10 Tips to Generate Your Own Body Heat
Yesterday it was a beautiful sunny day and about 40 degrees F. I was working outside and to get some sun exposure I took off my shirt to feel the healing rays on my skin. It was that perfect balance between cold and warm. The radiant heat of the sun against the cool air created a magical contrast. As I was treating myself to a treatment at the Panch Mamma Health Spa (meaning anywhere outside), a neighbor saw me and later asked “Did you get a tan?’ I explained to her about how good the sun and the cold are for optimal health and she had even thought of the possibility but couldn’t wait to give it a try.
Most people shudder when I mention the word ‘cold’ and the fact that you can be comfortable in it. The common tendency is to run from the cold by staying indoors or going to a warmer climate. But before you too shudder and mutter ‘brrrr’ and turn up your heat and delete this email and go tell your cat you just heard the craziest thing…Listen to this. I’m talking about a way that you can feel WARM in your body when it is COLD outside. Yes you heard right. And in this way you not only become comfortable in your native habitat without the use of modern technology but you also feel a super charged sense of well being by optimizing yourself with the Circadian Rhythms. In fact it is so fun to be adapted to one’s own place, you may even loose your desire to go on that winter vacation to the beach.
I have found a way to not only enjoy the cold but to crave it and thrive in it. This path has given me the advantage of feeling good in my body and relaxing and finding joy and abundance in the harsh conditions of winter. It’s not about survival…although it certainly will help with that…but it is about finding peace in the cycles of nature and the deep internal feeling that you can handle anything..
I learned the hard way and spent 20 years as a vegan with cold ass hands and feet no matter how warmly I dressed. When I turned paleo and especially what I call “Circadian Balanced Paleo” I felt a natural blissful warmth build up in my body. I started taking my shirt off for periods and walking barefoot even in winter and eventually started jumping in cold water.
How the Cold Supercharges Our Health and Quality of Life:
- Preserves cellular energy. (Heat stress is the opposite.)
- Increases mitochondria responsiveness and super efficient cell signaling using electron transfer system
- Improves communication between cells (Quantum Biology/Peizo Electricity/Semi Conductor more efficient in cold). What happens in one cell gets transmitted across the body.)
- Stimulates Heat Response (Thermogenesis) Heat generated when fat molecules break down into cellular energy.
- Synchronizes circadian rhythms—signals to the brain to hibernate (sleep). We sleep better in winter.
- Turns this hibernation pathway ON. Lots of regeneration when in this phase. (Approx midnight to 3am).
- SCN (Suprachismatic Nuclei) in eyes responds to cold and light. Can bypass the light cycle with the cold. (Land of the midnight sun.) Can cold adapt during summer.
- Improves sleep dramatically (exposure to cold during day as well as keeping the sleeping environment cool/cold).
- Reduces stress hormones (adrenaline and cortisol) when done in the right dose/intensity/frequency.
- Burns calories (Similar effect as exercise).
- Turns adipose tissue into lean muscle. Turns WAT into BAT.
- Stimulates metabolism and thyroid
- Turns rT3 (anti thyroid) into T3 (the thyroid hormone) and T4 (inactive) into T3 (active).
- Burns fat: Sends fat cells into the bloodstream like yelling “fire” in a movie theatre.
- Helps one become leptin sensitive (hormone that signals brain to burn fat/ketogenic)
- Detoxifies (toxins stored in fat…sends them to liver).
- Causes existing toxins to be less damaging (oxidizing)
- Helps us to become ketogenic—burn fat instead of carb. For cellular energy (ATP).
Why We Can’t Handle the Cold
People hide from the cold because their body’s are not in balance. We have a mismatch between our environment and our lifestyle that throws our Circadian Biology off. This reduces cellular energy and the ability to generate sufficient heat to feel warm and comfortable in our native habitat/climate.
The three things that get us out of balance so our brain’s are programmed for the tropics even the we don’t live there. This means the brain is trying to keep us cool instead of warm and is fighting the environmental conditions we are in. This creates inflammation as toxins build up and regeneration is stunted.
