Meditation, Breathing, Cold Exposure - The mindful thread

Discussion in 'Techniques / Training' started by s_mair, Jan 13, 2025.

  1. s_mair

    s_mair Regular Member

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    2025-01-01_10-34-31_712 (Groß).jpeg

    If anyone had told me 12 months ago, that I’ll be immerging myself in +2°C water on a freezing cold -4°C New Years Day morning in 2025, I would have seriously questioned their mental health. And yet here I was, stepping into a small local river canal and even enjoying myself while doing it. So what happened? And what the hell does this have to do with badminton anyways?


    Introduction

    As with a lot of people when they cross the 40 years mark, I couldn’t help but noticing that my body and mind started showing signs of change. Some small health issues started kreeping in, I keep having several respiratory infections during the cold seasons and I was having some issues with sleep. And since I’m not the type to simply accept those things as unavoidable and god given, I started researching and dipping my toes into different things that I found along the way. And the more I did so, the more fun I found in that mindfulness stuff.

    So if you haven’t left this thread yet, you might be interested in my experiences with some of the stuff that I tried and maybe some recommendations and starting points if you are completely new to the matter and want to check out if this could be something for you too.

    Disclaimer: I am very far from considering myself even remotely an expert in these topics. I’ll only share my very personal experiences with the stuff that I’ve tried so far to maybe give some of you a certain starting point if you want to give it a try for yourself. Let’s keep in mind that everybody is different and everybody will make different experiences with this.

    Let’s start with…


    Part #1: Meditation

    It’s almost been a shocking 10 years when I started this thread, dealing with issues to calm down after a practise or even match session:
    https://www.badmintoncentral.com/fo...s-to-calm-down-after-evening-sessions.157053/

    And even if there was a lot of good advice, none of them seem to be the real game changer for me. And after talking to a friend who is deep into Yoga and meditation for years now, I decided to give it a go. But where to start?! If you search YouTube you’ll find a lot of beginner tutorials and of course a gazillion guided meditation videos for literally every situation in life resulting in massive option paralysis.
    That same friend directed me to a mini series in Netflix called “Headspace” which was then my door opener:



    Each episode shows the basics of a specific sort of meditation and at the end of each episode there’s a 5-7 minutes guided meditation based on the technique shown in the episode. Very easy to understand and to follow and to me a perfect way to get in touch with the whole matter. They also have a YouTube channel with loads of guided meditations for all sorts of occasions.

    So I went on and I tried to implement meditation to wind down after an evening badminton session. And the results I got were nothing but stunning. For me personally, I found the most effective meditations for that purpose to be sort of body scan meditations. The most effective one for me was this one here that I can highly recommend if you want to give it a try (it’s in German, sorry…):



    I've found that a technique called “non-sleep deep rest” (NSDR) very recently that seems to be very similar and I really like this video as well:



    Spending 15-20 minutes on one of those meditations just lying or sitting down on the couch helps me reduce my heart rate and my overall stress level significantly. I still need some time to fully calm down and being able to go to sleep, but the meditation clearly can speed up this process and especially helps to close my thinking about the previous match situations during the session.

    As a bit of background to the NSDR routines, they are based on a technique called Yoga Nidra:



    So far I’ve only dipped my toes into that whole area, but those seem to have a lot of potential. If you also want to give it a go, here’s a starter:



    I’ve done this routine instead of taking a nap on a day when I felt very exhausted and tired in the afternoon and it felt as if I had actually taken a good nap. My whole body and brain felt vitalized and re-energized without the tiredness I usually feel after an afternoon nap. So this is something I will be digging into deeper. I can imagine this being super useful during a break on a long tournament day.

    Before I continue with things like breathing exercises or cold exposure, I’d like to take a break here and split this huge cake into several smaller slices. And I would highly appreciate some feedback if anyone found it to be useful up to here and of course it would be very interesting to hear from others who have would like to share their own experiences with mediation.
     
