Podcast EP47: From Cold to Calm: Cold Plunges and Salt Baths for Business Success

Welcome to Podcast Episode 47: From Cold to Calm: Cold Plunges and Salt Baths for Business Success

In this 3 Day Workweeks podcast episode, we dive into the benefits of cold plunging and salt baths for personal well-being and business performance. Discover how these self-care practices help enhance mental clarity, boost health, and improve productivity both in your business and personal life.

00:00 Introduction to Self-Care Practices

02:21 Cold Plunging: Setup and Routine

08:28 Cold Plunging: Benefits and Mindset

14:29 Salt Baths: Setup and Routine

17:01 Salt Baths: Benefits and Energetic Healing

19:09 Conclusion and Personal Reflections

Resources mentioned in the episode:

1. Self Care Essentials List
2. cold plunge tub
3. chlorine pods
4. thermometer
5. Why We Sleep book
6. bulk salt
7. rice storage container for salt
8. Vogue article "Here's how salt baths help you cleanse your aura and negative energy"

Talk to you soon!

XOXO,

Kate

Owner + Founder, Kate Waldo + Co. 

Creator of the Smarter Not Harder: 3-Day Workweeks for Millennial Entrepreneurs©  Program

P.S. Curious how you can grow your 6-figure business while slashing your workweek in half? Click here to learn about the Smarter Not Harder© program!

Some of our content contains affiliate links which provide us with a commission at no cost to you. Kate Waldo + Co. only recommends affiliates that we know, use, and love. 

FULL TRANSCRIPT

[00:00:00] I just love the feeling that fresh feeling that you get from brushing your teeth It feels like that for your whole body It feels so good. There's no real great way to describe it except for just trying it yourself.

[00:00:13] 

[00:00:42] Welcome back Today we're going to be talking about two of my favorite things to talk about, especially on Instagram. You guys love these topics. We're going to talk about cold plunging and salt baths,

[00:00:55] I'm going to talk about why I do this, the what, why, how, how often. But mainly the most important thing that you're going to want to hear is what this impact has on my business and on my mental clarity. And I just want to share it with you guys because it's something that I geek out on and most people are doing these kind of things more from fitness.

[00:01:20] standpoint, but I wanted to share my take on what it does for me as a business owner and how it could help you too. So first off, I'm a believer in self care before everything. If you take care of yourself, your body, your mental health, your, Well being first, then everything in business comes easier. It is higher quality.

[00:01:49] It is just coming from a more inspired place when you fill up your cup before you get to work.

[00:01:58] So take everything that I say with a grain of salt, and know that I'm not telling you to do it this way. This is what works for me right now. And if you can take any little bit of this and put it into your routine or adapt some way that you're doing something in a way that helps. That's what I'm here to share.

[00:02:18] Let's get into the cold plunging first. So I'm going to tell you, like, the kind of nitty gritty of what our setup looks like, And then I'll get into how I do it every day what the effects are and why I do it. So, what we use is this animal water trough. And it's pretty deep, I'd say, I don't know, like four feet deep.

[00:02:46] four, four and a half, five feet deep and wide enough that I'm five foot seven. I can get in the water up to my neck and my knees don't come out of the water. we found it was the best kind of tub situation, better than like a dumpster trashcan. Some people will buy like a brand new dumpster that's a little bit hard to get in and out of.

[00:03:10] Yeah. This has a pretty wide mouth to it, and it's meant for animals to drink out of, so it's very thick, heavy plastic. Ace Hardware is where we got ours. They didn't have anything similar to this at like Lowe's or Home Depot. I will link absolutely everything that I can for you in the description of the podcast.

[00:03:30] and you'll be able to find it in the YouTube show notes if you're watching this on YouTube. So we have this animal trough and we fill it with water a little more than halfway. John, my husband, is, the man who runs the show on the Ice Plunge, I get all the benefits without having to do the work.

[00:03:49] So, I'm very grateful to him, and I recognize that this probably wouldn't be such a frequent thing in my life if not for him. he keeps the water clean, he has these chlorine tablets that we put in it, and then we also, change the water fairly often especially when the chlorine tablets are in it and he changes the water about once a week and where we live, we live in Pensacola, Florida.