1—Understand the Ancestral Food Pyramid
which turns the FDA pyramid upside down. The Ancestral Food Pyramid puts saturated fat and meat on the bottom as the foundation and puts carbs on the top as an occasional treat. Eating foods grown outside our climate zone. That means carbohydrates in the form of sugar, fruits, and grain based products. These foods are designed to keep a body cool in hot weather. They burn quickly into ATP (cellular energy) without creating heat. Saturated Fats on the other hand are designed to burn slowly and to release heat in the process. There are 36 ATP’s produced in a glucose molecule compared to 147 in saturated fat such as butter. I find I can still eat these out of climate carbs but don’t need as much in the cold months.
2—Not exposing ourselves to winter—over heating our living spaces. Too much artificial lighting. Exposure to non-native Electromagnetic Fields.
In the tropics there is a long light cycle and warm temps. When we are constantly indoors with the heat turned up and artificial blue light at night we are mimicking the conditions in the tropics. The way to deal with this is to find times to get outside and also sometimes with less clothing. Get the body to feel the cold and also to get the natural sunlight. The cold can be one way to set circadian biology to harmonize with the season. Using a practice called Cold Thermogenesis which is a therapeutic dose of cold exposure on a measured and steady basis…you can set you internal clock so you sleep and wake with the Sun/Earth cycles. Non Native Electromagnetic Fields (nnEMF) creates a heating effect in our bodies which we cannot feel but our brains are convinced it is the tropics or summer.
3–Not understanding how to dress for the weather. We are inundated with synthetic clothing and clothing which does not insulate. This screws up the free flow of peizo electricity along the skin as well as traps moisture which disrupts the body’s heat exchange mechanism. There is an ancient secret….natural wool acts like fur. The warming effect of natural fur and wool cannot be replicated by synthetic fabric. Stay tuned for upcoming post on Dressing for the Weather.
How to Make Your Body Generate Heat in Winter
1–Eat an Ancestral Diet high in saturated fats. Especially use grass-fed gelatin and bone broth in winter with lots of butter melted in.
2–Expose yourself to the cold. Take a walk in a t-shirt for 20 minutes minimum each day or what feels right depending on where you live. Sometimes try barefoot walking in the cold even if it’s just for a few minutes. Explore your own edge and the more cold the better as long as you aren’t feeling run down. Get warm afterwards with a cup of warm fat-rich and non-carb beverage especially with butter and raw eggs. (See Raw Egg Latte and Paleo Egg Nog Recipes)
3–Turn down or off the heat in your house for periods of time. If you need to, do this in only one room such as your bedroom to avoid problems.
4–Low lights at night or use Blue Blocker Sleep Glasses F.lux is a free program that blocks the blue light from your computer screen at night. Download it here.
5–Go to bed early. Sleep as much as you need. Calm down. Ditch the ambition and let yourself rest and hybernate whenever you can. The best results come from the deepest states of being. You will find that doing these steps will cause to you be naturally sleepy.
6–Ditch the synthetic clothes and bedding and go for wool instead.
7–Add movement to your daily life in the for of Non Exercise Activity Thermogenesis (N.E.A.T.) This means don’t sit still for extended periods but find some way to move during normally sedentary activities. Standing at work is one step towards this. When you can you can add other movement, stretches and exercise. It’s easy to see how this works. Just start noticing how you get cold after sitting for awhile and how getting up and doing something can get you warm. Instead of heating the air, heat your body! See our blog posts on Movement. If you work at home you are in luck. Do some yoga, pushups jumping jacks, or dancing in between when you need to be actively typing or reading your screen.
8–Movement practices such as Yoga and stretching are amazing for generating heat.
9–Use Hot Therapy whenever needed to keep your body temperature up. Whether it’s a hot bath, sauna, or simply crawling under the covers for awhile. If you use wool bedding you can breath inside to create amazing radiant warmth without outside heat.