    #1 s_mair, Jan 13, 2025
    Last edited: Jan 15, 2025
  2. Cheung

    Cheung Moderator

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    I have observed 15-20mins is the time it takes to warm up or cool down from any activity. In the context of badminton, at social games, people warm up by hitting practice shots for about 5mins and then start a game. However, it takes a whole game to get a proper feel of the timing. If you sit for 20mins after a game, you have cooled down and need to restart the warm up from nearly the beginning.
     
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  3. InvincibleAjay

    InvincibleAjay Regular Member

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    Hi mate,

    Good to see you try different things to help you.

    I have been meditating and using mindfulness for the last 15 years plus. I whole heartedly agree, it helps immensely with my stress and balance things out in my life. I will share more when I have more time (off coaching shortly). I relate a lot to your post, I am a serial ruminator and that means my mind never stops, its like it is thinking 100 mph all the time but sometimes I wish it would just chill. I have got better over the years and meditation and mindfulness have helped me greatly.

    My resting heart rate is 40-45 :) I am lucky and generally fit in this manner but I find my blood pressure spikes too much when I am stressed, I have managed to control it myself with self help even though the doctor told me I would be on medication for the rest of my life. They just don't know me, I like you dissect and research everything until I become confident I can find a solution.

    Kindest regards,

    -Ajay-

    Quote of the Day
    You can't help getting older, but you don't have to get old.
     
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  4. s_mair

    s_mair Regular Member

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    First of all, great to see you being around again Ajay! :)

    That is exactly what I mean. When I'm coming home from an intense badminton session, my mind is stuck in "fight mode" for quite a while. As if your car engine in running at 6.000 rpm but with the gear being in idle. And that's where a bit of meditation or a breathing excersise (I will get to that topic next) does help me immensely to slow down that "thought engine".
    BTW, I think I've never been physically more fit in my whole life than today. Resting heart rate is around 45-50 and I can outrun most of our youngsters on court when it comes to stamina. I upped up my badminton from 1 session to 2 sessions per week and I picked up running again more seriously in spring 2024. Ended up with a total distance of 240 km throughout the whole year which was blowing my mind. So yeah... I try to get to a point at which for me age is just a number. I take it as a good sign that I'm one of the very few players in my club that doesn't need a knee, elbow or wrist brace when the play badminton.

    Anyways, I'm looking forward to reading about your favorite routines!
     
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  5. thyrif

    thyrif Regular Member

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    Thank you all for sharing your stories. Life isn't always easy, I've been sitting on the fence on this for a bit. Perhaps it's time I give this more priority, thank you.
     
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  6. s_mair

    s_mair Regular Member

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    Just give it a try. You only risk wasting a bit of your time.
     
  7. s_mair

    s_mair Regular Member

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    Part #2: Breathing

    Spoiler: For me personally, the effects of working and experimenting with my breath have been even more impressive and noticeable than the meditations. I feel like it gives me direct access to a lot of bio-chemical processes that are happening in my body and I get a pretty much immediate feedback.

    My door opener to this part has been the book “Breath: The New Science of a Lost Art” by James Nestor. And boy, did I enjoy that one. It dives into the importance and the role of breathing for basically everything that is going on in our bodies and the looooong history of people trying to alter the reactions of the body and mind with different breathing routines or techniques. Very interesting and entertaining read that gives you a “huh?” moment at least once every chapter, highly recommended!

    Main takeaway #1:
    Mouth breathing as everyday breathing is the antichrist. So if you are currently sitting there reading this with your mouth open, you should seriously try to do something about it!

    Takeaway #2:
    Reducing the breath frequency and hence taking longer and deeper breaths will reduce stress and lower the heart rate.