[00:04:14] It is very, very hot here in the summer. what's nice though, is that we do have milder winters, so we don't have to chill it down as much in the winter. What our routine is, is that John will fill it up daily with about 100 pounds of ice in the summer. And that gets the temperature of the cold plunge between 48 to about 52 degrees Fahrenheit, which is chilly.

[00:04:44] Not as cold as it gets in the winter, but it does the trick, especially when it's 85 to 100 degrees outside. the goal is to get that water under 50 degrees. do cover it with this thin sheet of plastic. We found something on Amazon that it's like a bathtub cover.

[00:05:04] So if, I guess it's made for if you're like weirded out by using like a hotel bathtub. But, you know, when you get a pedicure, they have those kind of liners in there. This is like meant for an entire bathtub. So we use that, but just, cover it over the very top of the cold plunge when it's got it when it's full of water and that helps keep like especially when the pollen was really bad that helps keep that out the bugs out those kind of things and then we do have a water thermometer that hangs in the tub and that helps us know the temperature so obviously we don't have to get as much ice in the winter when it's i can't remember the months but for us like i let's say December through February.

[00:05:52] We don't even have to put any ice in it at all, and it's very very chilly. So you can buy a cold plunge. I'm sure you've seen them. They are pretty expensive, and as far, we've considered it, but right now, like, It can get a little bit pricey to do the amount of ice that we do.

[00:06:14] in the summertime, we can taper off the amount of ice that we do in the spring and fall because It's not quite as hot and it can maintain its temperature a little bit better. But, it just, the math wasn't mathin on getting a actual cold pledge, like, machine.

[00:06:35] And also that's a whole machine that you have to take care of. Right now we just have our tub out back in our carport. it is covered on top and then kind of hidden from neighbors. So it's in a good spot. I don't know that we'd be able to actually have it in that same spot if we had an actual cold plunge machine and we don't have room for it inside.

[00:06:57] But this is kind of our setup, like. It seems kind of, kind of country, but it works for us. something that we're kind of looking into as an industrial ice machine to have at home. John goes every morning to Twice the Ice, the, one of those machines that's like in a parking lot and gets that hundred pounds of ice.

[00:07:14] it's a labor of love. He loves it, clearly, and I love it too. So It's worth it for us. the routine is normally John wakes up around 6. 30, he goes to get ice by about 7, 7. 30 and he puts it all in the tub when he gets it home and then we let it melt a little bit before getting in right away.

[00:07:40] So that it gets the whole plunge pretty cold and When we go outside we have little hooks for our bathing suits we'll go out there with our towel and put on our bathing suit hang up our towel and then start a timer This is how I do it. He does his like slightly differently. I don't have an Apple watch or anything So I just bring my phone and set a timer We set a timer right now.

[00:08:05] I'm doing like two and a half minutes. I need to work up from there. When I wasn't feeling so well, I was letting myself do a little bit less time, but I've done it up to five minutes. You'll have to consult Andrew Huberman's podcast for all the kind of knowledge about how long and when and what time and all those things.

[00:08:25] I do for about two and a half minutes, and what has helped the most, I think people are really freaked out by it, but kind of like anything, if you go into it and you have the mindset of this is going to be challenging, but I'm up for the challenge, in our household, we like to use the word challenging over hard because it also changes your mindset and your outlook on something to think of it as a challenge.

[00:08:55] It is worth doing, not necessarily that it's just hard and this is stupid because I think that when you say something's hard, it implies that it shouldn't even be done. So going in with that mindset of like, yes, this is going to be challenging, but I'm going to get through it.

[00:09:12] And I'm Breathing really deeply. It's a great meditative kind of process.if you are getting yourself into that mindset of like, yep, I'm going to be fine. It's going to be challenging, but I'm going to be fine. And breathing in and out as you're getting into the cold plunge. I go all the way in up to my neck.

