Float Therapy for Sports Performance

Here’s a sports trivia question for you:

What do the New England Patriots, Golden State Warriors, The Manchester United Football Club, Michael Phelps, and Peterborough’s own Cody Crowley all have in common?

Looking at this lineup it’s easy to think “well, these teams and individual athletes all have performed and won at the very pinnacle of their sport!”

And indeed, they are all winners, but that’s not all. They also used float tanks.

And they aren’t alone either.

The New Zealand All Blacks, the Chicago Blackhawks, The Seattle Seahawks, Carl Lewis, J.J. Watt, Olympic gymnast Aly Raisman, and many other professional teams and athletes have added floating into their training and recovery programs to gain a performance edge.

Floating is one of the best-kept secrets used by high-performing athletes and there’s lots of good research that helps to back up why athletes benefit from floating.

Raising the Bar - Performance and Visualization with Float Tanks

If someone told you that laying in complete darkness while suspended weightlessly in saltwater could give you superhuman strength, speed, and accuracy, would you believe them? It’s may not be as bold a statement as it sounds.

Research on floating and sports performance found that high-level athletes who had reached a plateau saw a rebound improvement in performance after floating in conjunction with visualization techniques. The performance increase was seen even without additional physical training.

Therefore, athletes were able to increase their performance just by floating before a competition by using that time for mental imagery of their sport. A follow-up study not only confirmed the results of the original research but showed that floating multiple times between games or competitions led to significant improvements compared to just a single float.

This confirms something that most floaters already know - the more you float the better it is for you.

Improving Accuracy in Target Sports

Beyond just looking at general athletic performance and floating, a few studies from research groups have looked at specific benefits linked to floating in athletes.

Several of these studies have tested how floating affects marksmanship in different fields including rifle marksmanship, darts, and archery.

In the rifle study, 75% of the participants saw a statistically significant increase in accuracy from pre- to post-float compared to no such increase found in the control group that relaxed but did not float.

A similar result was found in the study on darts performance with 80% of the participants' improved accuracy. 

In both studies, these improvements were seen regardless of skill level.

While the archery study didn’t see any significant increase in accuracy after just one float session, It did find that the floaters had more consistent scores than the group that sat in a chair and relaxed for the equivalent amount of time. Likely due to the lower perceived exertion and muscle stiffness during the archery test. 

Float Tanks Reduce Recovery Time

One of the suggested reasons for the benefits described above and how they lead to improved sports performance is through stress reduction. But there’s, even more, to take into account with how floating can help physical performance.

Going deeper with athletes on a physiological level, researchers in a 2013 float tank study looked at the effect floating has on lactic acid build-up.

Athletes are always looking for ways to mitigate the effects of lactate buildup in the muscles during and after a workout or competition as a way to maximize their performance.

It was found that floating after exercise showed a 62% reduction in lactic acid buildup compared to the control group.

The participants in the study also reported feeling less pain and were able to return to a peak performance level sooner.

In 2016 another study was able to repeat these findings in a larger sample size of athletes over 9 different sports. In this study not only was lactic acid reduced, but there was also a significant reduction in muscle soreness and improved mood and reduced fatigue in the participants that floated. 

Looking at the Big Picture of Float Tanks on Sports Performance

Taking all of these benefits into account, it becomes clear why floating has been one of the best-kept secrets of successful athletes. Stress needs to be kept under control to perform at a peak level. On top of this, floating can help athletes stay sharp mentally.

And maybe the best part of all of this is that floating is helpful for athletes at all skill levels. You don’t need to be a professional for it to benefit you. whether you’re recovering from a long run or a weekend baseball tournament, floating can help your recovery to keep doing what you love.

Learn even more about sports recovery at Flow Spa here.

The Benefits of Float Therapy During Pregnancy

Answering Your Most Common Questions About Float Tanks And Pregnancy

Float therapy has become more popular with pregnant mothers as a safe way to get great physical and mental relief and relaxation during pregnancy. Let’s go over some of the most common positions that mothers like to lay in while floating for maximum comfort.

Can You Use A Float Tank When Pregnant?

Floating while pregnant has become a growing trend, which is not surprising to see as float therapy has many potential benefits for both mom and baby. Some turn to floating as it helps to relieve back pain and relieve a lot of pressure, while other new moms just love to be able to hear their baby’s heartbeat in the quiet isolation of the float tank.

Float therapy is safe to do during pregnancy although it is understandable that expecting mothers have questions about whether you can float and the best way to do it.

We always recommend that you direct any medical questions to your doctor, but wanted to take some time to provide tips for one of the most common questions which is “how can I float comfortably while pregnant?”

It is generally safe to float on your back or on your belly because of the weightlessness created by the buoyancy of the sensory deprivation tank. The situation is different from outside of the tank where laying on your back can be risky for the health of the mom and baby. *

Getting Comfy For Your Float

Try out the following positions as starting points when you come in to float. Height, body type, and personal preferences really make a difference in what you will find more comfortable. If you’ve never floated before you will be surprised at how buoyant you are in the float tank because of the 1,000 lb. of Epsom salt dissolved into the float tank solution. It’s totally effortless!

Belly down floating can help to release pressure during pregnancy. The weight of the growing uterus pushes against the rest of the mother’s organs and so this pressure release for 60 or 90 minutes during the float can offer a lot of relief.

One position that is often said to be very comfortable for pregnant floaters is floating face down with their arms across or under a pool noodle. The noodle is kept under the chin to keep their face out of the water. In this position, even if you fall asleep for some deep rest and a well-deserved nap, your head will stay supported by the noodle out of the water.

Some other expectant mothers prefer to do the same face-down position without the pool noodles, just using their arms crossed under their chin to keep the face dry.

Another belly-down option for floating is to put your elbows on the floor of the tank and cradle your chin in your hands. The shallow water is the same depth as most people’s forearms, so you can keep your face dry in this position.

An added benefit is that this position can provide additional stretch and traction to the spine.

Once you’ve gotten your doctor’s approval, if floating on your back seems like the best option for you, you can use a noodle under your low back or go without it.

The Epsom salt concentration in the water will support you and your baby very well as it is.

Potential Precautions For Floating When Pregnant

Every pregnancy has its own unique conditions and while floating is a highly safe and effective therapy, we ask that all expecting mothers speak with their doctor for approval before floating.

We’ve seen some sources online say that women should not float during their first trimester but there is no data to support this concern. It likely originated because it’s more likely for miscarriages to happen during the first trimester.

This article is for informational purposes only and you should consult your doctor before making any decisions but from reports of floaters at Flow Spa as well as the community globally, floating through pregnancy can be an incredible relief on the body and mind.

Here’s one mother’s personal blog about floating while pregnant: https://floatingpregnant.wordpress.com/

*The risk related to a pregnant woman lying down on her back on a solid, flat surface is due to constriction of blood flow to the placenta. This can interfere with the development of the baby. Also, the weight of the uterus can put pressure on major veins, causing dizziness and discomfort for the mother. In a float tank, this doesn’t seem to happen, because there is no rigid surface underneath the mother to put pressure on the circulatory system. Floating has been shown to have other positive health benefits such as lowering blood pressure and reducing stress, which can also help a pregnant mother to have healthy blood flow to her heart and to the baby’s placenta.

How Ready Are You for Change? (And Using Float Tanks to Help)

When Dr. John C. Lilly, the inventor of the float tank, entered into the darkness and solitude of the sensory-deprived environment, it sparked in him the realization that he had just ventured into a whole other world inside of himself.

Our brain rings out in response to this lack of input from the external world like a wake-up call.

Turning inward allows us to raise our self-awareness and with that, we can start to transform ourselves.

Change awaits us.

And that’s exactly what we’re all longing for right now.

The Changes We Seek To Make

What is life going to look like on the other side of lockdown restrictions?

Are you ready for a change or are you already taking steps to make changes in your life?

While there has been a lot that isn't under our control lately, something that is in our sphere of control at all times is our actions and choosing to become more aware of how we make use of the time we have. The past year has shifted the regular routines for many of us and opened our eyes to the need for change.

We get stuck in our routines and what we are used to because it's familiar and becomes automatically ingrained as a habit. Kind of like how we pull into our driveway after a long day of work only to realize that we were barely conscious of the drive home, unless we are actively trying to identify and understand our habits they will take control before even we know what we are doing. This includes the bad habits that we may be thinking about changing or feel really ready to take a stand against.