    He especially highlights the effects of doing longer exhales on our nervous system and how this results in again lowering heart rate, stress level and reducing the level of our most important “stress hormone” cortisol in the body. If we are looking at the most popular breathing exercises and routines, they all have those things in common. Here’s a quick overview to check out:

    4-4-4-4 Box Breathing:


    4-7-8 Breathing:


    Cyclic Sighing (Physiological Sighing):




    What I really like about any of those is that you can do them during the day without taking some time off. It’s perfect for when you’re driving home from work or just sit in the office waiting for the next e-mail to arrive or the phone to ring. I found the Cyclic Sighing to be my favorite one since I feel like it gives me the most immediate effect and it’s easy to do on every occasion. For example: On the badminton court between rallies.
    And speaking of badminton, this leads me to the next sub-chapter…


    Part #2.1: (Nose) breathing and sports

    In the book, the author also explains in detail the benefits of doing nose breathing and reducing the breath frequency during physical activities. And being a 100% mouth breather when running or playing badminton myself, I decided to give this a go. The first runs that I tried implementing it felt horrible, I’m not going to lie. It just felt as if there is no way that it’s possible to get enough air in through the nose to make this all work. At first I only managed to do it for short intervals of a couple of 100 m before I got a serious feeling of suffocation and panic. I was prepared that this might be happening (it’s the slightly higher level of carbondioxide in the blood messing with me…), so I did my best to push through and keep on trying it on every run that I did. And by the fifth run, I was able to stay with nose inhales only for 2 km straight. By the tenth run, I didn’t have any major issues to stick to it for the whole 5 km run.

    And as a side effect, I reduced my breathing frequency noticeably. Before, I was mainly running with a 6-step-per-breath rhythm (so 3 steps inhale, 3 steps exhale), going down to 5 on uphill sections. With the nose inhale now, I could comfortably run with a 8- or even 9-steps-per-breath rhythm (so 3/4 steps inhale, 5 steps exhale). I simply learned to take deeper and more controlled breaths and as a result, I noticed that my average heart rates also noticeably went down compared to a previous full-mouth-breathing run at the same pace. And this then again resulted in a faster recovery after the run.

    Transferring this to badminton has not been that easy though. As of today I just can’t make myself switch to nose breathing during rallies. It works during warmup, but as soon as things get more intense and I start moving around more dynamically, mouth breathing is the only option. Between rallies is a different story though. If possible I try to breath through the nose there and especially focus on having longer exhales after very intense rallies. One side effect there is a psychological one on the opponent. It just feels amazing if your opponent is panting like a race horse while you yourself are standing there with your mouth closed, drawing what appears to be relaxed and slow breaths – even if your heart is racing and you’re equally exhausted as your opponent.

    In one of the later chapters of the book the author then mentions a person and the breathing technique he is promoting: Wim Hof. And he will be the main topic of the upcoming part #3. So stay tuned. :)
     
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  8. s_mair

    s_mair Regular Member

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    Part #3: Wim Hof Method

    Okay, now we have finally arrived at the chapter which I was most looking forward to myself. As explained before, I came across the name Wim Hof the the book by James Nestor. With a bit of research I learned that he has become famous as “The Iceman” (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wim_Hof), currently holding around 20 Guinnes world records and doing lots of crazy stuff over the past decades, mostly involving extreme conditions like cold or heat.

    For example:
    • fastest half-marathon run while barefoot on ice or snow in 2 hr 16 min 34 sec
    • farthest swim under ice on his second attempt, with a distance of 57.5 metres (188.6 feet)
    • spending almost 2 hours in a box fully immersed in ice
    • climbed to an altitude of 7,400 metres (24,300 ft) on Mount Everest wearing nothing but shorts and shoes
    • running a marathon in the desert without drinking any water (https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/ar...-marathon-40C-Nambia-touching-drop-water.html)
    So yeah, he is a freak, no way to put this differently. If anyone wants to get the full picture, just read his book “The Wim Hof Method: Activate Your Full Human Potential” (https://a.co/d/1obnOAU) – again, a pretty entertaining read.

