My wife and I have had a 5 am wake up call every morning for the past week.  It’s that time of year in Minnesota, everything is alive and making noise.

We have this crazy cardinal who starts up at the first sign of light with a maddening incessant chirp right outside our bedroom window.

I took three sauna rounds in my backyard sauna last night and tucked myself into bed by 11 pm.  When I awoke, it was 7 am, and I felt like I had just shut my eyes for a minute.

When is the last time you’ve slept that soundly?

A Finnish sauna helps relax your muscles and gets you in a mentally calm state.  You may just need someone to help shovel you into bed, but wow, what a way to get even with a noisy cardinal!

One of the more powerful sauna benefits is one that is often overlooked.  In this fast paced world of many demands, ask yourself, when is the last time you’ve spent a couple hours just thinking?  No TV, no driving around, just ‘recharging your batteries’?

Reconnect in the sauna.

Some people love running or hiking as a way to mentally recharge.  And in the film “What About Bob?” Bill Murray (Bob Wiley) is told to ‘take a vacation from your problems.’  Well here’s some free sauna information that isn’t about how to build a sauna or throw a sauna party or where the next mobile sauna is.

I had a great sauna last night.  Alone for a couple rounds, I was able to reconnect.  I found myself jotting down a list of things to do,  including writing this post.  Then my friend Dan showed up for a sauna.

Three things in our lives.

Dan and I discussed how, being so busy, life basically comes down to three buckets: family, work, personal.  Now this resonated with me as not only is he right, but I have a freaky appreciation to the power of three relating to sauna.

This morning, over coffee, I was able to put a “p” for personal, “w” for work, and “f” for family in front of each thing on my list from the sauna.  I’m pretty sure “put socks away” would be ‘personal’ but my wife surely notices my socks laying around, so I stick an “f” next to that one, and for that matter, “w” too, as it’s too cold outside to show up to a meeting with just my shoes on.  The point is, forging ahead with a focus on all three buckets is a rising tide that lifts the content in each.  And at the end of the day, after we kick the bucket, that’s it!

What about you?

Not sure if you’re a list person, or where you go to reconnect.  Maybe you take a pen with you while hiking, maybe you jot stuff down in the sauna at your fitness center (avoiding eye contact with Sven), but my backyard sauna is really good for my head.  Without a sauna, i’d still be looking for my socks, and you wouldn’t be reading this.

I had to do it.  I was sick of staring at these crisp clear sunny January Minnesota days from inside.  Plus I knew what was waiting for me, my backyard sauna.  We made it home and after grabbing 32 oz of water and my towel, I escaped to my sauna.

Goodbye hacking

I first noticed a change half way through round one.  No more hacking.  Just as a wood burning sauna can take the bite off a zero degree night, it cleared me out after just one shot of water on the rocks and a few coughs.  ahhhhhh sticking it out a little while longer, I then doused some cool water over me and stepped out into the fresh air.  Not bad!

Goodbye weird drugs

I don’t know about you, but taking cold medicine is just a bit of lessor of two evils.  I have no idea what guaifenesin is or what it does to your body, but it sure ain’t natural, and it surely is in cough medicine.  And a by product of being sick and taking drugs is that weird “out there” feeling from drugs.  I forget what i’m watching on TV, my wife’s voice has a freaky echo, and I get dreams to a warped degree.  Not good.  This much is clear: if I were to take a sweat sample off my skin during round two, i’m sure it would be full of guaifenesin.  I’m pretty sure the body doesn’t digest the stuff, but i’m very sure I was sweating it out.  It felt great to sweat, and feel myself again.

Goodbye achy body

Laying in bed all day and night sucks. I had pretty much turned into peanut brittle.  Skating took on heightened fear, for had I crashed, I’d surely break into pieces.  Yet, while sitting on the bench during round three, I began feeling the complete opposite.  I tossed a shot of water on the rocks, stood in the sauna and began stretching.  “oh, so that’s what my ankles feel like!”  My lower back pain was gone, I was like Gumby and each stretch and deep breath made me think “did i really just lick this damn cold?”

On the package of Cold Eze and those zinc lozenges it says something like “proven to shorten the duration of the common cold.”   I can personally attest, this same claim could also be posted outside my sauna door.

Update

Sound asleep, I notice is the sound of a garbage truck.  “Garbage truck?  what the?” So, I start thinking, if I am hearing a garbage truck it must be morning, and if it is in fact morning that means I actually slept through the night.  I open my eyes.  I look at the clock.  7:08 am.  Sheesh.  I just slept soundly for 8 1/2 hours.  First time I can say THAT since my cold.  Yippie!! thank you sauna!  I take a deep breath, no need to cough.  I get out of bed.. ah.. gumby, not peanut brittle.  Thanks again sauna!

This is an authentic wood burning Finnish sauna. Northern Europeans have been taking part in this ritual for centuries.

How is this sauna different?

Experience the wood burning sauna stove.  It was hand welded and crafted by a third generation Finnish stove maker, Lamppa Manufacturing, Tower, MN.  The stove weighs over 300 lbs. and has about 80 lbs. of special rocks that hold thermal mass.  This creates a different sort of heat, one that naturally radiates through the body and produces negative ions for a natural, therapeutic experience, offering many unparalleled benefits.