Float tanks can help you with making change by allowing you to focus on and understand your bad habits through deep introspection. This can also help you to understand the underlying motives behind the new habits you are trying to create change from.

When creating and refining the first float tanks, Dr. John C. Lily used the quiet isolation of that environment to develop a system around how to alter unwanted behaviours. He used this safe and controlled environment to focus on the negative aspects of bad habits and their underlying source.

Knowing yourself at this deeper level is one of the first steps to making long-lasting changes for the better.

What Is Your Goal?

Because we are creatures of habit, we all long for some return to normal in our lives. We get distressed when our routines are upset and we’ve all been experiencing some not so gentle disruptions to our routines over the past year.

Disruptions, like the ones we’ve experienced, do have an upside though, because it causes a degree of discomfort that makes us motivated to change. Whether we like it or not, the hiccup in our routine that has been the pandemic is something of a catalyst for change and the initiation of your mission if you choose to accept it.

Rebuild It Better

We can rebuild our lives in the way that we so desire and this past year has been a wake-up call for many who have wanted to make a change for some time. People have retired early and set off on new adventures, many others are quitting jobs they are unsatisfied with and analysts believe that a mass exodus from unhappy jobs is still coming as we move into the post-pandemic world.

Right now you have the opportunity to ask yourself, how do you want to rebuild?

Why not build a lifestyle that’s better than before? One that gets you excited to jump up out of bed in the morning.

Floating Your Way To Deeper Understanding

Dr. Lily was a different thinker in many ways, even by academic standards. Some of his work was related to how float tanks might affect our ability to “meta-program ourselves” Thinking of our brains like computers, everything that we experience - thoughts, emotions, actions - are all programs written by code in our brains. And yet, this code isn’t written from a little guy at a control station in our brain, but from our reaction to everything in our environment.

Dr. Lilly believed that if we focus on how our programs are written, we can modify the code and adjust and improve upon those programs. This is why he called it meta-programming but in simpler terms, it’s just another way to think about mindfulness and analyzing our thoughts and actions. Kind of like being your own shrink but instead of laying on a sofa and talking things out, your body is weightlessly suspended in Epsom salts as you do the talking inside your head.

Not only was it Dr. Lilly who found that floating could really help with the process of analyzing his thoughts, but many people who try floating and take it up as a regular practice for improving their health and happiness come to discover how helpful this can be.

Using Changes In Awareness To Make Change In Your Habits

We become much more aware of what is going on internally when we get to escape from the external world for a while through floating. We can use this time to let our bodies deeply relax while also exploring our programs and habits on a deeper level to sort out the cues and triggers and underlying origins of our habits.

This level of recognition is important and one of the first steps that I take when working with clients to understand the “Why” behind their desire to change.

We know that floating helps you to become more aware and present at the moment because there are no other sensory inputs from the external environment that you have to process or to cause distraction around you.

Many of the tools and techniques that we use and that are suggested in the scientific community today to improve mental and physical well-being include raising awareness, also known as mindfulness.

And it sounds simple to just pay more attention and become aware of the present moment but we are all facing the constant external pressures that make this more difficult than ever.

We feel like we’re being pulled in every direction.

Our external world is more and more distracting.

And we feel overburdened by responsibility in our lives. It’s hard to become aware and initiate change even when we still desire it.

We all crave freedom and because of the discomfort that restrictions have itched out in us, we are more mindful of the need for change right now.

Change is scary though. Starting anything new brings with it some excitement and anxiety. But our body and our brain do adapt, and rather quickly, with consistency.

And with change in ourselves, we can also help to initiate and inspire change in others. A lot of what we’re hoping for more of in the world right now.

How Ready Do You Feel For Making A Change?

It is daunting to make changes in our lives. Each of us has the ability to change if we choose to and part of that is knowing on a deeper level what you want to change first. This needs to come first before setting arbitrary goals that sound good on paper.

Are you ready for a change?

Take this quiz to find out.

Reflecting on 2 Years at Flow Spa

We’ve made it to Year 2.

It’s been a wild journey as everyone can appreciate what’s happened in the past year.

This time last year I was having fun making a day in the life of a float centre owner video. Everything was rosey and great as we made progress each month all the way up to year one.

The momentum train was rolling and it felt like business was picking up.

Then a week later, we started to hear reports about COVID-19 become more than just some bug a few people had. There was talk that the whole country would be shut down.

And a week after that, I watched Trudeau make that announcement and my mind rebelled at the thought of Flow Spa having to close after all the traction we had just built.

I didn’t want to close the doors.

But people were also being responsible and starting to stay home and stay away.

So we entered into a strange season where the business was shuttered. I took my passion for helping others and wellness online and started to share strategies for staying well at home when your favourite stress-busters and recovery and mindfulness practices weren’t available for a while.

The vision for finding your flow stayed the same but the mission looked a bit different as we couldn’t float or meet up in person.

And so the year 2 was a roller coaster like that. Several months of no activity at all in the spa. Followed by a few months of regaining traction and things looking very good again. And then entering into lockdown yet again for another six weeks to once again lose some momentum.

Everyone talks about the long-term vision needed when starting a business. Unfortunately there’s no game plan for when a pandemic strikes a startup.

All I know is that what we do at Flow Spa makes a significant difference to the well-being of our community. People need floating when all other options for pain relief and anxiety and stress reduction aren’t the right solution for them.

The science behind why floating works is rock solid and that’s what caught my attention so much from the beginning. I’m all in for what works and is validated by science. Stillness is the key to it and since we don’t give ourselves enough of that in this on-demand world we live in, there is an essential space available for float centres to offer up that much-needed escape from it all.

So while it’s unclear how many times we’ll be sent back into lockdown, we will keep striving on this journey because as I see floaters every day come out at ease and with a sense of stillness that wasn’t there an hour earlier, I know that what Flow Spa is doing is grounded in actually making a difference for many people.

And so whether you like floating or not, even in these challenging times I hope that you can continue to seek progress in yourself with your wellness, and passions, and continue to Dream On and Find Your Flow.

Love Yourself This Valentine's Day (And How To Practice Better Self-Love)

As the middle of February rolls around, it becomes that Hallmark moment each year where we take a stand and celebrate the love that's in the air. We are either celebrating our self-love or showing our affection to someone else but it turns out that the self-love really needs to be at the centre of it all.

After the year of isolation and, in many cases, loneliness that we've gone through, let's talk about practicing self-love and learning to love yourself like your life depends on it. Because just like the oxygen mask analogy on the airplane, taking the time to show care and consideration for yourself will rise the tide on all of your relationships and the people that you surround yourself with.

What Is Self Love?

While self-love is about care and doing the things that you know support your well-being, it's also just as much about coming to terms with who you are and Braving the Wilderness as Brene Brown refers to it.

When you start to accept all your perfect imperfections, it becomes that much easier to focus on loving and supporting those around you because you recognize your own needs as well.

When we accept instead of dwell on who we are under the surface, we can start to notice more of the beauty in our lives and in our connections with others instead of getting caught up in our mistakes or sense of inadequacies.

Where To Draw Your Focus

We all know that too much focus on our own faults and flaws can spiral out of control and leads nowhere positive, even if it's often easier said than done to avoid. Dwelling on the negativity is not how we break free from that vicious cycle though. Guilt doesn't inspire change. It creates an emotional sinkhole that our mindset fixates on. Furthermore, our brains are drawn towards negative information as it alerts us to perceived threats, and so what we want to do is lean into the positivity whenever possible and with the right strategies.

First, we want to recognize this negativity bias and know that it's a perfectly natural response in all people, although as Jonathan Haidt suggests in the Happiness Hypothesis, some of us have won more of the cortical lottery in being wired for more optimism. We often blame ourselves or get caught up on things that are outside of our control and when we do this, it can be easy to feel like we've failed at something. This fixed mindset thinking though can be course corrected though by using prompts to remind ourselves to think of what's in our control or practicing gratitude to seek out more positivity in our day-to-day lives.

Mindfulness and Self-Love

Taking our focus and self-love a step further, mindfulness is one way in which we can train our brains to counter the ruminating thoughts when done correctly.

Part of the reason that mindfulness originated as a religious practice was as a way to develop the self in a way that could help to have a positive impact on the greater community. We can use Metta or loving-kindness meditation to radiate compassion to those closest to us and the wider community and single-point focus meditation can help you to become more present and train your brain to counteract that fixation on ruminating thoughts.