    However he has always been claiming that it’s not his own superhuman abilities that allows him to do all this stuff, but instead that pretty much everybody has the potential to do this. He claimed that what enabled him to access this potential is a combination of three pillars that he has started to promote as the “Wim Hof Method”:

    1) Breathing Exercises
    2) Cold Exposure
    3) Meditation and Mindfulness

    Part #3.1: Breathing

    His signature breathing exercise is fairly simple and consists of three parts:
    1. Heavy breathing: 20-40 controlled cyclic deep breaths (controlled hyperventilation)
    2. Breath hold: Exhale after the last breath and stop breathing (as long as you can hold it without forcing it)
    3. Recovery breath: Fully inhale and hold for 15 seconds
    Repeat the sequence as often as you want (standard is 3-5 times). Here’s a short tutorial video including some safety advise:


    So as with other breathing techniques presented in the book, I decided to simply have a go, went on YouTube and found this guided breathing session - and if I had to recommend any of you just one video from this whole thing to check out, it clearly would be this one:


    After my very first go with this, I was instantly hooked. The physical response of my body was so strong and so instantaneous that is was almost hard to keep track of everything that was going on. During phase 1, my hands and feet started tingling, I felt lightheaded, I started feeling warm, my heart rate was rising - followed by an extreme calmness and focus during the breath hold in phase 2. And after finishing the third round, I was feeling so much differently than before. Fully awake and energized but yet calm and controlled at the same time.
    If you want to dig deep into the bio-chemical processes that are happening inside the body during the exercise, here’s a very detailed video covering that whole topic:


    Wim Hof himself has been claiming that by doing “his” breathing technique, we are able to open up a shortcut to directly tap into the autonomous nervous system and open up the possibility to alter things like immune responses and things like heart rate and blood pressure regulation. I am in no way in a place to say that this is true or not. At least he has made himself and trained “normal people” part of some funny scientific studies over the past years – the most interesting probably being this one:


    I’ve been doing this breathing exercise pretty much daily for a couple of months now, and I still just love it. No matter what is going on in my life or what state of mind and body I’m in before, I do feel different after doing 3 rounds of breathing. Every single time.

    And building the bridge to badminton again, I feel like this is the perfect preparation before a tournament, match day or even a normal practice session. It helps me to focus and control my nervousness and “performance anxiety” (if that term even exists) before a competition noticeably. And on the other end of the spectrum, it helps me collect my thoughts and calm down my brain after an exhausting session or tournament.

    And being already hooked with the breathing, I decided early November ’24 to also have a go with cold exposure…
     
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  9. s_mair

    s_mair Regular Member

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    Part #3.2: Cold Exposure

    The cold is a powerful stressor. Exposing yourself willingly and deliberately to the cold, from fancy cryo chambers to simply taking a cold shower, has various effects inside the body (and mind) that are part of many different treatments for probably hundreds of years.

    There are two main effects:

    1. Workout for the cardiovascular system
    All blood vessels in our body have a combined length of around 110.000 km. Yes, that is a lot. And along those 110.000 km there are muscle fibers that are regulating the blood flow by widening or narrowing the vessel. As soon as we start exposing our body to extreme temperatures, these muscles really have to work hard to quickly regulate the blood flow and doing it regularly makes them stronger and enable them to react faster to temperature changes and an improved blood pressure regulation.

    2. Coping with the cold as a stressor
    The cold is a potentially deadly threat to the human body. 15°C water is enough to basically let a human body freeze to death if exposed to it for a longer period of time. That’s why it costs a lot of mental power to force yourself into cold water or simply turning the water controls to cold in the shower.

    As soon as you expose yourself to low temperatures, the body will immediately react as if there was a potentially deadly threat happening. There will be a sudden release of all sorts of hormones (adrenalin, noradrenalin, cortisol) to first of all have all the power available to escape the supposed deadly situation, and in a second step to focus the body functions on one goal: reducing the loss of warmth best possible.
    It has also an effect on the immune system regulation which can have an impact on auto-immune diseases (more details, see Article).

    Regularly exposing yourself to the cold works as a practice for your whole body to also cope with other stressors and to be able to regulate your nervous system faster and more efficiently in case you’re faced with other physical or mental stress. There is also a mental aspect to this. Willingly making the decision and forcing yourself to face this supposedly life threatening situation requires a lot of strength and discipline (your body does play you all sorts of tricks trying to make you avoid going into the cold, believe me!) and overcoming that inner resistance makes you feel so much in control of your body.

