Something All Of Us Can Do Yet We Thought We Couldn’t. Some ‘Supernormal’ Powers Are Actually Normal
Wim Hof raised the eyebrows of many scientists after he was able to use meditation to stay submerged in ice for almost two hours without his core body temperature changing one bit.
This is remarkable, and adds to the growing body of evidence that points to the important role consciousness plays in our body’s reaction to certain situations/ailments. Since Wim was able to successfully maintain his core body temperature in such a harsh environment, he’s since gone on to climb Mount Everest in his shorts, resist altitude sickness, complete a marathon in the Namib Desert with no water, and proven under a laboratory setting that he’s able to influence his autonomic nervous system and immune system at will. But this isn’t about doing mind bending feats as it is about consciousness. And that’s where Wim’s focus is. He uses cold therapy as a mirror to show you where your consciousness is and what connection you have to your body. He encourages the connection between your mind, body and consciousness. Almost everything this man has done was thought to be impossible by most. Yet he teaches everyone how you do these things in this free mini-course. You can also check out the podcast we did with Wim here. Wim is able to influence his autonomic nervous system. What is the autonomic nervous systems (ANS)? It regulates the functions of our internal organs. Its role is to regulate several bodily functions such as digestion, heart rate, urination, sexual arousal, respiratory rate, pupillary response, and more. It operates reflexively and unconsciously, often without our even noticing. For example, we do not decide to make our heart beat faster when we are afraid, or notice when our blood vessels change size. This system just does what it does, assumed to have no external influences, and considered to be a natural body response that’s regulated by the hypothalamus in the brain (which is what regulates the autonomic nervous system. It’s the primary regulator of acute stress response, also known as the ‘fight or flight’ response. What are ‘factors associated with consciousness?’ From a modern day scientific standpoint, factors associated with consciousness include observation, measurements, human intention, perception, and our thoughts. We have seen these terms used in publications before, and we’ve written about a quantum physics experiment where “factors associated with consciousness” had significant results in physical systems. When talking about consciousness today, the perception and definition of this term is very different from, let’s say, an ancient Ayurvedic perspective, and it’s important to make that distinction here. Thoughts have been shown, from a scientific perspective, to yield some very significant results when it comes to influencing physical systems, including our own bodies. It’s no secret that a well-functioning immune system protects the body from pathogens, but sometimes it’s not strong enough, and this can lead to the development of various autoimmune diseases.
The immune system is controlled by the autonomic nervous system, and it has long been thought that we could not voluntarily influence our immune system nor the autonomic nervous system. This all changed when an intensive care researcher by the name of Dr. Matthijis Kox, along with Peter Pikkers, Professor of Experimental Intensive Care Medicine at Radboud University in Nijmegen, decided to conduct a study. According to them, humans do indeed have the potential and ability to influence the autonomic immune system with the power of the mind. And Wim Hof proved it. Wim Hof, aka “Iceman,” raised the eyebrows of many scientists after he was able to use meditation to stay submerged in ice for almost two hours without his core body temperature changing one bit. This is remarkable, to say the least, and adds to the growing body of evidence that points to the important role consciousness plays in our body’s reaction to certain situations/ailments. Since Wim was able to successfully maintain his core body temperature in such a harsh environment, he’s since gone on to climb Mount Everest in his shorts, resist altitude sickness, complete a marathon in the Namib Desert with no water, and proven under a laboratory setting that he’s able to influence his autonomic nervous system and immune system at will. According to the Radboud University Nijmegen Medical Centre: “The results obtained are remarkable, however, the investigators emphasize that so far, these results have only been obtained in a single individual.
Therefore, they can not serve as scientific evidence for the hypothesis that the autonomic nervous system and the immune response can be influenced through concentration and meditation techniques.” (source) To examine Hof’s ability, researchers injected an endotoxin, which is a dead cell-wall component of bacteria, into healthy volunteers. When this happens, the immune system reacts as if real, live bacteria have actually entered into the body, and thus it automatically creates a an immune system response.
The response is characterized by the production of inflammatory mediators and flu-like systems. “These experiments are completely safe and have been performed on more than 240 subjects in our centre.” (source) When Hof was injected with the endotoxin, while using his focus, power of mind, and meditation, his immune system reaction was extremely unusual compared to all other patients who were administered with the endotoxin. During the experiment, several measurements were taken, including that of brain activity, inflammatory mediators in the blood, and autonomic nervous system activity.
The experiment showed that: At the end of the study the researchers concluded that, although the results were extremely promising, “further research is warranted in which a group of volunteers that have acquired Hof’s concentration and meditation technique is compared to a group that does not master this technique.” This is perfectly understandable, of course. Just because one human being is observed to display certain abilities or behaviours does not mean all humans will be able to do the same. It does, however, suggest that we at least have the potential. (And there are, in fact, multiple humans who have shown to be able to use power of mind to influence physical systems.) Indeed, Cox and Pickkers were so fascinated by what they had witnessed that they chose to conduct another study. Wim Hof ended up training twelve healthy young male volunteers for 10 days. This took place in Poland, where each volunteer learned specific breathing and meditation techniques.
They were trained to swim in ice-cold waters and expose their bare skin to freezing temperatures. Science would tell us that these people are supposed to develop hypothermia, or at the very least, have the expected immune system response.
These individuals were then transported to the Netherlands, where scientists gave them injections of the endotoxin mentioned earlier.
The trained men ended up producing more of the hormone epinephrine, a stress hormone that is released during increased activity on the sympathetic nervous system to suppress immune response. “We indeed observed that in the trained subjects the release of inflammatory proteins was attenuated and that they experienced far less flu-like symptoms,” said Kox. Wim Hof is famous for a number of world records that are related to cold exposure, and the fact that he was able to produce less than half of the quantity of inflammatory proteins than healthy volunteers who had not learned his method is amazing. What’s even more amazing is that some of these abilities were then seen in the subjects he did train, which means that we all potentially have the ability to influence our immune system with the power of the mind. Almost everything this man has done was thought to be impossible by most scientists. Below is a documentary done on Wim by VICE News. If you are interested, check it out. For more on Wim and the studies conducted on him, you can visit his website here. We recently did an in depth podcast with Wim which you can listen to below: .
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