Two months ago I moved into a new house and promptly bought myself something that I have been lusting after for at least 3 years – a commercial cold plunge.
I grew up jumping into ice covered lakes in the High Sierra. (There’s a infamous story in my family where, at 5 years old, I didn’t jump into an ice covered lake. I’ve been doing penance ever since.)
In 2017, I built a homemade chest freezer cold plunge. The problem with using a chest freezer – beyond the slight chance of electrocution – is keeping the water cold, clean, and circulating.
So when I moved into my new house and extensive backyard, I splurged.
I’ve noticed a lot of positive benefits from sitting in freezing cold water for a few minutes every day:
- It’s the best (i.e. most abrupt) way to wake up in the morning.
- I feel energized for several hours afterwards.
- Cold plunging is good for my physique.
- But there’s one unexpected thing about cold plunge that I’m just starting to explore, and that’s my penchant to avoid it.
I’ve sat in my tub of freezing cold water for at least a few seconds every single day for two months. My daily average is two minutes at 39°.
But I will still go to extraordinarily great lengths to avoid the cold water each morning!
Some mornings I will procrastinate for 90 minutes; I’ll make tea, check email, deal with an urgent work thing, listen to a podcast. Anything to avoid the freezing cold water.
I now judge the efficiency of my day, and my wellbeing in general, by how quickly I get into the cold plunge in the morning.
Homework: What are you avoiding?
I’ve begun noticing other things that I’m avoiding.
The mark of success is not just whether I get into my cold plunge but how much I procrastinate beforehand. Whether I’m avoiding the behavior.
My homework, then, is to do something that you “don’t want to do” and to do it with attention.
- Go for a hard walk and notice how difficult it is.
- Eat very differently for one meal than you usually do, and notice how to feel afterwards.
- Take a cold shower, instead of a hot one.
Ultimately, I can’t prescribe something “difficult” for you because it depends on your baseline. (A cold shower isn’t hard for me anymore.)
The key is to notice how you feel before you engage in this difficult behavior. Notice your temptation to avoid that behavior, and then how you feel after you’ve done so.
Until next week,
Robin