I’ve been intrigued by Wim Hof and his unique breathing and cold exposure techniques for some time.
Like a lot of people, I’ve tinkered with the breathing protocols, from time to time, and done regular immersion sessions in cold water (mainly cold showers, and winter swimming). It always felt good and invigorating, but I knew that something was missing and I wasn’t getting the full benefits by watching the odd YouTube video and following instructions on Wim’s original Inner Fire app.
There’s a limit to how much you can learn from YouTube videos and cobbling together pieces of information, second hand, from different sources on the internet, and I knew I needed a more immersive approach (get it).
If you want to learn something properly and get the full benefits, then it is always best to hire a coach and learn, first hand, from someone qualified or with experience in that area. In the long run, it will speed up your learning curve significantly, ensure you get better results and save you a lot of time, effort and money.
Which is why I decided to take the plunge and book a private coaching session with Wim Hof certified instructor, Emma Estrela Corrie.
I had a three hour private session with Emma and I would highly recommend doing the same to anyone else interested in this kind of thing.
As well as learning all of the theory and Emma’s story, I was able to learn the finer points of the breathing techniques and then do a sixty-minute session of breathing under Emma’s supervision.
For me, this was the highlight of the coaching and I felt amazing afterwards.
And then came the ice bath.
Two-minutes of full immersion (hands as well, which was the hardest part) in a cast iron bath, filled with cold water and 40kg of ice.
I would highly recommend this experience to anyone (although you should not go straight to the ice bath stage and should gradually acclimatise yourself to cold exposure over time – more on how to do this in a future post) and will be incorporating the breathing and ice baths into my routine from now on.
The biggest benefits I noticed were:
- A deep sense of relaxation for the rest of the day (this was a massive stress reliever)
- The best night’s sleep I think I’ve ever had (I slept like a baby and felt deeply refreshed the next morning)
Anyway, watch the video to see how I got on (sorry about the wind noise) and you can laugh at my trying to warm up afterwards, with Wim’s horse stance exercises.
P.S. Perhaps my favourite part of the whole experience was learning the saying “you come out of the cave, but there is no bear” in order to remind myself that the thought of something is often worse than the reality (like climbing into a bath filled with ice).