Thittato

20 Days of Cold Showers Challenge So I've been having a pause from journaling here and for the last month I've only been journaling by myself. It is nice to change things up a bit sometimes to get out of a rut. Last journal entry here ended with me doing my tenth session of winther-bathing this season on New Years Eve. For January I did another 12 sessions of winther-bathing, and I have only gotten deeper into the Wim Hof method. You might say that by now I have fully converted. But I still keep up with both my regular yoga and meditation, but my regular meditation is usually something I do after the Wim Hof breathing method. So as for now I feel that Wim Hof Method has turned into my platform and context. The start of this month I finally downloaded his app, and of my gosh how awesome it is to use an app like that to structure my practice. I'm continuing to do his breathing method daily, which I have been doing daily since 11th of January, and 1st of February I started doing his 20 days of cold showers challenge. It is very nice to try out different things when it comes to cold exposure. I would like to try out cold walks soon as well, walking around in nature in only my shorts. It was interesting that I actually find cold showers harder than winther bathing out in the sea. Don't know why, but the shock is much greater in the shower I find. Perhaps because the water is running instead of standing still. And perhaps the cold water in my shower is equally cold as out in the sea - I'm not sure about that because I haven't measured, but it feels equally cold or colder. Anyways. So for this first week I'm showering in cold water for 1 min and 15 secs, then I'll be adding 15 secs every week, until I reach 2 min. It is much nicer to do it structed like this instead of just doing it on my feeling because even though I was staying in the water until the shock calmed down, I usually didn't push myself more beyond that, but now I get a chance to really exercise my ability to be in cold water, and gradually progress week by week. Also now I'm doing at least 5 cold water immersion per week, instead of "only" 10 or 12 in a month. But I feel I have been really building it up gradually and smoothly. It is really amazing to meditate after doing the breath work, and even more amazing to meditate after cold water exposure. I used to get really high and felt really raw and powerful after cold water exposure, but it has gradually turned into just feeling more and more calm but alert and energized - so I would say it has developed into a state which a find more mature and wise. This whole thing has been a really great vitamin-injection into my meditation practice. It feels like it is coming alive like never before, but in a calm and integrated way. Although it is a bit stressful that I so strongly feel this urge to want to preach to people that they should get into cold exposure therapy, but hopefully that will balance itself out soon. Anyways, last month has been really awesome, and I'm really looking forward to get deeper into this 20 days of cold showers challenge.

Tenth session of winter-bathing this season. Super-nice! Hehe.... :-) No resistance this time. Just pure joy. A quiet celebration of everything that has been, everything that is, and everything that will come.

10 sun salutations, 10 min of meditation, and 11 min of Wim Hof Breathing, today. Pretty smooth little program. It is interesting to get back in touch with breathing exercises again.

Ninth session of winter-bathing this season. Finally I became currious about Wim Hof's breathing techniques. So I did this one before I went down to the sea: That was a very different experience. First of all the water felt much colder, probably because I was more calm and present, and when I came out of the water I didn't get that super-hero feeling that I usually get. Well, maybe a little bit of it, but mainly I just felt even more calm than after the breathing technique. Maybe this could be really interesting regarding my tendencies to become manic about stuff. Maybe it is really good that I didn't go into that super-hero feeling that I'm so addicted to. This state I'm in now feels really healthy in a very different way. I just feel very natural, calm and down to earth.

10 sun salutations today, and then 30 min of meditation. Nice. I'm so inspired by this project of doing 10 sessions of winter-bathing before the new year. Only two more to go. I feel so fresh and healthy. Been having tendencies towards having a little cold when I wake up in the morning after winter-bathing in the evening, but I quickly shake it off after I get out of bed and take a shower, and then I just feel very fresh and healthy. Maybe part of cold exposure therapy is triggering a very mild cold, and then letting your body fight it off. And after having done some cycles of that, ones immune system gets used to bigger fluctuations in what kind of temperature changes ones body is experiencing. Something like that is totally going on.

Eight session of winter-bathing this season. First 20 min of vinyasa flow yoga, and then my eight session of winter-bathing this season. So awesome!

Seventh session of winter-bathing this season. No meditation today, but I did my seventh session of winter-bathing this season since I started up again 8th of December. I decided after this session that I want to reach 10 full sessions of winter-bathing before this year ends. That is going to be the perfect way to summarize this year. It should be easy. Only one more session and then I only have two more to go. Then I will take a little pause from this cold exposure project and just see what my natural inclination will be after this.

30 min meditation today. Feeling deeply blessed.

... and I feel very ambivalent about this. What to do? Me and my ex had a very clear promise to each other that we were going to remain friends after we broke up, and we remained close friends for half a year after we broke up, but as soon as she found a new boyfriend, she distanced herself from me. But then she started to develop a close friendship with my bestfriend. I don't feel ok with this at all. He was introduced to her through me. It seems pretty strange to ditch the friendship she had with me, and then instead go ahead and develop a close friendship with my bestfriend. Even though it is 7-8 years since we broke up, and I really don't want her back because it totally didn't work out, I still feel angry at her for ditching our friendship. We hang out on the same scene, and occasionally bump into each other. I've tried to strike up a friendly conversation with her many times asking her what is up and stuff like that, but she always turns very awkward and shuts the conversation down immediately. She finds it very hard to just say hello in a friendly way. I had almost forgotten that she could actually smile, except that I'm reminded of that when I meet her when I hang out with my friend and her face turns into a huge smile when she sees him. It feels very unloyal of my friend to develop this friendship with her, and I feel that she is very disrespectful towards me when she cannot stay away from my inner circle when she ditced the friendship she had with me. I wish I was cool with this, but I'm not. Is it normal to feel this way? What can I do?

30 min meditation today. Zero focus. Haha. Pretty huge contrast compared to yesterday.

