The top 5 benefits of taking cold showers

Cold showers are actually really good for you. Besides helping to reduce overall electricity usage (and most likely save water by reducing the amount of time that you spend in the shower), cold showers have a host of health benefits. This is how they can boost your overall health:

1) Cold showers can increase metabolism

Your body burns calories whenever it needs to warm up or cool down. Your metabolism refers to the rate at which your body burns calories naturally. By doing things that increase the amount of calories that your body uses, you train it to burn more calories. If you don’t burn a lot of calories most of the time, your metabolism rate will start to slow down. Since taking a cold shower forces your body to burn more calories to warm up, you stimulate your metabolism.

2) Cold showers increase energy levels

People with faster metabolisms have more energy because more nutrients are being used instead of being stored away as fat. Cold showers also increase blood flow because your body will respond to the cold shower by pulling blood into its core to keep the most important organs warm. As your body slowly starts to warm up again after the cold shower, blood will return to the rest of the body. The rapid removal and return of blood flow will help the entire body to get rid of old blood that carries waste products and receive new blood with much needed nutrients. The combination of increased metabolism and increase blood flow will boost your energy levels.

3) Cold showers burn fat

It takes energy to warm up and it takes energy to pull blood into your core. Your body uses the energy that is stored in your fat cells to do this. By taking cold showers regularly, you can train your body to use its fat storage more regularly. Over time, this can lead to a decrease in fat levels. The increase in overall metabolism will also increase the rate at which your body burns fat throughout the rest of the day. If you want to even more burn fat, check out these ways to lower your daily calorie consumption.

4) They improve mental well-being and have an anti-depressive effect

Have you ever enjoyed the feeling of cold air brushing against your bare skin? When cold receptors in the skin are stimulated by cold temperatures, the brain releases feel-good hormones like endorphins and dopamine. These hormones make you feel good and fight against depression. In fact, depression is caused by a big reduction in these hormones in the brain. When your brain does not release enough of these hormones, you experience depression. Taking a cold shower is a great, healthy way to boost these feel-good hormones.

5) Increased immunity

Have you ever wondered why cold temperatures can make you sick? It is not because the coldness itself leads to sickness, but rather because cold temperatures challenge the immune system. A challenged immune system struggles to fight against the germs that cause sickness. Cold showers will also challenge the immune system. If done right, this can train the immune system to be stronger. As it learns to respond to the cold regularly, you will be less susceptible to immune drops in colder weathers because your body will have learned to adapt to cold temperatures. Think of it as exercise for your immune system. Eating foods that are high in antioxidants like fruit and vegetables are also great for boosting immune health. Tea is also high in antioxidants. You can even use the tea bags to reduce eye strain after using them to make tea.

This is how cold showers can help to improve your overall health. If you would like to learn about other ways to improve your health, check out this article. Remember to do everything in moderation and never push your body further than what it can handle. Have a happy, healthy day.

Saguren Redyrs

Saguren Redyrs is a personal trainer from South Africa, and the editor of SA Spotters.

He has a passion for making health and fitness simple and attainable for everybody.

Check out his post on forming new habits.