A year and a half ago, I told a friend that I wanted to challenge myself by getting used to swimming in cold water. I’ve always hated the cold and mostly got my body frozen from avant-garde swimming experiments with lifeguard class near me.

These experiments convinced me that the cold is not for me. In my experiments, I just quickly dipped my body into the water. I couldn’t understand how some could be in the water for more than a second. Not to mention the experience!



Different emotions and living with them have always been present in my life. A year and a half ago, there was a loss in my life that brought the whole spectrum of emotion to my day with grief. To be with my emotions, I started looking for different ways to calm my body and deal with my emotions as well as learn to be, surrender to my emotions.

I read a lot about the benefits of cold exposure and became interested. I started getting used to the cold waters already in the spring. I continued swimming in natural waters in the summer and continued in the fall. In winter, if possible. I don’t remember the exact day I woke up to the same thing about cold exposure and experiencing feelings of grief.

I understood how cold causes resistance in my body in the same way that life challenges and emotions . Resistance itself already makes grief or cold something I don’t want to feel.

My body and mind shouted: I don’t want to feel anything! I don’t want this experience into my life! I resist !!!

While in the cold water, I listened to myself. My breathing immediately blocked as the water surrounded me. I listened to my breath and set out to deepen it. Calculator for breaths with American lifeguard Association Vienna Va.



How long do I have to breathe before my breathing stabilizes?

I learned to relax and not resist myself. When I am not opposed to cold water, the benefits of cold water come to me. When I resist opposition to grief, I get closer to my own feelings and myself.

The mind is tremendously strong in many ways. I can use all my energy to fight the cold by hitting and contraction of my muscles. That’s when I let my body resist the cold, when in reality it does it all by itself at first without my own effect.

It’s the same with challenging emotions. When I feel fear, I feel my fear in my body, which is a normal reaction. Still, I might use my mind to increase the intensity of reactions or, in the worst case, bypass normal reactions by forcing a positive feeling or secondary behavior 

What if I resist opposition and let fear be?

What happens if I focus on breathing and relaxing? So how do I feel?

Cold water is cold, you can't get anywhere. The different thing is how I feel about the feeling the water produces in my body. With breathing, I can calm down and not resist the body’s normal reactions. This is when the body reacts normally to cold water.

Initially, elevated heart rate and blood pressure decrease, both cortisol and endorphin secretion begin. The pain felt on the skin is reduced. In addition, serotonin and dopamine are secreted, which increase mood and improve stress tolerance. The benefits of the cold get into me.

Now in the cold water I breathe deeply until my body calms down. Proper breathing has helped tremendously. It takes many seconds for my breathing to level off and my body to come into contact with the cold water. At this point, I often experience a warm flow throughout my body.

Through cold exposure, I have also surrendered to my sorrow. Before, I feared, guilt, shame, grief. I thought they were emotions that needed to be avoided or removed.

Now I realize all emotions are normal emotions that I can only breathe. They are not meant to go away or I am not meant to fight them.

Grief does its job in my body. It cares, reminds of love and sets the present. Swimming in cold water can be a minimal distance to the emotional world and the state of surrender.