30 min meditation today as well. The feelings of stuckness I encountered a few weeks ago are totally gone. Now there is a lot of momentum again. Unfortunately, or fortunately, it seems like I'm getting more unstable when my meditation goes deep. I guess that is natural. When the mind becomes really still and soft, my being opens up for more emotional stuff stored in my body to come up to the surface. So whatever cycles are activated because of this, it is good to know that I can ride these cycles out, and then return to my still point again in meditation.

Well. She has been in two long-term relationships since we broke up, and I usually don't think much about her, but she is newly singel again, and she has re-connected with my best-friend. Apparantly she wasn't allowed to hang out with him with the guy she recently was in a relationship with because he was jealous at him, so I didn't hear much about her in this period, but now they have started to hang out again and it really triggers something in me. My best-friend has expressed attraction towards her to me a lot of times, so I know that he is keen on her, but he is in a longterm relationship himself, but because they are separated by the pandemic their relationship recently turned into an open relationship, but he is not too keen to act on it because he is madly in love with his girlfriend, but still he enjoys somewhat of a flirty energy or something with my ex. It makes me want to distance myself from my bestfriend. It doesn't feel like our connection is open, pure and something that I trust when suddenly she is re-connected with him again. I really don't like that she enters into my life in this in-direct way again. It feels like my life has moved on long time ago and I would have been fine if she was a stranger to me, but something about this dynamic really triggers me. Not sure what else to say about it. This is just how it feels. Perfect scenario would have been that she was just totally out of my life. So either I have to: 1. Tell my bestfriend that I cannot accept that they hang out with each other. 2. Distance myself from my bestfriend since I don't want to be plugged into these conflicting emotions that I get plugged into through him. 3. Do some emotional processing / purging to clear out whatever is trigged in me because of this. Maybe it could be ok if I grew out of whatever this triggers in me. I used to be into tantra before, and one of my tantra-teachers told me he once had someone have sex with his girlfriend when he was observing just so that he could work on his jealousy. Maybe this is the perfect opportunity to work on my jealousy or whatever it is that is triggered in me?

Sixth session of winther-bathing this season. Yesterday. Also 30 min meditation yesterday. Today: 45 min meditation. Very good flow.

Fifth session of Winter-bathing this season. And 30 min of meditation earlier in the day. Nice. Nice. Nice.

30 min meditation today. Very good flow.

Yes, cold water exposure :-) I live in Norway. Well. It is very refreshing. I love it, and it feels like it gives me a huge boost. I only do when I feel like, though, so its not like I’m following a systematic training regime.

30 min meditation today. Feels like my technique keeps getting better and better.

30 min meditation today as well. Lots of resistance. I didn't want to apply my technique for the first 15 min, I just wanted to sit and surrender into the experience, but everything got a lot smoother when I started to apply the technique.

20 min vinyasa flow yoga this morning, then 30 min meditation, and then 20 min yoga nidra. Pretty sweet program. I love this practice.

Fourth session of winter-bathing this season. Aaaaaah.... So nice <3 It really is like a reboot for my system. All the stress that has accumulated during the day suddenly just dissolves. And today I was even in doubt about whether it was the right decision, thinking I was challenging my winter-bathing stamina too much by doing this too often now that I have just started up again. I was angry and stressed as I walked out into the water, resisting to dip down so that my shoulders also got under water, but as soon as I overcome that resistance and sank down so that only my head was above...... aaaaaaaaah, all stress dissolved and I felt like a hero again.

30 min meditation today as well. Felt really good and valuable. I tend to freak out because I get so obsessed with things. It was chess just a few weeks ago, and now it has been rollerblading for some weeks. That either/or, black and white ON/OFF dynamic regarding this seems to have been softened a lot lately as well. I go so heavily into these things that it stirrs up a lot of doubt in me and I start to think I have to cut them out completely. Seems like this has been softened very much. I'm thinking these days more in line with "It's normal to have interests" and "It is normal to alternate back and forth between various interests." My self-talk is getting more mature, and less sort of self-talk out of some kind of panic-mode.

30 min meditation today as well. I’ve been so extremly inspired by rollerblading and the whole skating-culture lately, listening to podcasts, watching skate-videos etc, finding new rollerbladers on instagram and new styles, and discussing all this with my best friend who is also really high on rollerblades these days, and we are finding old pictures of ourselves when we were rollerblading in our teens and talking about our past a lot and what led to what, etc. It feels fun and healthy, but meditation is a nice way to keep this inspiration balanced, and it brings me back to myself again. I have some resistance towards meditation these days, because it sort of interrupts the flow of inspiration that I’m in and brings me back to the more boring and serious aspects of life, but at the same time it also feels very calming and sobering.

Third session of winter-bathing this season. Been working night-shift for to nights now, and I felt that I needed something to calm me down after this shift before I go to bed. Winter-bathing was perfect. I really baked that manic buzz I came home from work with out of my system by taking a nice cold bath down at the beach.

30 min meditation today. Sobering.

30 min meditation tonight as I’m working night-shift. I’m so inspired by rollerblading, and extreme sport in general, these days. It seems like the perfect extension of ones yoga and meditation practice. It is all about cultivating that flow. I’m watching a lot of skate-videos these days, and I’m listening to a lot of podcasts by people who are into these types of sports. So nice to really immerse myself in this culture. I hope I can keep my awareness going regarding how I translate my yoga and meditation-practice into rollerblading. It also really helps me to balance my obsession with Chess. Been watching so many youtube videos with Chess-content since I got into Chess 2,5 years ago, and I’ve been having ambivalent feelings about getting into Chess because it often makes me feel like just another gamer, but somehow I’m addicted, but I think skating is a much healthier addiction, especially since it is easier to connect it with my yoga and meditation practice.