Ian Hart interviewed Bart Scholtissen for his book “Healing Hacks” which is all about natural healing techniques and hacks for recovery fast and performance max. He interviews healing hackers who give their most valuable techniques to stimulate the healing process in the body. You can learn more about it when you read the book – https://healinghacks.net/. Bart Scholtissen is a mindset expert, Wim Hof Method instructor, lifestyle hacker, nature person, guide, connector & change agent. He is a neuropsychologist Dr. and passionate about connecting evidence based with experience based to bring people closer to their own nature.

1. I’m personally not a big fan of like left brain, right brain and I know that these are like things that are being said, but to me this thing, this brain that’s inside of here, that’s one big network and there is a cross action and everything going on. (Brain Activity | 10:09)

2. I sort of found out there is no such thing as coincidence. We live on this, this living organism called earth and everything is connected, everything is looking for balance and things don’t happen without a reason (Balance | 12:00)

3. Me finding Wim and actually our path sort of crossed cause I am coming from evidence based going to experience base and he’s coming from experience based on to evidence base. So at some time and point we crossed and I guess that’s sort of where we met. And the method is, it’s not, it’s not easy but it’s so simple. Breathing mindset, cold, nature exposure, connection that it just, it hit me, it hit me harder than anything had hit me in the years before. Due to its simplicity, the elegance of the simplicity is there and it’s just like a good Italian dish. You have three ingredients and create magic on a plate and, and Wim’s method, combining things that have always been present, breathing, mindset, cold, nature, combining those things into something which is more than the sum of the things just hit me (Wim Hof Method | 12:25)

4. I’ve been breathing wrong for a large part of my life, so that hit me immediately. I felt that I felt something changing in my body and it was, I was fighting the cold for a number of days when I started taking cold showers and then after, I think day five or six of cold showers, I exited the shower warm and that’s when it really hit me that… Okay. What’s this? I just, just being in a cold shower in January where water is really cold, I come out and warm. (Wim Hof Method | 13:50)

5. I stopped fighting the cold cause a lot of things we do in this western society when we meet stress is we fight because that is what we’ve learned to do, you know? Fight. And I think I just, I just accepted the fact that it was cold so accepted the stressor at hand and then my body, I let my body do what it’s supposed to do, warm up and it did. So yeah, this beautiful biological mechanism that’s there that hasn’t evolved out. (Ice bath and the body | 15:19)

6. Resisting whatever you’re resisting just creates more pain. (Ice bath and the body | 15:53)

7. Your brain is a pattern machine. Your brain uses up a lot of energy to process stuff. So if your brain can produce patterns, which are less energy consuming than novelty things, and then your brain will choose for that to just keep things going with the least amount of effort possible… the first thing you’ve, probably happen is the fact that you have been learned in this Western society that cold is not okay. That so the pattern on that that is there is that cold is dangerous. You’re going to die, you’re going to freeze, you’re going to turn into a living popsicle or whatever. And those emotional aspects of the memory, which has been imprinted regarding cold exposure will sort of turn all turn on all the alarm signals in your brain and you want to get out. And if you find the opportunity or the peace of mind already that you don’t get out, then you might still go into fight flight mode, maybe even freeze mode cause… and you will fight the stressor at hand because that was also what we’ve been taught. If there is stress fight because you might be able to win. But personally and also in the studies that Wim did, like what we’re showing is that the competition is useless because you can’t fight nature. We are a part of nature and you will never win. The ice is always going to be colder so there is no use in fighting and so you need to leave that pattern behind that you will win by fighting by creating forced balance, which is no form of balance to me. And just accept what is present and then overrule those old patterns and let go of Ego. So to say, cause ego was like, yeah, we’re going to win, we’re going to do this, come on, if let go and just accept what is whatever stressor it is in this case is cold water or ice water. And then you can be, and you can, you can leave the brain, check in with your system again and your body knows what to do. Create balance, create heat if there is cold. And it was to do that because we have been doing that for decades. So that was what was happening and if you then learn so you’re learning something new, you live in your comfort zone of warm fluffiness and you go into this cold stressful environment opening up to learn something new and then you will have this new pattern that you can use every next time you meet a stressor which might be cold or something else, because your body always reacts in approximately the same way to stress and you can use everything you learned in an ice bath in other stressful situations and that helped me a lot. (Neuroscience and Ice bath | 17:16)

