uh on rheumatism on arthritis because we have hundreds of people with arthritis and it's gone they control it it's incredible without medicine without pills they just control it they got there and the doctors say uh spontaneous remission man man look into their healing power interesting born with with well i'm very close to the uh the rheumatology department at cleveland clinic and the doctors they're very interested in opening these ideas it'd be amazing to do a study i love that do yes please let's see yeah let's go because autoimmune disease affects you know 80 million people more than diabetes more than heart disease more than cancer together and and the treatments we have are only somewhat effective and often have a lot of side effects and costs so i think it's a really important idea i love this idea so we're gonna figure this out now one of the other things you know is really relevant this is very important i know studies non-speculative evidence-based trials it's what you need i agree because 80 million people relieving of their suffering by autonomy within themselves that is love
that is love yeah all right you just said it it's love that is exactly what this is all about i i just you're so full of love you're so giving you're so on a mission to teach people how to be happy and be empowered and you know right now is one of the most challenging times in a long time in human history and we're all uh facing the threat of economic loss the disruption of our social fabric the the incredible fear and disease the depression and loss of autonomy and there's so many things that are taking us down and i i know this is a very tough time for a lot of people and and what you're saying is that a lot of this is in our minds i mean there are realities externally that are are real and yes there's loss and there's all sorts of things but how we handle that is up to us and using these methods in this power of of learning how to regulate your own biology and your own health that that actually you can relieve things like depression and anxiety and talk about how that works because we sort of hinted at it but i think it's worth spending a minute talking about how these techniques the wim hof method that you describe in your book achieving your full human potential which everybody should get and i'm excited to have my copy and go through it and practice it is how can we use this method to help us with this difficult time and how does it work to relieve depression and anxiety exactly exactly depression is directly related to a deregulated biochemistry a inflammation a deregulated immune system caused by oxidative stress could be stressed from mental stress emotional stress bacterial viral doesn't matter it's all cell biological stress are we able to uh have by a cell biological stress uh influence positively by us at will
uh influence positively by us at will yes we have and we've been before before you go on i just want to make a point for those listening depression from the traditional scientific perspective now we understand is a disease of inflammation in the brain so if you're depressed your brain's on fire and that's why what women's talking about is so important so continue i just wanted to make that point yes yes so that is deregulating the hormonal balance of dopamine serotonin in the brain because of the inflammation are we the question is are we and inflammation is the cause and effect of actually any disease disease but let's get back a are we able to bring down inflammatory markers or inflammation and i say yes within a quarter of hour within a quarter of our i mean a very developed stage of a disease takes more time of course it takes healing it takes energy it takes plaster plasticity and all we are all able to influence therein vigorously if we just take up uh the techniques well i've seen so many people with so many diseases thought of incurable without the age of pills and medicines and now these people took on these natural ways and they're pure they get a control a sense of control within their own bodies and then it all starts starts but for prevention i tell you and depression which is inflammation we are very able within 20 minutes to feel a different human uh condition of the mind within 20 minutes just do this breathing and then point out and feel because feeling in the end is the real understanding
understanding wow incredible whim i mean this is such a gift you know one of the things that you talk about um is how when we push ourselves physically that that we we learn about our boundless capacity as as humans and of our spirit can you talk about that yes the human performance when i get people people anybody anybody within five minutes i can make them doubling doubling their push-ups performance performance without breathing without holding your breath holding your back back holding holding they hold their breath and push up like twice the amount in number of their push-ups they ever did wow so i can do 50 push-ups you're going to get me to 100 yes and then without the aid of breathing wow okay so then do you do tomorrow or or after this or because you gotta lay on the ground but this is what it is we if we are able to influence power direct into the biochemistry biochemistry into the muscle tissue and make it alkaline alkaline then you know performance when you become sore acidic you're not able to perform anymore yes but if you make it super alkaline you keep on going because the neurotransmitters are able to keep on going this is the simplicity of performance it's learning how to control and influence deeply into your biochemistry are we able to do that yes we showed this and that's it we are incredible all of us us well you know what you're talking about is is regulating your ph through the breath so for people who aren't medical your ph you know is your acid alkaline