Connecting Deeply With Your Self

Floating makes for a great self-love date as it is a powerful way to practice mindfulness and being fully embodied in the present moment. With such a reduction in external stimulation because of the unique environment of the float tank, your sense of self dissolves into the water you are floating in and the air around you.

So whether you treat yourself to a float this Valentine's Day or bring along a loved one for the experience as well, know that you are connecting deeply with yourself and doing what's best for you to support the loved ones around you.

Floating Your Way To A Better You In 2021

The new year brings about a desire for change and a renewal of energy towards the goals that we have for ourselves.

Many of us saw our goals and ambitions grind to a halt in 2020 due to the pandemic. We had to push things off or delay our dreams, whether it was seeing a business take off, travel around the world, or compete in a sports event.

So as we get started with 2021, we mostly want to approach things with optimism that this year will be brighter for our ambitions.

So as you set out with New Year's Resolutions and hope this year, here are some of the benefits of floating that can help you along the way with your resolutions.

Sleep

Sleep and getting a good night's rest is at the root of all of the goals that we have for ourselves because none of it is possible without sleeping well and restoring our energy.

Enhanced Learning and Performance

The relaxing state that we get in with floating can have a beneficial impact on our emotional state, which also helps us with memory and retaining information. We've all experienced the brain fog that comes from intense emotions. When we are stressed or in a negative emotional state we can have a hard time with remembering positive experiences and recalling specific details.

Partly through reducing stress and anxiety and partly because of the deeply restorative state our brains get into while floating, researchers have found that memory recollection is more vivid in people who have floated versus control groups that didn't float.

Floating is also used by athletes and high performers as a way to break through plateaus and reach greater states of performance. When it comes to mental training for sports and creative pursuits, the distraction-free environment of the float tank can help many people with their visualization practices and rehearsal.

Addiction

Even a short time away from triggers for cravings and addictions can be beneficial when trying to break away and prevent relapses.

Sensory isolation has been used in studies of combatting addiction with nicotine, alcohol, and narcotics. In these studies, it was also shown that prolonged isolation can help with withdrawal systems, lessening their intensity and making them more manageable.

Certain recovery programs have even begun integrating floating into treatment programs as a way to lower the risk of relapse in drug addiction.

There are also many personal stories of people who have used floating as a way to help with addiction. John Lennon shared in his biography Lives of John Lennon by Albert Goldman that he used floating to help him overcome his heroin addiction.

Mindfulness and Meditation

Practicing mindfulness is a more trendy and newer resolution for a lot of people and floating is the best training wheel support for your meditation goals that you can find. Float therapy is gently-forced meditation. When you are floating, your brain and body can't help but get into the same state as experienced meditators do. The theta brainwave state used to be only accessible to monks and people in REM sleep but float therapy has opened up this realm of relaxation to everyone. Because the float tanks have audio in them, a float session can also be coupled with a guided meditation to facilitate this learning process.

Unless floating is the healthy habit you're looking to do more regularly this New Year, it can't help directly with the habits but it can help to support you with your New Years Resolutions in many ways.

Goal Setting and Finding Your Purpose

Even if you haven't figured out yet what you want to accomplish for yourself in 2021, floating offers the perfect escape to find some time with your thoughts to sort things out. Use this time during your next float to think about what goals align with your deepest values and what you would like to focus on this year.

Float Your Way To Peace | Studying Serenity and Float Therapy

Finding serenity sounds nice right about now, doesn’t it?

As we’ve struggled through 2020, it can seem like a faraway dream to find serenity now.

With so much uncertainty, it’s difficult to tune out and relax to focus on the present, even though it’s one of the most important things we can do for ourselves right now.

We have to remember to focus on what’s in our own control and what we can have an impact on when the world feels so chaotic. And one of the things we can make a positive impact on is taking better care of ourselves. Finding our own sense of serenity and taking care of our mental health through positive routines is something we can and should control, especially at this time.

Because we so often talk about mental health from the perspective of negative symptoms, it can be hard to remember that mental health isn’t an on/off switch. We don’t often talk about mental health from the positive perspective without comparing it to the negative but the reality is that it exists on a spectrum and even when we’re not suffering, we still have room to make things better for ourselves.

And this is one of the things that floating does best for you. It improves your serenity by helping with mental and physical wellness while setting you at ease.

We often think of serenity as something that comes from meditation or the peace of relaxation but it’s also a specific term used by scientists. Serenity is a marker of mental wellness that gauges how well we stay present, our readiness to practice forgiveness, and how content we feel with our lives despite the negativity.

Serenity was also one of the many mental health factors studied in recent float therapy research.

In 2018, Dr. Justin Feinstein’s team at the LIBR were able to demonstrate the effect of a single 60-minute float on serenity, and the results are part of what makes floating such a promising wellness practice:

In anxious participants, serenity soared post-float, above the baseline for non-anxious participants in the study.

And in the non-anxious group, serenity increased a significant amount as well, demonstrating this mental health gradient.

Even more impressively, when looking at the data from all 50 participants in the study, every single one saw an increase in serenity post-float. And a quarter of them maxed out the serenity scale post-float.

Looking at the graph for all the participants’ data shows the significant results of this study. The red bar is how serene they felt before floating, and the blue bar shows the post-float improvement.

There’s a presentation on the full results of the study here, and the research article is available here. In addition to the study looking at serenity, the researchers also saw decreases in anxiety and muscle tension as well as increases in relaxation and energy levels.

This chart shows the different mental health traits impacted by a single float:

Regardless of what this year has been like to you, we are all able to cut through the chaos and choose to take control of what we can, including our self-care. And this can look like many different things that you find restorative, from meditation to yoga, to sitting by a fire listening to holiday music or even getting away to the complete stillness of a float tank to silence the holiday hubbub for a bit.

Serenity can be found closer to home than you think and isn’t just in some far-off oasis. But it does require you to take the time for yourself to rest and recharge.

The Secret Behind How Floating Dissolves Your Stress and Reduces Anxiety

There’s an incredible amount of pressure put on us from the choices we make each and every day. Not to mention that we are also in the midst of a global health crisis. It’s clear that the stress we face daily can cause a lot of health problems. Many of us recognize the commonly associated physical problems like heart disease and high blood pressure, but stress can also weave its way into presenting as mental health issues like PTSD, depression, and eating disorders.

Most of us can feel the need to recharge and provide ourselves with some of the self-care these days as the world seems to spiral out of control. We want to turn to any solution that may help but there’s always a bit of skepticism when it comes to alternative wellness practices and whether they are as helpful as they claim to be.

Floating is no exception to this.

So let’s dive into some of the science on floating to see just how beneficial it can be for reducing stress.

Float Therapy and Stress Reduction

Dr. Justin Feinstein is one of the most well-known scientists studying the effects of float therapy in his custom lab setup at the Laureate Institute of Brain Research. In a recent Tedx Talk, Dr. Feinstein shared some of his study results about the effects of floating on stress.

The effects were incredible.

Every single person who participated in the study experienced some amount of stress relief. Furthermore, most of the participants saw a significant reduction in their stress levels that lasted for more than 24 hours after just a single float session.

If there was a pill you could take that would allow you to be stress-free for the whole day, who wouldn’t want that?

Floating to reduce stress may be more time-involved than just taking a pill but the benefits of it seem to be even more significant than most anti-anxiety treatments.

And just as importantly, there’s no concern about interactions with other medications or other negative contraindications. It’s one of the safest and lowest risk wellness practices there is.

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Dr. Feinstein isn’t just studying the effects of floating on people with normal, everyday stress though. He’s looking at stress-related illnesses like PTSD, depression, and anxiety, and finding that the individuals with the highest levels of stress before floating experience the greatest benefit from the treatment. Everyone who floats returns to a baseline level of relief, which means floating will bring you down to a similar level of relaxation as those people who always seems to be as cool as a cucumber.

What’s The Secret Behind Floating?

So the next big question is how does it work? Do we really just lay in the dark and let our minds clear out our thoughts for an hour or so?

This does seem to be the key to it all.

It’s difficult to find the effects of the solitude of floating, where we can’t be bothered by the outside world, anywhere else. Our minds and bodies slow down dramatically, our brains enter a state similar to dreaming, and this all gives us the ability to recharge more quickly.