[00:09:36] And then I kind of pop up and dunk my face in the water for a couple seconds. And I find that that, your vagus nerve is in, in your face. that helps my whole body chill out a lot more. And then I keep my eyes closed and I breathe for a while. Towards the end, I sometimes will open up my eyes. what's crazy is that when you open up your eyes, everything's like, brighter and more vivid.

[00:10:01] You feel more awake. It's honestly like a really crazy cool feeling. And what John and I were talking about this morning was how you really feel a lot more present in your body. you recognize that it's cold, you recognize your body's cold, you can see your goosebumps, but this strong sense of peace and calm that you find when you do this practice on a regular basis, I won't lie, if you don't do it for a while and come back to it, it's going to feel a lot more challenging and a lot colder and your body's going to freak out a little bit more, but the more you do it, the easier it becomes.

[00:10:41] The first time is always when you get out, try not to shower or bathe for at least two hours so that your body gets the full effects that it's warming itself back up. What I do is I go on a walk or I'll do some kind of exercise if it's cooler out or you just are too cold, put on warm clothes, you know, socks, a hoodie, layers.

[00:11:05] If you can't get warm, then go shower. Don't, let yourself get into hypothermia. That's not what it's about. You don't want to do that. kind of play with it. you'll see what it's like. And the feeling, though, when you get out. Yes, this is great for your health in so many ways.

[00:11:25] Like I said, it's touted by fitness gurus and all the things, you know, athletes do it for recovery, It boosts metabolism, your blood flow. It's good for your joints. It's a really good, jolt for your immune system to make sure that everything's working It helps get rid of headaches because it's pulling the blood from your extremities into your internal organs There's a lot more that it does But why I do it is because I like doing the most challenging thing First thing in the morning and I know every time I have some hesitation like I'll wait a couple more minutes Or I'll futz around a little bit more.

[00:12:04] I'll make my coffee first or whatever but having that habit I feel is a really good practice that bleeds into the rest of your life, where you're willing to face the challenge early on in the day, and you know that as soon as you complete it, you're going to feel 1, 000 percent better.

[00:12:23] So when I come out, it forces me To be calm and to be present, when we wake up, our cortisol levels are the highest. And so we can have this adrenaline pumping and start thinking of all the things we've got to do today and all the emails we need to answer and all the clients we need to talk to and all the projects we haven't finished and all that stuff.

[00:12:42] But doing the cold plunge helps really stay present and centered because you have to breathe in order to not freak out and just be shivering and miserable. So I find that it's really centering. And it wakes me up and motivates me. Once I do that, then I want to do stuff. I'm not as much in cozy mode anymore.

[00:13:06] Yeah, I want to like put on cozy clothes. But if I go, if I cold plunge and then I go do some type of activity, even if it's just going on a little walk, then I'm up. I'm motivated. My day is started. And everything from there. That's kind of what they talk about with working out is like it's not just the act of working out It's the choices that you make as a domino effect Because when you wake up you do your cold plunge and you're like, all right well next thing in my habit is that I go on my walk or I do my exercise then you stay motivated you can then you know get into your whatever you're doing for work and Sit down and and you feel really good.

[00:13:46] You feel really accomplished for the day. I just love the feeling of it's when that fresh like feeling that you get from brushing your teeth It feels like that for your whole body It's just such an amazing feeling. It feels so good. There's no real great way to describe it except for just trying it yourself.

[00:14:07] we try to do it nearly every day. We also live at the Gulf of Mexico, so we'll go to the beach and we'll do it there. The water's starting to warm up more now, and so it doesn't really have as much of the same effect, but it does have the salt effect, which I'm about to tell you about salt baths.

[00:14:26] This is something that I've also gotten A lot of questions about the table salt baths, because probably you've heard of taking an Epsom salt bath. You think of sore muscles sometimes people do it for when they're sick. And this is a different spin on this, so this is taking a table salt bath. And I'll tell you the nitty gritty and then I'll tell you the why.