your ph you know is your acid alkaline balance and it's kept to a very strict number in your body 7. 4 but it can vary slightly and it has big impacts on your physiology on chemical reactions on performance performance and the best way to quickly regulate the only way to quickly regulate your ph is through your breath so carbon dioxide if it builds up uh will tend to make you more alkaline right and if it's low it'll make you more acidic so if you're you're increasing your carbon dioxide you're actually becoming more alkaline right right yeah what we do is actually blowing up carbon dioxide we blow it off we blow it up and you're it's being measured in the university university and it shows that the ph level went uh from uh yeah 7. 3 7. 4 to point eight so uh to a two eight even and you know what happens with the virus they become irreversibly damaged viruses when it reaches the point of eight that is that's more alkaline yes very alkaline but it only peaks and then it comes back to its original state but you know what happens in most of the people with uh autoimmune diseases they have a chronic presence of being slightly acidic acidic yes their lymphatic system and they don't clean up inside whatever the reason doesn't matter it's there and that is the foundation for uh outing a deregulation of the immune system in the end it gets back into the system and with this techniques we are able to empty the lymphatic system of being acidic and that's incredible make it make the right to clean it up that
make the right to clean it up that that's that's prevention of uh autoimmune diseases so so simple depression on immunity happiness yes happiness yeah man so good so yeah what do you say to people who kind of say oh this is nonsense this can't be true i don't believe it this is what i always say you know non-sense try to sense this feeling is the understanding do it just once once and then judge yeah that's good i think try it you like it like i said right yeah uh so you you've inspired so many people around the world what what are you most proud of of what you've done uh every time i get a letter that i saved somebody's life or that he cured of a terrible disease or depression or being out of this dark space where they have been with a family for god's sake not being able to be a genuine beautiful father or mother or over their children then that blesses my soul that is the best yeah it is it's nice hearing those stories i i think it's just incredible and you know when um what's your vision for the wim hof method what would you like to see happen with this you're putting this book out in the world you've been doing this for a long time you have a cult of followers but now you're getting out into a bigger stage what's your vision my vision is that we actually uh i want to show that everybody is able to awake through a non-dogmatic choice to become happy which is the hormone control over the hormonal system to become healthy which is the control over the immune system and to become strong which is the control over the metabolic processes in the cell are we able to do this we have shown this in science and now it's coming to you as a non-dogmatic choice and that's what i wish people to
choice and that's what i wish people to be happy strong and healthy man it's a great place let's enjoy it i love that you know i think it's so true i mean you're you're such a gift to the world and you've taken something that's very abstract and uh mystical and religious and turned into something that's really practical accessible immediate and powerful and its ability to reset your mind and your body body on a path from disease and depression and despair to hope and happiness and health you know what whim is talking about is you have two nervous systems essentially you have the voluntary and the involuntary nervous system you know the voluntary nervous systems you can raise your hand you can scratch your head head you're doing that at will but there's a whole set of operations in your body your heart rate your breathing uh all the basic functions of digestion your immune system your endocrine system they're all governed by your nervous system that's called the automatic or autonomic or involuntary nervous system and this is not something that we typically can control yes we can control our breath we can breathe faster we can breathe slower and that's the doorway you're talking about into this system but what you're talking about is really a you know a medical paradigm shift which is that we can have voluntary control over what we previously thought were involuntary functions such as regulating our body temperature right which is what you do when you climb mount everest in your shorts and this is you know what i'm really curious about is you know you mentioned these esoteric texts and in tibet these practices you know they were they we were like searching for outer space and we're going to outer space they're going into inner space so they the technology systems that we've developed that are our current modern technology systems the amount of science has gone into that they put that into the science of the mind and to understanding our biology understanding how to influence it and and it seems like you somehow hit upon that there's an ancient technique called tumo from the tibetans which is used as a spiritual practice where they teach monks how to dry the sheets they dip
monks how to dry the sheets they dip sheets in ice water they wrap themselves in the sheets and when they're able to dry the sheets then they send them up to the top of the mountain in their underwear to sit in the snow all night not freezing and essentially was that the thing you read about that got you started thinking about this yes absolutely and got me absolutely intrigued because there is not only more than meets the eye i wanted to find it i wanted to find what was written and all these esoteric books books from the bible to the quran to the bhagavad gita to the torah and all the textbooks on yoga this uh patanjali all those things i wanted to see and how to experience what are they talking about what is this possible connection to a deeper level within and now i found it and i brought it to science i found the proprioception in pteroception being able to be top down regulated so it all began with being inspired looking at gutumo which is one of the esoteric practices of in buddhism uh uh done by naropa the doctrines of yoga yoga tumor is one of them goomba is another is running and trance for days and trans running yes trans running and you got the levitation lagemia a cd you get all kinds of supernatural so-called supernatural abilities within us but they have to be awakened you have to learn to connect with those abilities and i thought very inspiring but what i actually want is to find happiness happiness strength