    The physical adaption process of the body to the cold usually is completed after 2 minutes, so everything beyond that doesn’t really have any further beneficial effects and is more a “mind over body” type of thing.

    Wim Hof himself has been pushing the boundaries of cold exposure to the maximum and the way he describes the effects in his book just made me super curious to try this for myself. So I started with turning my shower to cold at the end of my regular warm shower in the morning. At first, I lasted 10 seconds at 15°C, then it was 20, then 30, and then I could feel my body adapting to the cold pretty quickly. After two weeks of daily cold showers, I could do 2 minutes at maxed-out cold tap water which is a chilly 8-10°C in the German winter. And even if I’m fairly used to it by now, it costs me a lot of will power to do turn that lever to cold. Every. Single. Time.
    But the kick I get from it is so powerful that it gets addictive.

    So the next step was to take a cold bath somewhere outside. And that’s how I ended up in that small canal as seen at the very beginning of this thread. Immersing yourself in that 2°C water, overcoming your whole body screaming “NOOOOOO, DON’T DO THIS!!!!”, gasping for air during the first 30 seconds, then feeling your body adapting and going into “crisis mode”, your mind moving away from everything it has been dealing with before to only focusing on the cold is a unique experience. So I’ve been doing cold baths now around once a week since mid of December and it feels great.


    Part #4: Summary and "The One"

    As you can see, I’ve had a bit of a journey through various techniques over the past year. But what are the actual results and effects on my daily life and badminton in particular?

    First and most important: So far this has been the first fall & winter season that I can remember in which I didn’t have any kind of airway infection. And this whilst having my kids and wife having multiple infections since early October and so many colleagues at work being ill during that timeframe as well. The past two winters, I’ve pretty much always been the first one in the family to catch a cold – so this is a significant improvement for me. I haven’t missed a single practice or club league session this season due to illness.

    A second effect I noticed is that my body shows less extreme reactions in stressful situations – at work or before/during badminton matches. As written before, I feel a lot less nervous before an upcoming match day and more calm and focused when I’m on court. I’m still getting absolutely furious missing the typical easy kills or serving into the net at 18-18, don’t get me wrong, but it feels like I could calm down to base line faster.

    A critical reader will say that these effects are all just anecdotal evidence without any actual scientific foundation or proof. And of course that is correct. And at the same time it just makes me feel good and confident and that alone is worth the effort in my opinion.

    And to anyone who doesn’t want to read through this whole thing, here’s again “the one” breathing exercise that I’d recommend to try. In the morning after waking up, before a badminton session, when you get home from work and you don’t find anything on the telly – it really doesn’t matter:


    So hopefully some of you will find something useful in here. And if you do, it would be cool if you shared your experiences or share other stuff that you found effective. :)
     
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  10. Flixor

    Flixor Regular Member

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    Thank you for sharing your experience!

    A colleague recently recommended the book from James Nestor which I am currently reading as well as the Wim Hof breathing technique I am incorporating into my daily life.
    Let's see if it improves my game and recovery :)
     
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  11. UkPlayer

    UkPlayer Regular Member

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    This is one of the best threads on here. Some great information.

    I haven't done much cold exposure but it's something on my list. For recovery I use a sauna regularly as they have one at my leisure centre, I find that massively beneficial, as well as stretching and foam rolling.

    Meditation is interesting because not only does it have benefits off court, on court, the less you are thinking the more you are present to react. Also once you start thinking under pressure you start making mistakes and trying too hard, so staying in the moment and focused when you're losing is a real skill to have. This is what I love about badminton, it's a complete discipline that involves many aspects. Playing tournaments again I can see how really small things which you do off court add up.

    Yoga also, I do elements of while I am going through my stretching routine but I'd like to get more into the meditative aspects of it.
     
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