Sauna for The Soul

Whilst I am still not sure if my recent Finnish sauna exertions have left me physically any healthier they have certainly left me pondering what it is about the sauna that seems to make both no and yet complete sense at the same time.

Its probably partly my nature that attracts me to the Finnish deep love and ritualised beasting that is the true sauna experience. The battle of fire and ice. A test of strength and endurance. Truly mind over matter whilst for the most part, stark bollock naked.

Over a two week trip through Finland I have cranked up the stove, refilled the buckets and chipped away at the ice dunking hole on a daily basis. Fully embracing both the advice of the Fins I have met and the frankly ridiculous number of saunas on offer throughout the country. This is after all a country whose ice breaking Coastguard ships have not one by two Saunas on board. One for each watch!

As I have sat in various sweaty corners on various sweaty benches, with bare wooden planks worn smooth with the application of many arses I have been able to gradually crank up the heat, learned some of the more bizarre sauna etiquette and begun to actually look forward to the icey lake plunge that follows each roasting.

Sitting, minding my own business and making up Finnish sauna quotes, “Only fools, halfwits and Norwegians leave the sauna door open” and “With great ladle comes great responsibility” being two of my favourites it surprised me the first few times when somebody would strike up a conversation. 

For such a taciturn nation the sauna is the place that the Finnish come to life. Not unfriendly or unapproachable, as they are often painted, the Fin you meet in the sauna is a completely different person to the one who you meet in the non-sauna world.

People are not only warmer, literally, they are looking to talk. Following some excruciating taxis journeys, my friendly excited chatter dying immediately against the granite like faces of the unblinking and constantly forward looking drivers, this was a shock.

Regardless of the many penises are whapping around and the sweat pouring from everybody’s bits it was almost non stop chatter. How we laughed about my ignorance of the inner workings of a sauna stove, how we grimaced whilst discussing the seriousness of the Russian border and how we winced when talking about the world sauna championships, that ended in tragic consequences (honestly!).

Then just as you get fully warmed, by the heat steam and conversation its time to take the plunge.

Out of the frying pan and into the freezing waters of the frozen Baltic sea or the nearest body of frozen water.

I thought doing broken ice drills in Norway whilst with the Royal Marines in a former life was the height of manliness. In full gear, clutching rifle and ski poles surrounded by a circle of watching contempories you skied, like a true man, straight into the hole cut into the frozen lake. Wincing and gasping you reeled off name, rank and number and maybe got asked to swim a few lengths if the training staff didn’t like you. Then , having immedialty drunk a shot of Pussers Rum, you dragged yourself out of the water and squelched to a tent with a whirling fan heater and forty naked blokes all talking about how cold and hardcore they were.

Cut to Finland and you are watching a parade of old ladies, small children, young awkward teenagers and people of all shapes and sizes merrily walking barefooted and unflinching to the ice edge of a frozen body of water and then voluntarily dunk themselves in. They will perhaps even swim a few lengths, or in a leisurely manner if the ice is too thick use a hammer to smash some of the ice pop off to the changing rooms. Not a shot of rum or heater or safety team in sight

Having lowered through the ice and then tried to swim a bit and then, with frozen toes and fighting the urge to run hobbled back to the sauna you can sit in the warm feeling your skin flush with the change. It’s a truly sensor experience.

It brings me the same sense of awareness’s that hard exercise does. When you reach the point that everything else you were thinking or worrying about becomes secondary to the messages your body is screaming at you. This muscle hurts, that lung is about give up, why are we doing this. It brings you abruptly and completely into the moment.

Either you are semi poached, grimly hoping the maniac grasping the ladle like a Skandi demon doesn’t empty the rest of his bucket of water onto the burning coals or you are feeling every single skin cell wince as it enters the icey water. Its an instant removal of emails, iphones, relationships and stress. Your body simply wont let your mind wander to anything other than the now. And in our 24hr world a few minutes of living in the immediate with no thoughts or feelings beyond what you body is telling you can’t be a bad thing.

So I am now totally with the Fins .Turn up the temperate and ready the plunge pool. Sauna is not for the body. Sauna is for the soul.