[00:00] Welcome back to the Focus B show. This is Katie Sudddhart here aka the focus b. And on this show, I interview high performers and leaders around the world to discover their secrets on peak performance, productivity, mindfulness, and leadership. So if you want to take your performance and your leadership to the next level, then you're in the right place. Listen up and connect with the magic.

[00:36] You one topic I talk about a lot is energy and how you can raise and boost your energy. This is something that I find so important because if you have more energy, not only is it easier for you to tackle work projects, but also you'll attract people that have a similar type of energy. And so overall, it has a huge impact on how you show up and on so many different aspects in your life. And so I've spoken before in other podcast episodes and videos. You can check them out. On the topic of energy, one anachronym that I created that I love is called Nest, which looks at your nutrition, exercise, sleep, and time out that I believe are four fundamental blocks in terms of physical energy. And I've also spoken about mental and emotional energy and all these sort of things. And today I want to look at one unconventional method or maybe something we don't think of when we think of raising our energy. And this is something called hometic stressors. And these hometic stresses are, for instance, cold, heat, exercise, and not eating fasting. The reason why this is sort of unconventional or different is because these stresses or hormetic stresses are factors that if you did it in too large a dose, would actually harm you. But in smaller doses, they increase your resilience, they increase your vitality, and they make you feel great. One of them that those of you who know my content will have heard of is cold showers. And this can be also ice bathing. And it's a whole wim HOF cold exposure. And this is one of the reasons why it's so invigorating, it's so refreshing, it's so wonderful, is because it is a hormetic stressor. And therefore, by exposing your body to cold, but it also works with heat, your body becomes more resilient. It's hard for your body to do that. And so you develop a resilience where this is really magical. I heard this on a podcast, I can't remember which one, but it's if you train your body to be more resilient to physical stress, such as huge differences in temperatures, but it could also be exercise, it can also be not eating all of these physical stresses. If you train your body to deal with that, then your brain and your mind is better able to deal with daily stress at work, for instance, or at home. By building your physical resilience, you build your mental resilience. So personally, I think it's worth taking that cold shower every morning if you just do two, three minutes in the cold, even less two minutes, 1 minute when you're beginning, if you want, and then you're able to cope with stress better for an entire day. Win win. And I've also come to really enjoy my cold showers. I think you really get used to that sense of, yeah, you feel great afterwards, a bit like after a workout. So what I find that's sort of different here is instead of looking at things that make you feel good and make you feel happy and energized and this is super important too, is to look at how can you incorporate some of these hormetic stresses into your weekly into your daily life so that you can start to build that resiliency or resilience? So this could be incorporating a cold shower, or maybe if you live close to a lake or the sea, doing a cold dip every morning. So nice to be in nature, to be connected, and this is a wonderful way to start your day. Another of these aspects is exercise. So looking at your exercise routine and thinking, okay, what can you incorporate that will help you to have a bit more of this resilience, this physical resilience from exercising? This is tremendously, tremendously important. I'm not the first person to talk about exercise and it's always a great reminder, I think for many of us. We sometimes fall off the wagon, stop exercising for a bit and then get back on. And the more you do that, the more you'll realize that when you're off the wagon, your energy level is nothing like when you're on the wagon and then you get back on and that's okay. That's part of building habits and routines and finding that rhythm that works for you. And the last one was around fasting. And again, this is something that maybe some people feel reluctant to, or maybe you're already practicing intermittent fasting. And it also depends a bit on your body type. For certain people, fasting is even more beneficial. For others that have a different type of sort of morphology, it can still be beneficial, but maybe in different amounts. So for some people it's really great to do, for example, something quite extreme, which is the 24. So it's 20 hours without eating, 4 hours during which you can eat. So this would mean that, for instance, you could eat between twelve and 04:00 p.m.. And then you wouldn't eat anything from 04:00 p.m. Till twelve the next day. I know that it's more common, the 16 and eight, I think, and this is 16 and eight. So you don't eat for 16 hours and you can eat for eight. This is similar, you skip breakfast generally, most people do, though you could also skip dinner, which helps you to have a better night's sleep. And these are methods that can work really well for people who have a morphology, a bit like kafir morphology. For those who know vatapita kafha from the Indian Ayurvedic system and for people who are more vatapita, maybe it works to not eat a day a week or every two weeks, or skip a dinner sometimes. Whatever feels right with your body. And by right I don't mean easy, but when you feel good afterwards and you feel it actually did your body good. So that was the third type of formatic, stressor. So the first one with extreme of temperatures, hot or cold and you can also alternate them by going very cold. For example in Sweden this is quite common, you go to a sauna, very hot, then you go in a cold lake, then you get back in the sauna and you alternate this. Or you can just practice cold showers regularly and then exercise, which is amazing, mind blowing, wonderful, game changing, find something you enjoy and just do more of it. And then fasting or intermittent fasting. So this can also be useful and it does make a difference because it does put your body under some form of physical stress and then you're able to better cope with this. And on top of this, in terms of fasting, it helps you to no longer have that dependency on food whenever you feeling a bit bored or frustrated. So it also helps you to revise a bit the relationship you have with food which is always a good thing and always something to look into and you're building your discipline and willpower. So really it's all wonderful. They're all really good. Highly recommend the cold showers. Yes, they're my favorite night of exercising too, and fasting. I just think in my case I just sleep better, for instance if I skipped it or don't eat for a whole day. So yes, be very curious to know, do you practice using these? Do you use hormetic stresses to boost your resilience, to boost your energy? And does it work? What are the results you've seen? Would love to hear this in comments. And also if you enjoyed this episode and if you want to share it with the world, the easiest way to do this is to leave a review on Spotify or Apple podcasts or share it with a friend. So that would mean the world to me and thank you so, so much for tuning in and hope this was useful for you. Wishing you a wonderful day.

[09:00] Thank you so much for tuning in today to the Focus Bees show. I would absolutely love to hear your feedback. So let me know in an Apple review or YouTube comment what was most valuable for you and feel free to share this episode with a friend or a family member. Wishing you a wonderful, magical and focused day ahead.