Before float tanks took over as the most effective and relaxing way to experience this solitude, a psychologist named Dr. Peter Suedfeld did a lot of sensory deprivation research in the 60s and 70s by placing people in completely dark rooms in isolation for 24 hours. The term he used for this was REST (Restricted Environment Stimulation Therapy).

Dr. Suedfeld created a paradigm shift in the scientific community on sensory deprivation. Before this time it was only thought of as torture, as a result of incomplete research and questionable methods performed by researchers that would prime the subjects for a bad experience before the experiment even began.

By keeping the subjects at ease and making the process simple for anyone, Dr. Suedfeld found that participants actually enjoyed the sensory deprivation experience.

Over the years, Dr. Suedfeld found that the benefits of REST carried over to many areas including addiction treatment, helping with autism, enhancing creativity, and reducing stress.

This research was the foundation for the future of float tanks and helped scientists, as well as the wider community, stay open-minded to the benefits of floating and reducing stress.

Since these early days, we’ve come even further in seeing the light that shines in the darkness of sensory reduced environments. You don’t need to spend a full day in the darkness to experience the benefits, a single float session can provide similar benefits.

In his Tedx Talk, Dr. Feinstein comments on how we as humans aren’t designed to be constantly plugged into looking at screens, listening to the cacophonous noise of the city, or sitting under the glare of fluorescent lights all day. We also aren’t supposed to constantly let our minds go wild thinking about our to-do list and everything else that we cram into the 24 hours of our day.

Even if we enjoy having a full and vibrant schedule, these things can wear us out and add to the stress of our daily lives. Taking a break is our chance at hitting the reset button, and as we’ve seen, floating has been proven to be one of the most effective ways to do that.

The Top Three Reasons Float Therapy Can Help To Reduce Your Pain Naturally So That You Can Live The Life You Want Again

It shouldn’t be so hard to find the right treatments when your body needs relief. Swollen and achy joints, stiff muscles, these things drag us down and impact our ability to feel our best.

Float Therapy can have a major impact on the pain you are experiencing. This modern innovation on a natural phenomenon has incredible benefits backed by science. When it comes to treating chronic pain, there are few therapies as gentle, yet effective as floating.

Here are the three main reasons why float therapy is so great at relieving pain:

Experience Weightlessness in the Float Tank

Floating is one of those miracles of human ingenuity that needs to be experienced to fully comprehend. It’s like harnessing the power of the Dead Sea in a giant bathtub.

Briefly, the float tank solution is saturated with 1,000 lb. of Epsom Salt, making the water denser than our bodies.

When you lay back and relax in the float tank, your joints and muscles decompress in a way unlike anything else.

You float effortlessly on the surface of the water.

Your body doesn’t even get this relaxed laying in bed or while deep asleep.

This decompression effect is the first potent pain-relieving effect of float therapy. Many people with joint pain and sciatica leave their float session doing a jig they feel so good.

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Magnesium for muscle relaxation

Laying in 1,000 lb. of Epsom salt, which is a magnesium sulphate salt, is a muscle relaxant. Often when we experience any type of pain, whether it’s in our muscles or our joints, we struggle with muscles locking up as a way to prevent further injury. But this in itself is very painful.

The super-saturated solution of Epsom salt in the float tank has been associated with increased cellular hydration and blood magnesium levels which suggests that float tanks are an excellent way to get more of this important electrolyte into our system. This also helps to explain why people experience less restless-leg syndrome and have some of the best nights of sleep after floating. As a muscle relaxant, magnesium is often used as a supplement to help with restless leg syndrome and as a sleep aid.

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Stress also Turns To Tension

Who doesn’t have stress in their life? We’re adapted to handle stress but the problem is that stress has become pervasive in most people’s lives and it is causing more sickness than we can imagine.

Stress often expresses itself in the body as tension being held in areas like our shoulders and neck. Different people hold onto stress in different ways. But when we physically lock up due to stress, it becomes very painful physically as well as limiting in many other ways.

It’s unbelievable how relaxing the float tank experience is. Many people are blown away by where they hold stress they didn’t even know about. This awareness while deeply comfortable is very effective for releasing tension and letting the clutch off of holding on to that tension physically and mentally.

People come out of the float tank feeling like brand new humans. Making it a part of your regular routine for treating your pain can be a radical shift in your well-being.

Book at Float a Flow Spa today.

You’re just one float away from a new outlook on life.

Feel your best by Booking an Appointment today or call today to schedule a free consultation to see if float therapy is right for you.

Floating Away Anxiety

Float Therapy for Anxiety Relief

It is so hard to stay grounded and focus on anything other than the thoughts swirling around in your head when you are feeling overwhelmed.

That chest pounding, hard to breathe anxiety feels like the worst thing ever.

And it’s so hard to get away from.

Often when we feel like this, our bodies hold on to that tension in ways we don’t even realize in the moment.

Bringing our bodies back into awareness when our mind is on overdrive is one of the most effective ways for coming back to the present and recognizing that everything is going to be ok.

It is for this reason that research into float therapy has been very promising in terms of helping to relieve anxiety.

Floating can significantly reduce anxiety and lower levels of stress hormones in the body.

The feeling of weightlessness in the float tank lets your tension disappear like a clenched fist opening up.

It doesn’t even take being a meditation guru to experience this beneficial effect of floating. The unique environment, designed to reduce all external stimuli tricks your brain into letting go into blissful nothingness and calm. (It is for this reason that researchers have termed float tanks as R.E.S.T for Restricted Environmental Stimulation Therapy).

And research like this that has led to more funding for studies on floating in the last five years.

Labs in the States are now looking at the long-term benefits of floating for chronic anxiety and pain disorders and as a way to help veterans with PTSD.

This video from the Flow Spa Experience course goes into further details on the best practices for using float therapy for anxiety relief.

If you want to learn more, you can get access to the full Flow Spa Experience course for free at www.flowacademy.ca/fsx

Salty Summer Float Giveaway

The perfect summer oasis is something that we dream of.

Escaping from the hustle and bustle to be at ease and enjoy some R&R.

COVID-19 changed our plans for vacations and cottage getaways though, and this summer has been full of stress for a lot of us.

We’re doing something special as a way to help out with your relaxation this summer. The Salty Summer Giveaway is on now and you can enter to win the grand prize of 3 float sessions, for yourself or to share with your friends and family.

Getting a chance to tune out from all the noise and busyness around you for an hour is as blissful as it comes. 3 times makes it all the better.

Don’t wait because the contest closes soon and by sharing it with your friends you’ll get even more chances to win.

You can enter the contest through this link:

P.S. Everyone wins something! Your first prize starts with just one referral entry into the contest.

7 Effective, Natural Ways To Relieve Pain and Feel Your Best

Pain is one of the most pervasive and pernicious conditions that we face. We've all experienced pain in our lives and about 20 percent of the population lives with a chronic pain condition. From our joints to our muscles, to our nerves and beyond, all systems of our body are affected by pain. Fibromyalgia, arthritis, and sciatica have become commonplace words as we face these conditions ourselves or know someone we deeply care about who is suffering daily from them.

Billions of dollars are spent each year treating pain and researchers are equally invested in seeking out effective ways to relieve pain.

Today, let's go through some of the most effective pain treatments that you may not be familiar with and how they may help you to relieve your pain and find more ease in your life safely and naturally.

First, we must preface by saying this is for informational purposes only and always consult your physician before making any changes in your prescription or routine.

How We Normally Treat Pain

Billions of dollars are spent each year on over the counter and prescription pain medications to treat the slew of symptoms that affect us. While many people are dependent on the medications they are taking for pain management, most of us are aware that medications and even operations that we go through for treating our pain are not without their downsides. Over the counter drugs, like NSAIDs are known to cause gastrointestinal issues, prescription drugs like opiates carry addiction and dependency risks with them, and going under the knife always poses a risk as well.

When it comes to joint replacements and spinal fusions, we may be opting for limited mobility and strength while on borrowed time with nuts and bolts that don't stand the test of time in the same way as our organic parts do.

Research and technology are making miraculous changes in the field of medicine though and we will continuously see improvements across the board with safety in regards to medications and pain treatment procedures but it still comes down to the decision of the individual on what route they wish to go. Cost also becomes a limiting factor in many instances with medical interventions.

So whether it's because of the financial costs, or you're someone who prefers natural options wherever possible, let's now look at natural pain relief options that you may not be familiar with and how they may help in your case.

