I notice the Ice Man Wim Hof is getting scientific and media traction, how close is his method to traditional techniques like Tibetan tummo (if I have the terminology right).

Thoughts please ?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Np0jGp6442A

was gonna post this last night too

I remember seeing his Arctic circle marathon years ago, but didn't really twig that this was a teachable thing rather than a bit of natural freakery, or that it had anything to do with tummo. Do you think he's doing what the Tibetans do but with less hocus pokus ?

The results with the immune system experiment are pretty startling. I've had people tell me that concentration will cure illness, "yeah just focus on the feeling" blah blah , but all that ever did was make me more aware of the discomfort, and make me think it was idiotic advice.

I guess the thing that makes the difference is to use a breathing technique to alter the physiology rather than just expecting it to be mind over matter and simply meditate an illness away.

I've never found meditation to have any effect on asthma, for example, it just sucks more dust mite feces up my nose.
But a technique that suppresses an inflammatory response might be workable.

This would be my guess, but I don't know much about how the Tibetans did it, other than being fascinated by their demonstrations of sitting out in the cold without a shirt, being draped with wet sheets, and then drying them with their body heat.  I suppose all of this stuff is inherent human ability, and sometimes re-discovered, sometimes passed down.

I would also be interested hearing from experienced Tummo practitioners.

Maybe I speak too soon - or it depends on the type of hocus pocus.

I think tummo studies have had some difficulty eliminating the effects of special body movements, which naturally raise body temperature.

But the visualisations may be an important element.

http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0058244

The study compared those who performed breathing techniques with those who did the same techniques plus viualisation. The visualizers created greater increases in core body temperature.

Teehee, Hof's book just plopped through my letterbox, gonna go read it now

Lotta love in that podcast episode.

Anyone here try the breathing technique shown by Hof, starting at 8 minutes into the video? I've done his technique based on reading descriptions about it, such as breathing as if blowing up a balloon, or similar to holotropic breathing. But seeing Hof and Joe Rogan do the breathing on the podcast, it's clearly different than I had thought. I suck at holding my breath (hey, that's gotta be some sort of pun?!), being able to do it for 1:30 at best, and only while I'm lying down. But after doing just 30 breaths of the type shown on the video, I did 2:00 without much struggle, and while walking around a part of the time.

For a moment after the breathing I felt more clear-headed than usual, with noticeably less blah-blah mind. Of course, the same can be said for most any physical exercize.

What he got Rogan to do seemed pretty much the same as online instructions you can find.
Hard inhalation, with uncontrolled exhalation, followed by a period of breath holding.

[edit] - those instructions call the hard breathing the "balloon breath", as if you should place the emphasis on exhalation. It's very badly worded. Place the effort on inhalation instead.

I tried the breathing technique.  I held my breath for 1 minute 30 seconds, took one inhale, and held it a minute more.  I wasn't really pushing it, and I don't think I've gone that long before (when swimming, snorkeling). 

Here is an article from Scott Carney, Wim mentioned him as a skeptic in the vice clip.

http://www.scottcarney.com/article/the-iceman-commeth/

Now you mention it I've charged myself up in a similar way before doing underwater lengths of a pool, which I always find is a calming experience, because if you lose the calm your lungs don't last as long. I'd forgotten about that. Never noticed any effect on heat, though, but public pools aren't very cold. Then after I got out I'd sometimes stick myself under the cold shower and go "UuuuuUUUWuuUWRRRGHAAHHHH!!!"

- caution, don't overdo it https://en.utwikipedia.org/wiki/Shallow_water_blacko

One intention he does have is to prove his method effective in lifting depression. But can his methods have a dark night aspect ? Haven't heard of that yet. On the other hand the mindfulness based methods do seem to have a dark night aspect so is there some benefit of breathing techniques over purely mental contemplative ones ?
If you go down that line of thought you would be tempted to forget vipassana in favour of pranayama - correct me if I'm wrong ?

Also, this WH method is being postulated as a return to something we naturaly have but have lost touch with. I often wonder the same about meditation - whether the need for most meditation is simply a reaction to the development of agriculture and civilisation.
It's easier (I think) to make a case for loss of physiological wisom as a result of developing civilised lifestyles, how easy is it to extend that to the contemplative life ?

Basically the question would be something like, back in 30,000BC did we all run round naked on the ice caps, or did we need something like the WF technique in order to do so - like a physiological Golden Age ?

Good tip about the shallow water blackout. The link contains some contrary information to what Wim Hof asserts, and he does address some of it in the videos above.

I don't know about most of your queries. But I am very interested to see how far his techniques can go in treating things like depression (and autoimmune disease).  My opinion is that the agricultural revolution changed civilization so there was time for things like meditation (for people drawn to that). Less time looking for food means more time available for other things.

One thought that I've had lately related to Wim Hof relates to "facing  things as they are".  With meditation we encouraged to sit with discomfort, such as physical or emotional pain.  Shinzen Young talks about "determined sits" as a fast way for spiritual development.

Well, how about putting your body in some of the most uncomfortable situations you can imagine, and just being with that?  That's what Wim Hof is doing.

Yeah it does seem to contradict Hof.
It says that hyperventilation doesn't really change the oxygen content of the blood, whereas many divers and pranayamists think it does, although it also looks like there's some room for some elevation of O2.
I think it's more a case of lowering the blood CO2 level than raising the oxygen level. So it's not so much a case of living off more oxygen, but rather you don't get the signal to breath from the CO2 level, for a longer time.
Also this causes blood vessel constriction in the brain which gives the light headedness, and if that's the case then the lightheadedness isn't due to extra "energy".
The wikiP page on hyperventilation has some interesting basic info.

I tried a home oximeter and I think raised the oxygen level in my blood by a couple of points by power breathing, but I don't think those are super accurate. Hof says he can take oximeter reading over 100.

But he seems able to hold his breath a long time, and I suppose that free diver's training works to some degree so I think maybe there's more to it than a basic wikipedia treatment allows.

And he's obviously mastered other profound effects of breath manipulation. Hyperventilation can be caused by stress response, so I wonder if there is some reverse engineering going on - getting into the stress response via hyperventilation ?

It all needs a proper physiology book treatment. As he becomes more widely known maybe some enterpising bunny will produce one.

Don't know how much it is a response to determined discomfort though that may play a part in what Shinzen Young did. He talks about his gruelling zen training, and bliss response, which sounds like an endorphin/cannabinoid/whatever rush in response to pain. It also sounded like something people into S&M talk about. http://friskybusinessboutique.com/the-endorphin-levels-in-bdsm/


Sound familiar ?

Anyway I'm glad to point out the blackout thing. I was thinking about trying hyperventilation and swimming myself, and it wouldn't be a surprise if more people are tempted to try it now.