Today’s podcast notes are from the Huberman Lab Podcast. Andrew Huberman discusses the benefits of Heat and Sauna and shares some valuable tools and protocols to help you improve your physical and mental health. You can watch the full video here.
Heat exposure or Sauna is a powerful way to improve health and longevity. It reduces mortality to cardiovascular events and risk of stroke. More regularly you do heat exposure (Sauna), 4 to 7 times per week, 50% less likely to die from cardiovascular diseases.
Simple guide to Heat and Cold Exposure
Approximately 57 minutes Heat and 11 minutes Cold Exposure per week shows major improvements on metabolism and helps to increase Brown Fat. The timings can break down to smaller chunks so they can be more manageable.
Most fats in our body are white fats. Too much white fat can lead to obesity. On the other hand, brown fat stores energy in smaller spaces and produces more energy than white fats. Brown fat can generate long-lasting energy more than white fats. Deliberate cold exposure helps the body to produce brown fat.
Heat exposure to increase growth hormone
Certain forms of heat exposure can promote the release of large amounts of growth hormone. However, when we start getting adapted to heat, the release of growth hormone reduces dramatically. On the other hand 2 hours of sauna exposures (you can divide this to 30 minutes of 4 sessions) per week can increase the release of growth hormone by 16 folds. So if you are aiming to increase the release of the growth hormone, it is better to stick to 2 hours sessions per week every 10 days or so.
Heat Exposure promotes better cardiovascular health
Regular use of sauna can reduce mortality to cardiovascular events. It also reduces the risk of having a stroke. According to many studies, more often people do saunas, their health gets better. Sauna sessions help your body to mimic cardio vascular exercise. Your heart starts beating at a higher rate and blood starts circulating in your body faster. So even when you are sitting down in the sauna, you are getting cardiovascular exercise.
How Does Heat Exposure Improve Mental health?
Regular heat exposure reduces the cortisol levels in the body. When you are exposed to short-term acute stress, the Endorphin system is activated. When we are in a sauna Dynorphin are released in our body. Dynorphin relates to pain, agitation, and discomfort. As a consequence of this dynorphin release, your body counteracts with Endorphins that soothe and make you feel happy.
In time this process of Dynorphin and Endorphin release becomes more efficient. Your baseline level of mood increases and your contentment and joy lasts longer.
Tools to cool/heat your core quickly
This is a very useful tool to reduce and control fever. It allows cooling of blood and body a lot quicker.
It involves cooling the upper half of your face, palm of your hands, and balms of your feet. You can use cold towels or anything that won’t damage your skin because of the cold. You can follow the same protocol to heat your core.
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