8. There might be a thing to… Lots of ego in the system working to make it more difficult to go into an ice bath and to be with the situation cause the ego was working on you so hard. (Ego and Ice bath | 21:21)

9. The patterns that are there, the ego that saying, I can fight this, I’m better than this. The dopamine testosterone levels are so high. Yeah, I know I’m better than this. I can fight this. And then you need to let go of that. And that two people are who are really high in that fight flight mode all the time. It’s, it’s more difficult to let go than people who are somewhat lower in that, in that system. So if you’re in, if you’re always like going on your sympathetic part of the nervous system and that has become your normal then it’s more difficult to turn down again to de-escalate and to find that you’re actually capable of doing that, creating that balance again without the necessity of being in that hyperactive ego driven sympathetic part. (Ego and Ice bath | 23:10)

10. When you walk barefoot in nature what happens is that negative ions from your system get from the earth are being taken up by a system. And that may reassure and ensures that your heart, your cardiovascular system, breathing immune system, it all works better. So actually what I think is happening not only on a brain level but also like in your entire system is actually balancing again, you’re connecting with the nature that you are part of. And the thing you know I can wear a nice shirt and I can be in all these houses and cubicles and stuff. But actually this is nature and the nature outside is something that we are a part of. But what we have done over the, like in the cognitive revolution industrial revolution where, whatever kind of revolution or evolution that we’ve been in as a humans species is create further distance between our nature and the nature outside, which in essence is one thing to me…  So the more we are able to connect again our nature with nature outside, the more balanced we are. And the more, yeah the more at ease we can become. Shinrin-Yoku in Japan, you know, forest bathing is, since the 80s there, it’s a form of therapy which is widely accepted and normal. But here in the Western society, it’s only be, it’s new and it’s becoming more well known now. But so, so going out into nature creates balance and so getting… and it makes you connect because connection works two sides. Connection should work inside first and then outside we can connect with each other if the connection inside is good and that connection inwards will work better if you’re connected with nature. (Health and Nature | 24:48)

11. The fact that people think that that’s impossible as a nice example of the limiting beliefs that we have gathered around, over the years in our brain. And I used to have the same cause when I was at, at the edge of my first iceberg. I thought I was going to die when I would answer. And an ice bath for the people who’ve done that, they know is intense, can be intense, but way less intense than being in freezing, fresh, streaming water as somewhere out in nature that’s colder. But still the body knows what to do. The body knows what to do but the limiting beliefs in our head are prohibiting the body to do what it’s supposed to do. And so what we train you to do is to let go of those limiting beliefs. And that’s also why this exercise is part of the instructor training. And so it’s not about keeping you in there for 10 minutes. It was less, was around seven minutes or something, but it’s not about the exact time, but it’s, and you could’ve been in there for longer… approximately. So what happens there is that in this extreme harsh nature that you’re in, there is no external heat source so you can’t turn to a warm, I don’t know there is no sauna there, there is no, no warm sunshine. So you can’t turn to external heat source. So you need to go inwards to reheat. Your system knows what to do. We can go into details like mitochondria bursting and activity. And so extra energy in essence, extra energy needs to be produced in your system in order to create excess heat to reheat your body slowly and gently. And you’re, everybody is capable of doing that it’s just a limiting beliefs in our head. The mindset that we’ve been taught to listen to is dysfunctional. It’s keeping us in this disbalanced situation. (Wim Hof Method and the body | 28:47)

12. The intercostal muscles, so the muscles between your ribs. There’s this study was done last year in Michigan. So at first the big news was like brown fat, brown fat activation. Everybody has white fat, brown fat and brown fat activation was, was shown to be higher in Wim or people working outside for instance, like in Scandinavia, a lot of people do outside work, tree logging and if they’re out in winter time, they have more brown fat. And this brown fat is brown because it contains more energy producing cells, energy producing bodies per cell so these, these things, the mitochondria, they’re a bit brownish and that’s why brown fat is called brown fat. They can turn around the white fat into energy better than other cells in your body. So that was found first. And so we do brown fat activation, movements, activities to increase the heat. And last year in Michigan study, they found that intercostal muscles we’re also part of this reheatings, reheating system of your body. There are a lot of capillaries in your intercostal muscles and when you tense those muscles so energy needs to go there. So oxygen needs to go there to make that and to release that energy. And the capillaries that go through there just spread out that warmth that is being produced there throughout your system. (Wim Hof Method and the body | 32:34)