What are the benefits of an authentic Finnish sauna?

1.  Health and wellness: Sauna therapy is perhaps the best way to detoxify, ridding one’s body of slow metabolizing bad stuff.  Saunas rejuvenate, clear and promote healthy skin.  Alternating between the sauna room and outside, saunas help with respiration  Saunas are great for muscle relaxation, whether stiff from a cold winter day or exercise.

2.  Escape: beyond the physical benefits, sauna therapy is great for stress relief.  Imagine having your own cabin escape right in your backyard.  No driving, no big mortgage, just a “staycation” where you can turn a corner of your backyard into an enjoyable working asset, a place for social interaction with family and friends.

3.  Green: with a small solar panel, this entire unit can be ‘off the grid’.  It is efficiently wood heated with minimal smoke output.  Today I am heating using Minnesota red oak, harvested from private land.

How do I take a sauna?

The cool thing is that there are few rules to a sauna.  A few basic suggestions:

1. Drink a big glass of water before going into sauna.  Stay hydrated throughout.  This encourages sweat and wards off dehydration.
2. Wear as little as possible.  Whatever you are comfy getting wet.
3. Have a towel handy for drying off when you’re all done.
4. Enter the hot room.  Most people stick around for 10-15 minutes.  Toss a bit of water on the sauna rocks, if desired.
5. Getting too hot?  Try sitting on the lower bench and work up to:
6. Go outside and dump water over your body or jump in the lake.
7. Stay outside and cool off, let your body equalize for a few minutes.
8. Repeat 1-7.

Oh, and keep the sauna door closed!

Disclosure

By reading this, you are using this sauna at your own risk, if you feel faint leave the sauna immediately. The sauna stove is very hot and if you touch it you will get burned. Please look at but do NOT touch.

Considering whether to build a wood burning sauna or an electric sauna?  You may want to read below.. I’ll post all comments.

Why do we go there?  The unemployment rate may have jumped, housing sales may have dropped, Michael Jackson may have died, but at that moment, sitting pensively in a sauna on an island on a lake 240 miles from Minneapolis, all that interests us is:

• Water pump from the lake: “how did you set yours up?”
• Duluth: “can you pick me up a box of 2 1/2″ deck screws?”
• Fishing: “Jack caught a twenty four incher off Comet last week.”

May sound a tad trite, but where do you go find your community?

1. Pretzels – little sodium replenishment and no oily fats.
2. Cheese – dairy protein jives much better at night than meat protein.
3. Fruit – natural vitamins and fiber via Granny Smith apples or any fresh fruit.

These three foods work well together, without any red dye #5 or poly-splenda-msg-benzoate.

I sleep great after this light snack… Any other suggestions?

I’ll admit, the morning after a long sauna party can be a very groggy experience.  Unlike a hangover, though, after getting out of bed and brushing teeth, etc., it’s amazing how fresh one feels!  It’s important to drink plenty of water during your sauna session, and with anything, don’t overindulge in alcohol.   But there is a thing I call the sauna quotient:

6 hours sleep after a good sauna =  8-9 hours sleep without a sauna.

It makes sense: your body is relaxed, your muscles rested, your mind restored.  It’s like my buddy Clint says: saunas are my reset button.  Everyone deserves their own reset button!

Three major attributes of saunas.

1. Health and Wellness
2. Escape
3. Green

Three sauna rounds make for a complete sauna.

1. Round 1: heat up and cold rinse
2. Round 2: induce loyly (steam), sweat heavy, and cold rinse
3. Round 3: sweat heavy, muscle stretch, skin cleanse and clean rinse

When you build your own sauna,  consider the three zones for optimal sauna enjoyment

1. sauna room: 7′ high ceiling max.  optimize your cubic footage, consider bench height.
2. changing room: lots of hooks, music and small fridge for cold water and beverages, good flow.
3. outdoor patio: outdoor shower, nice sitting area to chill out and look at the stars, privacy, buffer.

Three beers make for a good sauna party.

Three guests make for a fun sauna party.

Three hours is about how long a good sauna party lasts.

Ever heard the one about fish and guests both start to stink after three days?   3 saunas a week can minimize this.

I accept the fact that an increased body temperature burns fat. I take issue with Infrared and the mechanisms by which infrared technology raises one’s body temperature. A wood sauna is a sauna. An infrared is a microwave.  Wood heat is a much more natural way to heat a sauna room.  Loyly (steam vapor from water tossed on hot sauna rocks) is a key component to any authentic Finnish sauna experience.  With infrared, you can’t toss water on light bulbs.

Go to Scandinavia, where folks have been taking saunas dating back a couple thousand years. Ask any Finlander (or this guy singing in the video) what he thinks of infrared ’saunas’ and he will confirm: infrared is NOT a sauna. Infrared is merely an easy way to market and exploit a great health and wellness tradition:

• Infrared light bulbs are cheap.
• Infrared ‘heaters’ plug into 110v, requiring no chimney’s or special wiring.
• Infrared companies can ship product to any sucker anywhere via flashy websites and trade shows.

Please read my page on free sauna information and become better informed.

Before you buy an infrared, take an authentic Finnish sauna.