For me the appeal was the mental and psychological benefit attributed to taking cold showers. Doing something as uncomfortable as stepping into a shower and turning the cold water on full can condition you mentally to do something that will be difficult to do. Once you have confronted and conquered the initial unpleasantness of a cold shower, everything else becomes a little easier. I attribute this little addition to my training for contributing to my success in completing the Ironman, something I still shake my head about today in disbelief.
Fast forward to 2022. I will turn 70 in October or, as I prefer to say, I will celebrate the 31st anniversary of my 39th birthday. To commemorate this once in a lifetime milestone, I hope to do something outrageous. Something like, say, a 50K trail run with my son-in-law, Michael, in the mountains of North Carolina. I decided that cold showers will be a part of that training to help insure I am prepared for what will be fun, but undoubtedly uncomfortable as well.
This brings me to the point of this post: comfort. In the U.S. we have become enamored of comfort. We are so addicted to being comfortable that we will do almost anything to avoid discomfort. We want to be physically comfortable, mentally and emotionally comfortable, and spiritually comfortable. Anything that shakes that is bad. Unfortunately, this love affair with comfort is killing us. As a physician I see the results in an endless stream of patients who are obese, suffer chronic illnesses that are directly tied to an affluent, sedentary lifestyle, and who are clueless as to why. Ask them to alter their lifestyle, get out of their comfort zone and exercise, change their diet, and take charge of their lives and they visibly recoil or just stare at you uncomprehendingly. Only a tiny minority take my advice to heart.
People have an endless ability to rationalize why they cannot do something difficult, often without even trying. It is so much easier to stay in your comfort zone than to step out and risk being uncomfortable and even failing. Until you can make peace with the idea that being uncomfortable is not so bad, and can even lead to good things, you will be stuck in your particular rut indefinitely.
What are you seeking to do? What is your why? Get fit, lose weight, change a career, return to school, write that book? The time to step out is now. Starting can be as simple as getting up tomorrow morning, stepping into the shower, and turning on the cold water. Of course, I have to add the physician disclaimer that, if you have a heart or other chronic medical condition, you should check with your physician first. You have nothing to lose and much to gain.
Richard T. Bosshardt, MD, FACS