strength and health yeah so for that i went inside and the cold is a it shows you who you are and what you are yeah yeah you have a possibility to learn to control interior mechanisms inside through the power of your conscious will it is concentration and then neurologically neurologically we learn to connect with systems existent existent within us but but within our western science thought of impossible to connect with impossible to connect or to control at will by humans and now i have shown in studies how to do it for example the last study i did in uh in michigan detroit psychiatry brain scans i showed how to tap in consciously into the deepest part of our brain which is the petty aqueductal grey hemisphere the place where opioids and cannabinoids are being activated and but this was known to be not possible to be done at will and now i showed how to do it in brain scans just by the my sheer willpower so in brain scans not even moving i was not allowed to move just by the power of my thought i was able to make cold water coming on my skin skin and just by thought making my skin temperature not going down that is top
that is top regulation in pteroception thought of non-existent in science and now they saw hey i was doing that all the time and the temperature never decreased it stayed one degree up is home one degree more than normal it's there i positioned it apparently that's the way it works and it stayed over there after exposure of cold water for uh 45 minutes and it stayed over there and then they saw saw what normally happens with test subjects because they had 74 test subjects uh done the same thing in the brain scan and the fmri they saw them and then they saw that the insula was very low activity and the pre-frontal cortex was very high activity because of the stress stress but they never saw the deep brain stem activity of the periaqueductal periaqueductal the endocannabinoid system at work and in my case my endocannabinoid system inside inside was at will being activated and thus i had a great time my insula was very nice my prefrontal cortex or the stress was not there because i had a good time while being in the brain scan exposed to icy cold water incredible incredible that shows the deep esoteric disciplines disciplines of the kutumo and the buddhists and the yogis and all this is what i show people to be able to do within a weekend incredible so let me just stop you there because what you just said there was groundbreaking
there was groundbreaking um aside from the ways in which you can control yourself that that last sentence that this can be taught in a weekend i'm reading a book now called the way of the white clouds by lama govinda maybe you know that book and he talks about these practices whether it's tumult the trance walking the levitation uh these quotes superpowers that these monks get after being in a cave for nine years meditating or 12 years meditating but what you're talking about is a weekend that that actually you know you're not necessarily that guy who's been meditating 40 000 hours but somehow you've found a shortcut to access access your happiness and in a way these practices are really not about having super powers who cares if you can jump in an ice cold lake fine maybe maybe you won't drown if you jump in the ocean if you fall off a boat but really it's not about that it's about mastering control over your own biology your own mind in a way that most of us don't think we have the power to so tell us how can you take a bunch of overweight unhealthy people from the city and have them climb kilimanjaro in their shorts and be great after just a few days of training like how does that even work because you know you've been mastering this for 25 years yes last time i climbed kilimanjaro in shorts shorts the oldest participant without former experience in mountaineering suffering from lyme's disease he did it in shorts in 31 hours he is healing people with lyme's disease now because he normally it's four days to go up right to get up there normally it's five to nine days and then 40 percent in well-dressed with a lot of layers about 40 only a summit yeah and in my case everybody is going to summit and then in record times we are defying all the existence
are defying all the existence physiological laws of acclimatization of red cells and white cells we just show a different paradigm and that is possible in only say one day unbelievable and that is amazing so how do you do it because you know you usually have to meditate for 40 000 hours to have these changes in your brain right we see these the altered traits we've had dr daniel goldman on our podcast talking about these studies with richard davidson at the university of michigan and looking at brain imaging of these meditators who've been meditating for 40 000 hours these olympic meditators and have all this control and power over their their physiology and their brain and their mood their happiness but you're saying it's a weekend training yeah maybe one day or one morning even oh god it's mark it it's like your house is on fire fire then you don't think you do and then incredible things happen you think too much we are over complicated complicated we have never learned to bring the blood flow from our neocortex into the deeper hemispheres of our brain which is the seat of all those so-called supernatural supernatural abilities of ours the adrenal access we showed showed in in comparison of research where they took the blood of people going into their first bungee jump and these people doing these breathing exercises exercises doing these brief they took the adrenaline of those people doing breathing exercises and i can show people doing that within 10 minutes that they have a higher level peaking of adrenaline than the people in fear going for their first bunch of jump wow
for their first bunch of jump wow see what i mean it's fully in control they are lying down they feel a kind of high and they are tapping into their adrenal axis deeper than those people going into their first bungee jump that's incredible if you have a control over the adrenal access then you know how to reset yourself to the way nature meant it to be the utmost of functionality functionality because there is danger and now you get a control over that and then suddenly the tables are turned then suddenly bacteria and virus and uh uh how do you say anxiety and all those things they disappear yeah yeah incredible so so you talk about cold being your only master your only teacher why is cold so healing healing yeah i call this because it shuts up it's it's not complicated you just have to adapt you are learning about the mind is learning how to let go of your fear anxiety too much thinking overthinking complicated being no in the cold you learn to let go so the body is able to respond to adapt and then you get into the adaptive mode of the immune system you get into the adaptive power of the body and you learn about it and with that because when you go into the cold and you learn to do that that on regular basis then the neurology changes and you get neurological pathways to the adaptive power of your own body the way nature equipped you with with very logical and that bacteria and a virus and anxiety mutant regulation all those things change they