Why Natural Pain Relief?

Natural pain relief need not be ineffective pain relief.

Our bodies have innate systems in place to deal with blunting pain signals and healing injuries to our bodies.

The inflammatory response is an inherent defense system against attacks. When we are physically injured, inflammation signals the defenders to heal or kill and regenerate any cells in our bodies that were affected. This system is again activated by internal threats like pathogens when we get sick or contract a foodborne illness. Pain signals are produced as a way to protect ourselves from further damage during these attacks but also get produced by the inflammatory system as well. As most of us have experienced, short-lived pain is manageable but starts to take its more serious toll on us when it becomes a chronic and ongoing problem. Inflammation isn't supposed to linger in our body and it appears that a dysfunctional state of inflammation is linked to many chronic pain disorders. Pain researchers have shown that many of the common types of pain that we experience have a disorder with inflammation at the root of the issue.

By learning how to treat the root cause and taking proactive steps to keep up the treatments, many people can reduce their need for harmful medications or prevent the need for surgery through a holistic approach to pain relief.

Once again, always check with your doctor, but we'll go through these exciting and promising pain relief treatments and what types of conditions they may benefit you for.

Remedies You Can Use Right Now to Relieve Pain

Rule number one with making any changes is never pushing it and always check with your doctor.

Stretching or Foam Rolling

Stretching and foam rolling can often be beneficial for muscle or tendon pain. We've heard of people saying they've got a knot in their muscle or we've experienced it ourselves and there seems to be some truth to the statement. Often due to repetitive strain or injury, our muscles can form trigger points which are adhesions in the muscles. Other issues can include restrictions in the fascia that holds muscles together or scar tissue in muscles and tendons. These conditions are painful and often chronically so unless they are worked on, either on your own or with the help of a therapist. While you may not think that a simple knot in your muscle or repetitive strain could cause a debilitating issue, our body is so highly interconnected that this can often create a weak link effect where your most noticeable issue is further down the chain from where the problem originated.

Doing light stretching daily and including foam rolling in your routine are simple ways to create some more mobility in your system. Foam rolling involves putting your body weight into a soft foam tube on affected areas and rolling gently back and forth as a form of self-massage. Using props like a tennis ball, or Thera-cane can also help to access small or hard to reach areas. One area that we often neglect but can see dramatic results from is rolling out the soles of our feet. Because we are on our feet for so much of our lives and many people do not have perfect posture or wear improper shoes, researchers have shown that this can almost immediately improve the range of motion in our entire posterior chain. It's a testament to how interconnected our entire body is.

CBD Oil

CBD oil is a very promising natural remedy for many people suffering from inflammatory conditions. CBD is the non-psychoactive component of the Cannabis plant and is also often extracted from hemp. It is a powerful natural anti-inflammatory remedy that works to block pain signals through our endogenous cannabinoid system.

Both pets and people find incredible relief by including topical or ingestible CBD products. With the Cannabis industry becoming prominent, CBD research is starting to show effectiveness for a wide range of pain conditions, including arthritis, fibromyalgia, cancer-related pain, nerve pain, chronic back pain, and joint and muscle pain from sports. It also has been very beneficial for relaxing people and helping with anxiety and insomnia or sleep-related disorders.

Because of the anti-inflammatory effects with CBD, it's best to check with your doctor if you are on any other anti-inflammatory medications before trying CBD.

We sell CBD products at Flow Spa and have seen many customers able to avoid the need for medications or reduce medications by adding CBD to their routine.

Practice Mindfulness

Mindfulness is one of the most exciting fields of research from the past decade. This buzz-word worthy term includes things like meditation and enlightenment or transcendence but there's nothing mystical about the science of mindfulness; it is simply a way to think of present state awareness or non-judgemental thinking. Not only is mindfulness effective for reducing stress and anxiety, but research has also shown that a regular practice of mindfulness can help us to become more resilient to pain and suffering in our life. People who are trained in mindfulness are better able to block and ignore pain signals in their body, which can lead to higher levels of happiness and perceiving life more positively.

There are many free or inexpensive courses and apps for practicing mindfulness. Some that we recommend include the Waking Up app, Oak, Headspace, and Insight Timer. At Flow Spa, we also have a Muse Meditation headband which is a biofeedback device that guides your brain into a calm state using cues from nature sounds. It's free for anyone to use at the spa.

Learning how to become more mindful is a challenge for many of us, which is why several of the other safe and natural treatments for the pain we're going to suggest may help to ease you into regular mindfulness practice if it doesn't come naturally to you.

Nature Exposure

One of the ways to make mindfulness more accessible to you if you struggle with it is through getting into nature, which has also been called forest bathing. When we breathe in the fresh air of natural surroundings like in the woods or a park, the fragrances that are released from the plants and trees around us have been shown to reduce blood pressure and stress. Stress is a pro-inflammatory condition in our body, so by reducing stress in our body, we are also able to reduce a major source of chronic inflammation.

To get the greatest benefit from nature exposure, leave your phone and other devices behind, breathe deeply, and enjoy your presence in nature. If you need a phone with you for emergencies, you can put it on airplane mode.

Nature exposure can work well to help you into a mindful state because of the calming effect but also due to being a more active form of walking meditation. Try counting your paces or breathing on pace with your steps as you walk through the woods.

Treatments Worth Trying for Deeper Pain Management

Infrared Sauna

Chronic stress is pro-inflammatory and a pervasive problem in our bodies but a complete absence of stress is also not ideal for our well-being. Short, intense bouts of stress like with a hard workout, heat, or cold exposure, make our bodies adaptable and more resilient. Infrared saunas and other sauna use have been shown to help with joint and muscle pain like arthritis, as well as create a beneficial response for coping with and reducing stress. When we get exposed to intense heat like with sauna for a short period, our body responds with the same defense system that is activated during injuries, which helps us to heal and regenerate. Furthermore, the sweating that is caused by the heat helps to rid our bodies of other stressors that build up in our system, like the toxic byproducts of chronic inflammation or heavy metals and other environmental toxins.

Sauna use seems to help a lot of people who struggle with joint paint like arthritis and some circulatory conditions that lead to pain and discomfort. To get the most out of a sauna treatment protocol, it needs to be done ideally 2-3 times per week and at least once per week.

Acupuncture

As we talked about with foam rolling and stretching, adhesions throughout our bodies can lead to pain and dysfunction. Acupuncture can help to stimulate blood flow and relax adhesions to allow our bodies to move better again and reduce inflammation. While this treatment modality may not appeal to everyone, it has a wide range of benefits that may be worthwhile for you to consider looking further into. Treatments will usually start with a more frequent schedule until the pain and tension have diminished at which point less frequent maintenance sessions may be performed to prevent pain or injury from recurring.

Floatation Therapy

Floating or float therapy goes by many names, like sensory deprivation or R.E.S.T for Restricted Environmental Stimulation Therapy. It's the Dead Sea experience harnessed in a comfortable and private room with a pod or a float tank that's designed like a bathtub big enough for you to lie down flat on your back in without touching any sides. Within the float tank, there are only 10 or 11 inches of water with 1,000 lb. of Epsom Salt dissolved into it, allowing our bodies to float like a cork on the surface. The float rooms are dark and quiet, with optional music and lights, and the experience of laying in the super-saturated saltwater decompresses the entire body and lets the mind relax and quiet to reduce stress and anxiety. Experiences usually range from 60-to-90 minutes in length as the body needs time to decompress and reduce tension once the pressure is taken off your body.

Float therapy is one of the safest and most effective treatments for a wide variety of conditions which is why much research has been going into this amazing and relaxing experience in recent years. Clinical evidence for float therapy includes treating chronic neck and back pain, pain related to depression, reductions in stress, anxiety, and blood pressure, and ongoing research is further validating the benefits for arthritis, fibromyalgia, concussion therapy, and PTSD.

This bucket list experience for many people becomes a regular part of their routine once they realize how much it helps with reducing pain not only right after the treatment but for days and weeks at a time. Many doctors regularly rank float therapy at the top of their list of recommended treatments because of its safety and efficacy with little to no side effects. Typical frequency of treatments ranges from one to four times per month depending on the severity of pain and the need for relief.

At Flow Spa, we specialize in float therapy and have seen countless customers come in again and again for relief from pain. If you're interested in learning more about how float therapy can help you, book your first appointment today or give us a call for more information.