13. Once their life and when the temperature, the ambient temperature gets down so much, or you’re in that period that you’re in a prolonged period of time and cold environment, then your body wants to stay alive. And consciousness is also taking up a lot of energy… You know this talk that we’re doing is taking up energy. Our brains need to work in order to communicate and if your system says, well, no, we need to shut that down a bit then you might get these in this states of confusion, which are also symptoms of hypothermia and mild hypothermia arising. (Hypothermia | 37:01)

14. The thing you can influence is mindset because your mindset creates your reality. (Mindset | 41:39)

15. Scientists believe that the heart was like the brain. And so now we’re starting to like bring it into a connection. I don’t know if you ever heard of HeartMath. (Heart | 42:18)

16. This western society sees these two things as separate things. And physically you can, you can get your heart out and you can get your brain out. But I think that they are all parts of one thing, and that this like, like your heart and your gut, that’s a brain. But this is also a brain in an essence this is your central line. And it’s one, to me, it’s one thing. So if you’re in connection, if there is flow or good vibes, like Bruce Lipton says it’s not only interpersonal but also intrapersonal. (Heart and Brain, Wavelength | 43:00)

17. Science is just an, a very extreme example of the society we live in. And in science people only look at things they can see, right? What’s non measurable? So no zero is a one can be added to it. That doesn’t exist. (Science and Mindset | 44:43)

18. There is something in between those trees, which isn’t measurable yet. Maybe in a scientific way, but it’s there. It’s energy.”(Science and Mindset | 46:34)

19. The most impactful things in our lives are the things that we can’t see. Like love and anger, right? Those are impacting your lives.(Science, Energy of Nature | 46:45)

20. The intangible, tangible stuff and by taking people into nature, helping them with breath work, letting them be connected to their own system, their own body again, and by that to nature, letting them take off their shoes and walk on their bare feet, which a lot of people have never done before because you know, you wear shoes because that’s what society dictates. You wear shoes and then people take them off and they like, oh, this hurts on my feet as, hey, you’re feeling something now… I am. And so you raised the awareness of, of all the signals that this body and nature is sending you, then you can increase connection and increase happiness. And then as Wim says, help people living a more happy, healthy and strong life. Enlightenment. (Energy of Nature | 47:44)

21. What I feel when I walk, when I walk into the forest around back here, I take off my shoes, I feel the connection, I feel the energy go through the system and even further because the physical limitations of your body are not the end of the energy that you are part of. And you can feel that and that might sound vague and spiritual to some people, but if you open up to that, to that experience and just, you know, go out there, take off those shoes and be open to the experience and you can actually start feeling that. (Nature and the body | 49:28)

22. Going out in nature and reconnecting with the earth and building that energy… Not only with earth, also with the air, you know the things that we can’t see cause cause we can see earth again, we see the soil, we see the bottom that, that our feet are standing on. But we’re constantly surrounded by energy, which is in the air outside as well as inside here. And the more you can connect with that, the trees, the wind, whatever, the more connection you will have and the more peace of mind you will get, the better balance your body will be. So then when, if you meet the stressor, cause we all meet stress in our lives, you find new and better ways to deal with the stressors at hand and this happy, healthy life and go bio hacking for living for the rest of your life. (Energy of Nature and Healing | 50:18)

23. Breathe consciously… stating out the obvious. (Lifestyle Hacks | 51:43)

24. Go out there, make things less complicated. We are over complicating almost everything in our life, which leads to this, this huge amount of limiting beliefs in your head. And you can read a lot of books about it and that’s interesting. But just go there, go out there, go outside of your comfort zone and be open to experiencing new things. Go jump out of an airplane, wearing a parachute, face your fears and go look what’s on the other side of that fear. Because you can learn a lot there. That’s mindset. Let go of the limiting beliefs here. Be Open, connect with yourself, with people outside and you know, with nature outside and just be happy and live now. (Healing Hacks | 52:38)

     

Ian Hart is a Body-Mind Transformation expert, the creator of EarthFIT Training Systems, co-creator of BACK PAIN RELIEF4LIFE, HEALING HACKS author, and founder of BEAUFORTPERSONALTRAINING.COM and MYBACKPAINCOACH.COM. Ian and his team help people get into optimal shape in the safest, fastest and most effective way possible, using cutting edge science.