regulation all those things change they happen naturally yeah because that's the way we are built to be not in anxiety because we have to judge and to be alert we have a system for that inside inside so depression bipolar and all those things we are doing the studies now with san francisco and michigan on bipolar and uh depression to show that we have found keys to equip people with a higher control within their own brain using cold therapy or using just breathing most of it is breathing because what do you do when you go into the cold you learn to breathe [Laughter] [Laughter] so the deep breathing uh influences power direct the biochemistry and the biochemistry changed is learning how to suppress the inflammation yeah and then it doesn't go through the blood a blood brain barrier or the brain blood barrier and affecting and deregulating their hormonal homeostasis over there and calling a call to depression or feeling bad or feeling confused or anxiety or anything like that we have a natural ability to rebalance our bio chemistry through breathing ten minutes how did you get started on this you weren't born the iceman how did you become the iceman yeah exactly i i was born a human uh like anybody else but uh i think it was a trauma not only me i say this it was my mother i was one of the twins and unexpected i was the second i was too long in and then i almost suffocated and i was born in the cold of the hole
born in the cold of the hole just before entering into the operation room so i think it is it inflicted a trauma right over there and that made me different of my identical twin it was you know being a getting born uh being almost suffocated in the cold of a hole that inflicts on that little being there something yeah you don't know but it's there and that made me always different of my twin brother identical twin brother because he has been uh experimented or researched upon because we are identical that's incredible yeah and it shows that he is not capable of doing what i do because i trade but the drive i got from that trauma made me a soul search a searcher for something that is deeply within me and i had to go and connect with that and solve it and then you know where i solved it where i found it when i was 17 consciously i felt the attraction to go into the cold water i just felt and i went in and it felt like this is it i was looking for this you know with without words and that made me feel good and then the other day i went back and i did the same thing and it's and it felt good as it did the first day and then i began to do it of course every day and then you what happens when you go into the court order you do you take a deep breath that's natural a natural reflex because you need to influence your biochemistry deeply when cold ice water which is a
deeply when cold ice water which is a stressor stressor is inflicting upon you as an impact you need to take change the biochemistry inside and that is done by deep breathing yeah yeah then i separated the deep breathing at ho doing it at home and i saw all what i had been reading upon these chakras the esoteric disciplines i learned to control the breath and to manipulate my nervous system endocrine system to the level of the autonomic nervous system yeah thought of impossible by humans so i did this for 25 years on my own because everybody was thinking i was crazy crazy swimming outside well you are crazy but that's okay in a good way i'm bloody crazy about my wife and my life yes yes and after all it's not so crazy after all showing in signs to go past the existent paradigm of uh uh our possible influence at will within our own bodies and mind that means the autonomic nervous system endocrine system immune system all a lymphatic system we were to uh believed we were schooled in that that was impossible to interact with or to influence simply inside those systems of ours and now we are going in comparative studies studies to make people within a couple of days being able to tap into all those systems that in contrary of what was written in medical science
medical science if you loved that last video you're going to love the next one check it out here depression is not about serotonin yes you know serotonin is an important neurotransmitter but a large part of depression is actually related to neural inflammation in fact yeah studies have shown that people who have depression
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59 minutes of source material 75 Reacher quality score
cold exposure is not valuable because it is extreme. It is valuable because it is clear. The body receives a sharp thermal signal, the nervous system responds, and over time that response can become more composed.
Breathing practice gives people a practical way to influence arousal, focus, and stress chemistry. In plain language, the breath becomes a lever. Used with care, it can move the body from reactivity toward regulation.
Hof points to research showing that trained participants can influence inflammatory response under controlled conditions. That does not make cold a cure-all. It does show that the immune system is more responsive to behavior than many people were taught.
The useful protocol is not performance. It is repeatable contact with discomfort, followed by recovery. Cold showers, gradual immersion, and measured breathing all work best when they leave the person clearer, not depleted.
The body is not a machine to dominate. It is an intelligence to train.
Begin with the final 30 to 60 seconds of a shower cool enough to command attention.
Keep breathing steady before making the cold colder or the session longer.
Stop if you feel faint, panicked, numb in an unusual way, or unable to recover warmth.