How To Achieve Your New Years' Resolutions with Floating

It's no surprise that most New Year's resolutions fail. The gym-goers and crash dieters who make resolutions in January are usually throwing in the towel within four weeks.

The issue with resolutions as well-intentioned as they may be is that they lack a plan. We often set goals and resolutions to break old habits and create new ones. But when we're stressed or busy, we often revert to our old habits instead of rising to the challenge.

Adding float therapy to your plan for a new you in 2023 can help you achieve your resolutions.

Here are 6 ways floating can help you to accomplish your New Years’ Resolutions.

Exercise and Recovery

Hitting the gym more is a popular resolution for many people but the problem that most of us face is dropping off from our goal too soon to see any real results.

Floating is one of the best sports recovery methods ever. The effects of floating effortlessly improve circulation and helps to remove the lactic acid that builds up from working out. The decompression on your back and muscles is also great if you're feeling sore or pushed yourself a little too hard with your workout.

The 1,000 lb. of Epsom salt in the float tank solution is also an athlete's dream, Magnesium is an important mineral for muscle function and Epsom salt soaks have been used by athletes for centuries to aid in recovery.

You may find yourself getting sore a lot at the start of your new adventures at the gym. Try to find the right balance so that you're not hurting too much to keep going to the gym on your planned schedule.

Weight Loss Support

This benefit of floating will be important to you if your New Years’ goal is to lose weight.

Getting control of your hormones through healthy choices is going to make a big difference in your weight loss. Cortisol is affected by our stress levels and when we're stressed all the time, cortisol remains elevated. This can lead to higher blood sugar levels and more fat being stored instead of burned.

Floating helps to drastically lower cortisol levels, supporting a healthier hormone balance in our bodies and improving our ability to burn fat, instead of storing it.

De-Stress

Maybe your resolution is to simply stress less this year and floating definitely helps with that. Floating is one of the most powerful treatments for reducing the stress hormone cortisol but the de-stressing effects don't stop there.

The physical relief of pain and the alleviation of anxiety also help to make a big difference in our stress levels, leaving you in a blissful state of relaxation.

Before you burnout, this New Year, consider floating away your stress. We find that most customers see the best de-stressing results when floating with one of our memberships every two weeks or monthly.

Addiction Support

Reducing your stress levels is also one of the most effective ways to prevent relapse when quitting smoking, drugs, or alcohol.

Researchers have effectively used float therapy as an anti-smoking intervention and the same efforts can be applied to supporting the recovery from other vices. The reduction in stress and anxiety can make a big difference in reducing cravings.

More Sleep

Most of our New Years’ Resolutions include resolving to do more.

More exercise.

More weight loss.

Making more money.

More, more, more.

And when we strive to do more, our bodies need the support and rejuvenation of more sleep. Floating relaxes the brain to the slower theta brainwave state that we also experience in REM sleep. This is one of the reasons why everyone likes floating for feeling refreshed and reinvigorated like you just came out of a great nap. Some people do indeed sleep during their float while others get this deep relaxation that allows them to then sleep better at night.

Meditation

Practicing mindfulness has become a recent resolution for a lot of people and floating is the best training wheel support for your meditation goals that you can find.

When you are floating, your brain and body can't help but get into the same state as experienced meditators do. The theta brainwave state used to be only accessible to monks and unconsciously while we are in REM sleep but float therapy has opened up this realm of relaxation to everyone.

Because the float tanks have audio in them, a float session can also be coupled with a guided meditation to teach you how to meditate while in a relaxed state.

Maybe you resolved to float more this year, but for all your other goals, the many benefits of floating can help you better achieve them.

Book a float session today to help you with your New Years’ Resolutions.

A Yuletide Poem From RJ Claus

'Twas the week before Christmas and all through Flow Spa, 

Not a creature was stirring, just floating in awe. 

Buoyantly nestled on a bed of Epsom salt solution, 

As visions of sugar plums danced amongst New Year’s resolutions.

Listen up now as I sing out with elation, 

Come one, come all, and save at our holiday celebration!

🎄Merry Christmas to all from RJ Claus and the Flow Spa Elves!🎄

Creating Balance With Your Weekends

You’ve Got To Make Time To Recharge

The concept of burning the candle from both ends embodies the trendy term called work-life balance, or lack thereof as seems to be more and more the case. If you are in a hard and stressful job but also spending your weekends staying up late and partying or neglecting sleep for Netflix binges, the wick that is your lifeforce is getting burnt out from both ends.

Thanksgiving long weekend just passed us and usually, long weekends give us respite from the ‘always on’ mentality that we live with today, as businesses also closed for a day of rest and give us all the chance to pause. However, long weekends are also filled with family gatherings and times of celebration which can mean late nights, good food, and plenty of drinking. All of this is great when it means reconnecting with friends and family spread near and far to create lasting memories but recognizing its impact on your nervous system and stress levels is valuable for avoiding a state of full-on burnout and keeping your training or business progressing if you are involved in any sports or entrepreneurial endeavours.

My Thanksgiving weekend this year was the aforementioned kind as I was attending my best friend John’s wedding in Toronto and I knew that I would have to find balance in other parts of my life and throughout the weekend in order to not crash after the wedding.

This is what a few busy days and late nights can do to your recovery. The following data from my Oura ring display from Saturday morning and Sunday morning on Thanksgiving weekend tells you all you need to know.

Knowing how various factors impact my sleep quality helps me to make choices to regain balance or simply know that I may wake up feeling less than optimal after a busy weekend like this and that I should go light with training to avoid pushing myself into a deeper hole or risking injury.

The value in knowing that a few nights short of optimal sleep combined with busy and active days crushes your recovery and readiness for training extends to general exercise as well as sport-specific training. If you like to work out just to stay healthy, following a busy weekend like the one I had, you may want to consider doing light weight training only or avoiding it altogether and just doing some low-intensity cardio, yoga, and stretching until your body is more fully recovered.

In addition to considerations with how your workouts are designed to create balance, do what you can to mitigate stress at work, and find other parasympathetic activities to include while you are returning to normal. For me this included getting some extra rest with an hour-long float session once I returned home, getting outside for a quiet walk, and getting extra sleep for the following few nights.

Most often the choices that help us regain balance aren’t the most fun or easiest options (but they will make you feel better) which is why you need to make the conscious choice to improve your recovery and reduce chronic stress levels.

Tips For Regaining Balance

• Adjust Your Workout Plan Until You Are Better Recovered - don’t tax the nervous system with high-intensity weights or cardio.

• Eat healthy foods - this is completely subjective to you and your goals but you probably know when you’re making the right choices. Use a food tracker like MyFitnessPal for a bit if it helps you get back on track.

• Forest bathing - getting deep into nature has restorative effects on your mind, body, and soul.

• Get extra sleep - turn off your devices and go to bed early to catch up on some Zzz’s.

• Go for a float - find a float centre near you and get into a state of deep parasympathetic rejuvenation.

• Reduce caffeine - when your body is reaching its limits you may be reaching for that extra cup of coffee to keep going. Avoiding doing that will limit further contribution to adrenal fatigue and stress.

• Plan in advance - if you know you’re coming into crunch time at work or in training, prepare ahead of time with all of the above tips so that your competition or all-nighter at work doesn’t grind you into the dirt.

There are many ways to return to optimal functioning but it all starts with awareness which we intuitively know when we’re approaching burnout and overtaxing ourselves. We don’t always have the luxury of stepping on the brakes and settling down - there are seasons in our lives when we have to go full-tilt forward. But when you can it’s best to slow down and keep balance in place.

If you’re unsure of what this feels like in yourself or if you want even more details, a device like the Oura ring, Whoop, or other HRV tracking tools can help you to quantitatively measure your recovery to keep track of trends. Intelligent use of your own recovery trends will allow you to push yourself harder for longer without getting sick, injured, or burnt out and is a critical factor in the success of many world-class performers across all fields of business and sports.

When you’re stressed and overworked, proper recovery isn’t just going to come to you; you’ve got to create time to regain balance.

Make Time To Recharge Today

How Teachers Can Benefit From Float Therapy

Back to school time in the fall is a challenging transition for students and teachers alike. Momentum shifts and that sense of the grind through to Christmas as the weather gets colder imposes upon our psyche. The stress of the new school year is also compounded by the new germs being passed around which often leads to an uptick in colds shortly after the summer break. Having a strategy to incorporate mental and physical wellness into your weekly and monthly routine is essential for maintaining good health year-round but becomes critical at these transitional times. 

