The core argument here is seductive in its simplicity: step into cold water, trigger a neurochemical cascade, emerge more mentally capable. And the physiological mechanism is real. When cold hits your skin, the locus coeruleusâa structure in the brainstem most people have never heard ofâactivates and floods the system with norepinephrine. Dopamine follows. The article cites a 2 to 5 times increase in dopamine levels, which tracks with what the research actually shows. These aren't feel-good chemicals in the casual sense. They are the substrate of sustained motivation and focused attention.
Where the article leans into motivational languageâ"mental dominance," "charging into discomfort"âthe underlying biology is doing something quieter and more interesting. It's not about conquering anything. It's about training a regulatory system that most of us have never deliberately worked with before.
The neuroscience here holds up. Andrew Huberman's work on the locus coeruleus is consistent with what's described in this video. The 2014 Kox et al. study on Wim Hof's trained practitioners showed measurable differences in sympathetic nervous system responseânot just subjective reports of feeling better, but objective immune and hormonal markers. Cold exposure doesn't just feel like it's building resilience. It is building resilience, at a cellular level.
The dopamine piece is particularly well-supported. Research published in the European Journal of Applied Physiology documented significant sustained dopamine elevation following cold water immersionânot a spike and crash, but a prolonged release that can last hours. This is functionally different from the dopamine hit you get from caffeine or a notification on your phone. It's slower, more durable, and doesn't come with a corresponding crash.
The framing of cold as a path to "dominance" is where I'd pump the brakes slightly. The most rigorous researchers in this spaceâHuberman, Patrick, the Finnish cardiovascular cohort studiesâfocus on adaptation, not conquest. The distinction matters. Dominance implies suppression of your body's signals. Adaptation means learning to read those signals accurately under pressure, then choosing your response deliberately. One is about overriding your nervous system. The other is about understanding it well enough to lead it.
There's also an important dosing conversation that motivational content tends to skip. More cold, more often, is not automatically better. Like any hormetic stressor, the benefits live in a specific range. Below it, not much happens. Above itâtoo frequent, too long, too intenseâyou're suppressing recovery and exhausting the same catecholamine systems you're trying to train.
If you're new to cold exposure, start at the end of your warm shower. Turn it cold for the last 60 to 90 seconds. Your goal isn't to tolerate the cold by brute force. It's to stay in it while breathing deliberately and keeping your attention on something other than escape. That cognitive redirectionâchoosing to stay present instead of fleeingâis the actual training stimulus. Do this three to four times per week. Give your nervous system time to adapt before increasing duration or intensity.
Here's what strikes me about this body of research taken as a whole: cold exposure is fundamentally a practice in emotional granularity. When you're in cold water, your brain generates an undifferentiated alarm signal. The work is learning to parse that signalâto distinguish discomfort from danger, sensation from threat. That skill doesn't stay in the water. It transfers. People who train with cold consistently report better emotional regulation in unrelated high-pressure situations. Not because they became emotionally harder, but because they became better at reading what's actually happening inside them. That's not dominance. That's clarity. And clarity, it turns out, is the rarer and more useful thing.