As a lover of psychology and nature, I’ve noticed something magic happens when a place can teach you about your mind. Nowhere is this more true than the bench of a well-crafted sauna. As the almost-too-hot air of a deep breath wakes up your nose and sweat begins to bead on your chest, so too can your thoughts begin to come into focus in a way that is increasingly rare in the breakneck pace of the modern world.
No matter how smooth the heat or how pleasant the hint of an essential oil hanging in the air is, eventually the sound of “the negotiation between the ears” starts to take shape. How far into this round am I? Halfway? Has it been longer? Shorter? Did I flip the sand timer when I sat down? Am I recovering or pushing myself? What’s a proper goal to aim for?
Thoughts like these, or more specifically, the awareness of thoughts like these, have become my favorite part of a sauna routine because I am reminded over and over again of the inherent fickleness of the human mind. Over the last decade, I’ve sat in stuffy basement saunas with cheap electric heaters to rooftop saunas filled with löyly rising from a colossal wood-burning stove, and I never ceased to be amazed at my mental chatter as my body initially relaxes, then acclimates, and eventually reaches its limit. And then predictably, as the door swings open (not too wide, of course, so as to preserve the heat for my fellow thermic bathers), my skin tingles as I am enveloped by the rush of cool air outside the hot box.
Of course, then the cycle inverts: what began as a refreshing chill can soon become uncomfortable, and sitting in a relaxing chair in an ambient room I begin to think of how soon I should start my next round in the hot box. If I’m fortunate enough to take a sauna at a place that also has an ice tub or better yet, a natural body of water, this familiar fickleness is made all the more dramatic by a quick transition from an upper bench to a polar plunge. The cold is a great simplifier; as I fight to retain some semblance of control over my breath, to turn gasps into steady cycles of inhales and exhales, it clarifies. I am nowhere but here; where else could I possibly be? Mere moments ago, thoughts of escaping the heat were all that occupied my mind, and yet now I seem to be ready to charge back into the realm of steam as I feel chilled to my core.
These cycles of contrasting sensations have become my happy place, and round by round I experience more joy, relishing in both the physiological endorphin release and the laughter that rises from my emotional body when I witness my ceaseless desire to be hot when I am cold and cold when I am hot. And when I can remain truly amused at my self-imposed condition, I don’t judge it; I only note it. This process of observation is the invitation I extend to myself to be fully present. Not changing. Not chastising. Just folding in some more ingredients of awareness. Oh. I’m doing that thing again. Neat.
I believe when we see fickleness as our constant mental companion, it can open us up to more compassion for ourselves and others throughout our whole day, as we begin to see how often we move, trance-like, from one appetitive desire to the next. But when we begin to interrupt this pattern, then we can begin to be free. Or at least in my case, endlessly entertained by the profound simplicity of the hot, the cold, and the temporal line that connects them
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