Teachers can benefit from floating through:

• Powerful stress reduction.

• A chance to get away to a quiet oasis without having to travel.

• Joint and muscle pain relief.

Float therapy is a wonderful way to reduce pain and stress naturally. Being supported in Epsom salt water that is denser than the Dead Sea allows your body to completely relax to relieve tension. The unique stimuli-reduced environment of a float pod or float cabin also allows your mind to let go of stress and anxiety. 

Stress Reduction

Teaching is a challenging and demanding job with all of the different factors that go into commanding the attention of a classroom full of students, all with their unique personalities. Combined with the tight timelines of grading work, and countless other factors, teaching can be very stressful. Float tanks may be the best technology we have to combat stress. Research has shown a significant reduction in cortisol levels come about from just one hour of floating. Anxiety is also significantly reduced and the “post-float glow” feeling of complete relaxation you get while not having a care in the world is extremely helpful when needing to unwind after a long day or a long week. 

A Quiet Oasis

The float therapy experience is incomparable. Customers leave saying that they’ve never experienced anything quite like it because we are never in an environment with no external stimuli. While some new floaters opt to leave the lights on or music playing, the benefits of the experience are compounded when you immerse yourself in the stimulus reduction through turning off the lights and letting the music fade out. This gives your brain the chance to bask in complete silence and darkness which extraordinarily refreshing in the overstimulated world that we live in. 

Pain Relief

Repeated strain from grading papers and desk work can lead to a lot of tight muscles and pain in the body.

There’s over 1,000 lb. of Epsom salt in each float tank, making it denser than the human body and allowing you to float completely without effort. Research shows this decompression is beneficial for back and neck pain, and ongoing studies are working towards validating the benefits that we’ve seen at Flow Spa with clients suffering from chronic conditions like arthritis and fibromyalgia. 

Needless to say, teachers who came into Flow Spa during the final grading and exams before school was out for the summer found their float experience to be exactly what they needed in terms of a reset between grading tests and papers. 

Developing different strategies to incorporate a reset into your routine will help to ensure that you are prepared through it all. At Flow Spa, we help in providing guidance with meditation and some of the various techniques you can use to consistently reduce stress and anxiety. Restorative exercise is also essential to maintaining balance and overall well-being. And when you need that time to get away from everything and decompress, float tanks offer an unrivalled experience. 

Top Eleven Health Benefits of Float Therapy

11 Ways Floating Makes Your Life Better

Jump to a Section:

1. Pain Relief

2. Complete Relaxation

3. Deeper Sleep

4. Anxiety Reduction

5. Stress Relief

6. Theta State - REM

7. Skin Health

8. Magnesium Deficiency

9. Creativity

10. Brain Injuries and Concussions

11. Sports Performance

Floating will make your life better. This incredibly therapeutic saltwater Flow Spa float experience has clinical evidence to back up a whole host of benefits.

Floating, float therapy, or REST (Restricted Environmental Stimulus Therapy), used to be called sensory deprivation tanks but the name has become a misnomer as improvements to the technology allows these spacious pods and cabins to be as comfortable as you want it to be. Customizations include leaving music, guided meditations, and relaxing lights on to help you get the most out your experience. Inside each of our pods and cabins are over 1,000 pounds of Epsom Salt dissolved into a solution at a depth of 11 inches. This makes the water denser than the Dead Sea allowing you to float effortlessly on the surface of the water.

Each person has their own unique experience with floating because it’s such a gentle therapy, the healing potential will benefit whatever is in most dire need of attention.

Here are 11 of the most common benefits supported by research and our own customer experiences when you come in for a Flow Spa float.

1. Pain Relief

Research supports the pain-relieving benefits of float therapy for chronic pains like neck and back pain. Because your entire body is gently supported in the Epsom salt solution, floating promotes better spine health by allowing the spine to decompress and all the tense muscles that don’t normally get a chance to relax - including during sleep - can reduce tension completely over time.

Other chronic conditions like fibromyalgia, ankylosing spondylitis, and arthritis have shown great promise in the customers we’ve had come in and long-term studies that are underway to gather further support for this beneficial effect of floating.

2. Complete Relaxation

Describing floating is challenging - it’s something you’ve got to see and experience to fully understand because it’s a completely new experience and sensation. One term that does get through most often in describing floating is that it is a complete and unrivalled relaxation experience. This type of stimulus reduction and peace sets the entire body and mind at ease in a way that’s hard to compare to anything else. The temperature of the water is the same as your body and most people liken it to feeling more like floating on a cloud rather than being in water

3. Deeper Sleep

Many people report having the best sleep of their life after floating. This is why it’s popular to float in the evening while winding down after work to allow the body to gently ease into sleep with a reduction in racing thoughts and to-do lists shuffling through your mind.

4. Anxiety Reduction

We live in a busy and distracted world and a byproduct of this is that many of us are facing greater levels of anxiety daily. Because floating is so relaxing and allows our overactive nervous systems to completely tone down for an hour, clinical evidence supports a dramatic reduction in symptoms of anxiety from float therapy. Many customers relish the feeling of leaving the spa without a care in the world about the things that usually bother them. More often than not customers will take some extra time to relax in our lounge and enjoy some tea or water after their float.

5. Stress Relief

In addition to reducing anxiety, floating busts through similar symptoms of stress. Researchers have shown a significant drop in the stress hormone cortisol after just one hour of float therapy. Having less cortisol present in your system allows you to have a clear and focused mind and to be more productive or to fully embrace the bliss of treating yourself to some well-deserved R&R.

This reduction in stress levels also contributes to a significant reduction in hypertension that comes with floating. High blood pressure is temporarily improved even after just one float session.

6. Theta State - REM Sleep

The theta brainwave state sounds like something very mystical, and sure, it can be but in essence, it is the slow and calm state our brains get into during REM sleep when we are dreaming. It is a sign that our brains are deeply relaxed and can be reached by experienced meditators as well. The cool thing is that research shows the deep state of relaxation that comes from floating induces a theta brainwave state without the need for years of practice in meditation or going completely to sleep. There are unique benefits to this including enhancing creativity, consolidating memory, and feeling refreshed without needing to completely fall asleep. While it’s not a perfect analogy, some people liken this theta brainwave activity that comes from floating as the equivalent of 4-6 hours of REM sleep. For people who sleep poorly, this can be extremely powerful when it comes to memory consolidation and recovery that sleep typically provides.

7. Skin Health

The float tank solution is nearly 30% Epsom salt which makes it supersaturated in magnesium. Magnesium is important for skin health and many customers dealing with dry skin or conditions like psoriasis and eczema report improvements in symptoms when adding floating into their routine.

8. Magnesium Deficiency

Testimonials from customers reporting that floating helps with restless leg syndrome or sleep quality (as magnesium is an important mineral for promoting deep sleep) suggests that magnesium may be boosted through floating. While it’s next to impossible for researchers to accurately support this due to differences in skin porousness and multiple possible pathways for absorption, it’s still great to know that floating seems to help with conditions often associated with magnesium deficiency.

9. Creativity

Deep relaxation and inducing the theta brainwave state has helped many artists and thinkers in a wide range of fields uncover incredible potential and ideas in their brains. Whether you go into a float with a particular problem you’re trying to tackle or it simply comes to you naturally from the depths of your subconscious, it’s undeniable that the unique environment of the float tank has produced countless fascinating works of art and ingenuity. Float centres in the U.S. have worked with various artists to put together entire music albums and art instalments produced from these artists after coming out of a float. Comedian Joe Rogan has also become a patron saint of floating as he often attributes this deep meditative state to helping him create many of his most popular bits of comedy.

10. Brain Injuries and Concussions

As if floating wasn’t good enough already, many doctors and health care practitioners working with patients dealing with brain injuries or concussions are starting to recognize the healing potential of float therapy. The typical post-concussion protocol involves having the patient spend some time each hour away from the blue light of digital devices and ideally in a quiet and dark area. Taking this a step further, the advantage of nearly-complete sensory deprivation that comes from floating provides an hour or longer free from stimuli, a significant amount of time for the brain to work its magic on healing itself.