[00:14:51] you do six cups of table salt, non iodized. And you want the water warm enough to dissolve the salt. In the winter, I'll do it like hot water and I like to do it before bed because just like the cold plunge wakes you up,

[00:15:06] Taking a bath in general before bed is a good practice to help you sleep better. If you read the book Why We Sleep, they talk about how good taking a bath is before bed. It helps draw the, I can't remember what it does to the blood, but it either draws it in or moves it to your extremities. Whichever way is the right way for calming you down and putting you to sleep.

[00:15:28] So, the water needs to be warm enough to dissolve the salt if it's needed. summertime and you're just going to be sweating to death after, you can pretty much do lukewarm water. The salt will dissolve. ideally you don't have anything else in the water, but sometimes I'll add soap for a bubble bath or I'll add in a little bit of Epsom salt if I have really sore muscles and I'm trying to combat that.

[00:15:49] for the salt, because this is a lot of salt, I buy it in bulk from Amazon in a 25 pound bag, and then I store it in a rice storage container that has a little one cup scoop so that I know How much I'm putting in now, you can buy the jars of salt from the grocery store, but, it is more pricey to buy the salt in the jars from the grocery store, and it's a little bit harder to, open them up, than it is to buy it in bulk and have it in that rice storage container.

[00:16:22] I'll link for you exactly what I order. if you're in a bigger city, you can probably go to a food supply store and find salt in bulk, maybe like 50 pound bags. It is ideal to do this once a day. Now, I recognize that that is not possible for everyone, and that these things can kind of add up, but let me tell you about what it does.

[00:16:45] So, you're gonna sit in that bath for 10 to 15 minutes. No more, no less than 10 to 15 minutes. Because this, the goal of this is that it's going to clear your energetic field. I pulled this from a Vogue article that I'll link in the podcast show notes, but this is from an Ayurvedic healer that said, Though science has not deemed salt to be able to remove negative ions, salt water can help produce low level electrical pulses, similar to the experience of those who practice Reiki and other forms of healing.

[00:17:22] Salt is essentially a crystal, and crystals have this great ability to change wave patterns around us. Because salt is alkalizing, it takes away heavy, humid energy from the environment. So I know this is very woo, but I swear to you, try it and see how you feel afterwards. I do this ideally daily, like I said, but especially when I've been around a lot of people, like networking events, especially when you go to a conference,ideally, you can door dash salt to the hotel and they have those big, beautiful bathtubs.

[00:18:00] Take a salt bath after you have been around all those people, interacting with all those people, touching people, shaking hands, all of that. You absorb so much energy and you need to clear that from your body so that you can kind of have a fresh start. fresh restart. Even if you go to some event that's like a high energy event, a concert, whatever, it's still a good reason to do it.

[00:18:23] But especially if you're feeling anxious, overwhelmed, or angry this really helps level everything out, clear your mind, you feel so much better afterwards. it's really hard to put into words.

[00:18:38] You just have to feel it and try it for yourself. Now I know that this seems like a crazy amount of salt. It works. I feel like it gives me a really good reset and brings me to a place of peace and centered. Even if I'm doing like a live coaching call in one of our programs or I have a particularly long session with a one on one client, I will do a salt bath afterwards and just kind of reset and clear.

[00:19:06] I hope that you guys enjoyed this. This is my super niche woo woo stuff that I do that I think really improves my business. It makes me show up as a better business owner. It makes me be able to be more present. focus clear on my game for my clients, for my students, and also be a better human in my personal life, be a better wife, daughter, friend,

[00:19:37] And I wanted to share it with you. So enjoy it, try it out, send me a message on Instagram and let me know how you like it. It's at Kate Waldo and Co. If we're not already connected. Instagram friends, but let me know what your process is. Let me know how you do it differently How you store your salt?

[00:19:57] Where do you get your salt? I go to Costco all the way in Mobile, Alabama Which is like an hour from us and they for whatever reason they sell bulk sugar, but not bulk salt so hopefully you can find it, but I'll link everything that I use in the show notes below and Let me know if you want to hear about how any other weird self care things that I do.

[00:20:20] We have an entire episode on it, so look back for weird self care that grows your business and add this to that list. All right, we'll talk to you guys next time.