Hey and Happy New Year to you!
Okay, so thankfully this isn’t more doomporn to add to the news cycle. It’s a brief story about an incredibly painful but also incredibly joyful New Year tradition that spans the whole world and goes back probably thousands of years.
In the first days and weeks of the New Year, people of all ages and races and genders happily come together and subject themselves to some seemingly nonsensical communal suffering.
I thought it was a crazy Irish thing. Hungover or still half-drunk lunatics dressed in animal costumes and big hats sprint into the ice-cold waters of the Irish sea (averaging 9.6°c / 49°F in January) to start the year with a splash.
But it seems the tradition has sprung up in many places independently, like in The Netherlands. Beginning in the 1960s with a small group of people in Zandvoort, these days 50,000 people across the country take part in the New Year dip tradition.
Check out this video of around 10,000 red-hatted Hollanders braving the North Sea head-on at Scheveningen beach, The Hague.
Then I looked into it a bit more. I found it’s also a tradition in Sweden. Switzerland. Denmark. Scotland. Wales. England. Hungary. France. Italy. Spain. Germany. Russia. Brazil. And the US.
Some of them are more religious. Like in Belgrade, Serbia, where an Eastern Orthodox priest throws a crucifix into the river Danube, and the first person to dive in and catch it is blessed with a healthy year.
Some are endurance based, like the 100-year-old polar bear swims that are held all over Canada to raise money for charity.
Others are a sign of pure relief or excitement for the New Year. Or, in more spiritual terms, cleansing rituals for shaking off the remnants of what’s been and opening up for what is to come.
There are many interesting aspects to the tradition, but what draws my attention the most is the pain and discomfort. People choose to start the first day of the year not by taking a spa day or laying around by a warm fire, but by facing the bitter winter cold and doing something incredibly difficult, painful, and life-threatening.
They choose to suffer.
Why the heck would they do that?
This year I decided to find out for myself.
Of course, it wasn’t a big event. Just a small group of us, and only two dared to slowly walk into the eerily-still section of a flowing mountain stream, hands linked, stripped down to swimsuits.
The water flowed directly down from the mountains of Montseny national park in northern Spain, with its peaks that rise up to 1,700 meters. Don’t let the word Spain fool you, it was 5°c out and the water temperature was estimated at a brisk 2°c (33°F).
Safe to say, the water was colder than I expected. Colder than I’ve ever felt and ever thought was possible. It felt like liquid metal that pierced every cell from the inside out and solidified more with each step.
As soon as we had immersed ourselves up to our chins, took a few shock-stricken breaths, we slowly but surely made our way out.
Then we did it again.
The third time didn’t happen. But two was enough. By that time, I’d found what I was looking for. I’d had a taste of why people all around the world have done and still do this ritualistically.
There’s no end of reasons why you shouldn’t drag yourself out of bed and swim in a freezing cold river in the middle of winter. To give one very good reason, even advanced cold water swimmers are not recommended to swim in water colder than 12°c (53.6°F). At water of 0.3°c to 4.5°c (32.5°F to 40°F), you can lose all sensation in your fingers and toes within three minutes, be unconscious within fifteen to thirty, and dead within forty-five to ninety (according to the University of Sea Kayaking in Washington).
Two rounds of thirty seconds in 2°c (33°F) were plenty. It took my friend around an hour until she regained the feeling in her toes.
Like many uncomfortable things in life, anyone can think of reasons not to do them. Sometimes, it makes sense. I wouldn’t recommend strolling into a mountain stream if you have zero experience with cold water or your health or body is impaired or compromised in any significant way.
But we have to be careful about being too careful. Because many of the reasons often stem from a single source:
The fear of discomfort.
And when the fear of discomfort has started to make our decisions for us, then we can come to give these “reasons not to” more weight than they deserve in any aspect of life that may involve even the slightest tinge of discomfort.
This was part of the answer I found to my question of why to as opposed to why not to. I wrote more about this in my latest post on Misogi, the ancient Japanese practice of cold water meditation.
There’ll always be reasons not to do things. Over the past 6-12 months, I’ve become accustomed to comfort and taking the easy road. So much so that anything that could cause me some inconvenience or the slightest bit difficultly didn’t even appear on my radar.
Working on my studies instead of Netflix? Is that even a choice?
Homemade salad and herbal tea over more chocolate and coffee? Hah, are you serious?
Going out and meeting people, learning a new language, picking up running again. Pfft, I’m pretty good as I am thank you very much.
This reaction worried me. A lot. But I couldn’t see any way out of it. I’m the world’s best deceiver of myself. No one could do it better. I have tonnes of practice. And I know myself better than anyone ever could.
Part of me knew I just needed to act. But knowing that doesn’t help when you’re in this state.
This is the magic of discomfort, and in particular, cold water. No matter how deceptive the lies are that you’re telling yourself, facing the cold water will make them very clear and show you what’s really true.
Facing discomfort and the unpleasant is a choice in today’s world. Distractions, drugs, and other escapes mean we can get by pretty well by avoiding the difficult and pushing it into the dark corners where we don’t have to look directly at it.
Now, I don’t know about you, but I love the comforts of life. My sister just recently introduced me to hot water bottles. One word. Wow.
But there’s a big difference between enjoying comfort and being bound by it.
Yet this is exactly what can happen. That is, unless we make the choice to willingly face discomfort head-on.
When you voluntarily choose to suffer, you come to know discomfort like a friend. You know that should anything come and turn your world upside down, your only option isn’t just to buckle or give up. You know that should life present you with challenges and opportunities, your default won’t be, “I can’t”, or “maybe tomorrow” or “why should I?”
Choosing to not just face discomfort, but welcome it, is the key to being fully alive now and not to just survive and take the path of least resistance.
To me, this is why exposing yourself to a bit of cold water is the worst but the best way to kick off the New Year.
Phew, this was a long one. If you got this far, thanks for sticking with me. If you do try out some cold water immersion, whether it’s in your shower on in your local lake, let me know the comments.
All the best for the New Year. Let’s make it a great one.
Joe
Thanks for reading!
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