The pain threshold - what ice baths taught me about trauma

Fear of discomfort rarely stopped me from accomplishing extraordinary deeds.

People often ask me: were you not scared of crossing the Himalayas all alone on a motorbike?

My favourite joke in reply to this is, ‘the only thing that freaks me out for real is the idea of falling in love.’

All my life I have engaged in practices that many would define as ‘hardcore’ and ‘extreme’.

I was a rebel at school, a rebel through life, a solitary person that needed input in the form of adventures, always seeking experiences that could bring me to the edge of being a human and as such, push me to act out of instinct instead of from the realm of rationality.

Cause facing danger throws me back into the primordial act of pure surviving.

It is a straight forward ticket to silence in the mind.

Adrenaline is my favorite drug.

It’s the wonder substance that our bodies gift us to help us cope with intense challenges.

When I fell with my bike in the middle of Spiti Valley, it is adrenaline that gave me super powers and allowed me to lift almost 300kg of metal and luggage.

Incredible, isn’t it?

Adrenaline, among others, decreases the body’s capacity to feel pain.

So what if this constant seek of adrenaline was just a coping mechanism to avoid pain?

Then came the ice baths and all my strength fell off.

It was disappointing.

Where has my inner warrior gone to?

In our retreats we offer this practice cause it has just so many physical and mental benefits.

Ice baths were a practice new to me.

Being born in the Alps, jumping into cold rivers and lakes was not threatening.

But staying inside of them for minutes long?

Forcing myself to endure the ice and that terrible feeling of freezing without the chance of escaping?

No thanks.

When I am in an ice bath I get furious.

It is a rage that is out of my mental comprehension.

Totally irrational.

The whole of me just wants to scream and snap at whoever is there to push me with laughter and care.

I feel I want to dematerialise.

And cry.

I asked myself: I do Kambo regularly.

I started getting piercings and tattoos since such a young age and honestly I always felt that the pain felt during the process was an appealing rite of passage.

I broke my body countless times and even that didn’t keep me from going on with my life as if nothing had happened.

I had many relationships that caused me emotional pain and I stayed in them cause my discomfort threshold is just too high.

I have a high tolerance to pain.

So why can’t I endure ice baths?

Ice baths don’t allow one to run away from pain.

Ice baths make you face the demons with no distractions.

What is your demon?

My history with ice cold water goes back to my childhood.

I was a raging child.

Sometimes I would just start screaming a loud ‘aaaaaaah’ for over an hour like a mad person and there was no way of stopping me.

Until the ‘Scottish shower’ came into play.

One of my caretakers decided that forcing me under ice cold water, clothes on, was a good way to make me stop screaming.

Truth is, it worked miracles.

As soon as I would announce one of my tantrums, they would say: ’Do you want a Scottish shower?’

And I would immediately lay low.

At that time, psychology was less developed.

I want to believe that nowadays parents would ask themselves, what in hell is wrong with my kid and why are they having hysterical crises?

But back then things might have been different.

The ‘Scottish showers’ were obviously traumatic for me.

They wrongly shaped my way of managing my emotions.

They affected my capacity to trust humans.

They taught me to not express my pain.

They taught me that love is not understanding.

And that, if we do ask for help, probably no one will listen.

So thought up bitch.

This memory of me as a kid hit me crystal clear during one of the ice baths.

It brought up a chain of reflections about human’s behaviour, much of which is totally unconscious and explodes in the weirdest and most unexpected ways.

Ice baths made me find compassion to myself.

It is the one practice where I need to watch out how I push myself.

I need to stop comparing myself and wanting to exceed.

Cause I can’t force the process.

I need to embrace it with calm and with the power of one breath at a time.

I am not having just an ice bath, I am having a psychology session with the most broken part of my inner child, the one that has endured violence.

As soon as I understood the process that was happening, I could start to relax some more.

I watch out for my inner talks right before entering the ice bath.

I am getting better at it with every practice.

Last time I even managed to smile.

Next time you have a disproportionate reaction, instead of dismissing it or trying to silence it, journey to its roots.

Ask yourself: why am I acting like this?

Where is this coming from?

Going at the root of a trauma is an enlightening experience.

It can guide you through an at times very painful journey of self understanding.

Use it.

Life and its vicissitudes are the best teachers.

We are here to transmute and transform to become the most raw and authentic versions of ourselves, in the good and in the bad.

Vulnerability is what makes us unique.

Let’s stop suppressing our cores and instead let’s begin embracing our weirdness.

Pic 1: The struggle

Pic 2: The release

Pic 3: Sharing is caring with Mike :) Thank you for guiding me.

With love,

The Alchemy Of Fire