This is an important point which has started to get the attention of athletes competing in high-contact sports and we’ve seen customers return to work after a shortened recovery period following traumatic brain injuries with the help of regular floating.

11. Sports Performance

Professional sports teams have started to take note of the potential of floating for more than just the potential to help with concussions. Athletes are highly driven and competitive and often have a hard time turning off their brains to enter a relaxed state. Floating can work wonders to allow athletes to shift into a deep state of relaxation to allow the nervous system to reset and recharge.

The very best athletes in the world also include visualization in their routine as a regular practice to perfect motor patterns for the repetitive movements involved in their sport. It sounds a bit odd at first and like magic to think that seeing yourself in your mind in action can lead to an improvement in the physical world but repeatedly this is the case in research done on a wide range of physical performances. Dry training with U.S. Olympic Swim Coach Bob Bowman’s athletes, including Michael Phelps, entails mentally rehearsing a race while timing it with a stopwatch. These world-class athletes become so myopically focused that they visualize their full race and can stop the clock within tenths of a second of their actual swim time. The sensory reduction of the float tank is the perfect place for athletes to mentally rehearse the practice of their sport to carry over to their performance in-game. Golden State Warrior’s All-Star Steph Curry floats multiple times per month to maintain crisp and perfect shooting.

Just like with any therapeutic modality, many of the great benefits of floating come with time and our customers experience better results over time as compared to just one session. While you’ll love your experience of floating even the first time, know that it gets better with each subsequent visit. A common recommended is that you try floating three times to get used to it and figure out your preferences for having the best experience.

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How Debbie Relaxed For Two Days Pain-Free After Float Therapy

The first voicemail was a courtesy call from Debbie to thank me; no need to call back. Debbie hadn’t had pain all day and didn’t have to take her usual cornucopia of pills.

The second call we received later from Debbie was even better…

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The healing potential of the float tank is quite incredible.

It’s hard to say just how and what benefits will come to any individual until they’ve entered through the doors of our float centre and stepped into another world of relaxation.

I’ve previously talked about how floating alleviates my back pain - a byproduct of years of heavy weightlifting - and this is something that has shown to be scientifically validated. There’s documentation consistent with these personal findings.

The oftentimes more amazing results come at the fringe of research where ongoing studies are working through the process of confirming hypotheses. This is where someone comes in not knowing if they will simply get an hour of deep relaxation and peace or if it will go further in alleviating deep-seated pains that have been persistent for years.

It’s been happening just like this so far at Flow Spa. A cosmic roll of the dice. What bonus gift will be dished out to our next customer? Will it be better sleep, a quieting of the mind, or the blessed release from the mortal coil of chronic pain?

It’s been happening more often than not and that’s why I’m convinced it’s only a matter of time before the ongoing research confirms these further benefits.

Everyone gets the relaxation once they get past the learning curve of the first 15 minutes or so. What’s on top of it is the icing on the cake.

From ages 13 to 89 we’ve already facilitated an amazing experience to an incredibly diverse group of customers but some still stand out as having their lives do a complete 180º after visiting us for a float.

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Another phone call was received several days later. Debbie was ecstatic. She couldn’t believe that she’d had two full days free from pain. The first time in what felt like an eternity.

Everything becomes better and easier when you’re not constantly in pain.

All the difficult times seem worth it when our customers become our friends and feel such gratitude for what we’ve been able to offer them.

This is why we float.

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Getting The Most Out Of Your Float | 1

At Flow Spa, we choose not to belabour the point of what to expect in the float tank because the experience is unique to each individual. There are far too many factors to take into account to be able to say “this is what you’re going to experience,” especially in the first few sessions as you learn how to relax deeper into the float. 

This isn’t to say that there aren’t tips you can use to get the most out of your float and bask in that “post-float glow.” 

Far from being comprehensive, today let’s look at some of the tips that you can work on applying when you come in to float to take the experience to the next level. 

Remaining Still

I include this as the first tip because I think it can be the more important one for many people looking to elevate their float experience. Part of the benefit of floating is that your body is given a chance to decompress and dissolve in relation to the environment around you. We’ve calibrated the temperature in our float tanks to be perfectly neutral to skin temperature and have made adjustments in the first few weeks to be sure that it is at the perfect comfortable temperature for virtually everyone coming in to float. This means that you’re not supposed to be able to FEEL that you are in water across most of your body or even be able to tell the difference between the air temperature and water temperature. After some thought and experimentation with this, I’ve come to realize that a very important step in nurturing this physical sensation dissolution is to practice remaining perfectly still once you set into your most comfortable position. 

Movement means that part of your brain is firing, whether you’re feeling restless or just fidgeting. 

The other reason to limit movement is that movement has a convective effect in the water, which will draw heat out of your core quicker and temporarily give you a cooling sensation at your skin as that heat is pulled away from your body. When you remain still everything in the float tank system, including your body, is in a perfect balance. Movement in the water is much like the cooling effect that standing in front of a fan while sweating in the summer heat has. The water draws heat out of the body and cuts through that vapour barrier that our bodies possess.

Slowing Your Breathing

The float tank is conducive to slowing down your breathing already because you are letting everything in your body relax deeply, which frees the diaphragm to take in fuller and deeper breaths and also allows you to hyper-oxygenate because all of your muscles are relaxed and not requiring copious amounts of oxygen for any demanding work. 

Many people never take full and deep breaths though so it can be a new and different experience the first few times in the float tank to allow your body and your breath to fully relax and deepen. 

I often advise starting with a box breathing style of 4-4-4-4 where you:

-breathe in for a count of four

-hold your breath for a count of four

-breath out for a count of four

-hold the bottom of the breath for a count of four

The Japanese Society for Hypertension has shown that even 1-minute of deep breathing (5-6 breaths depending on the cadence and method you’re using) can significantly reduce blood pressure. Spending an hour like this in the float tank, therefore, has a dramatic impact not just on mental wellbeing but on many physical markers of health as well. 

Some people prefer to count their breaths. When doing this style of deep breathing and meditation I like counting up to ten and then starting over. Holding any larger numbers in the mind can take away from the peace of mind you are looking for and if you’re deeply relaxed, even counting to 10 can become a challenge without losing track but whenever that happens you just start over. 

Come in with permission to relax

We all lead busy and distracted lives. It’s become a pervasive issue for many people which is why I believe the reset of floating first and foremost teaches all of us the value in practicing mindfulness in whatever way comes naturally to you daily. It’s not realistic for everyone to float more than once a month but trying to go 30-days with only one hour of mental peace of mind is also not a good strategy. 

When you do come in to float though you want to pamper yourself with the experience as much as possible. 

Turn off your phone or put it in airplane mode so that you can reap the most benefits of not letting your mind instantly get distracted again. Make a day out of it or at least a few hours by hanging out in our lounge before heading back out into the wild or schedule your float for a day where you do have to immediately get busy again after you are done. The more you can float on that cloud for a while afterwards, the more at peace you will be and the more you will realize the value in cherishing the present moment regularly in your life.

Does an hour of floating actually equal six hours of sleep?

Whenever something new meets Pop Media headlines, there’s a tendency for whatever tasty nugget might be included in this new thing to be sensationalized to attract greater readership. This “clickbait” opportunity has not been missed even on float therapy and sensory deprivation tanks.

While the comparisons to a portal to “Upside Down” from Stranger Things is often no longer included in the lexicon, the quote that is continuously blown out of proportion is in regards to the restorative effects of floating and sleep. Depending on which news source you’re reading, you’ll often see it stated that an hour of floating is equivalent to anywhere from four to six hours of sleep.

The most recent news blast that has likely proliferated this claim again was when Josh McDaniels from the New England Patriots said that 45 minutes in the tank was equal to four hours of sleep - extrapolate this and I think that is why people are now pushing the claim that an hour of floating is equal to six hours of sleep.

Is this really the case?

Let’s break down the components of this claim and decipher the reality from what is exaggerated.

What We Know About Floating as it Relates to Relaxation

Floating is a powerful way to combat stress and anxiety and multiple clinical studies have validated this claim. The absence of any external stimuli often allows your brain to sort things out on its own and realize that everything we stress about on a day-to-day basis doesn’t have to be such a big issue.

Because the brain doesn’t have all five senses providing input during a float session, our brain wave frequencies are able to settle down into a deeper state of relaxation. This relaxed state is called theta brainwaves and is the same state that expert meditators reach and we all achieve during REM sleep and dreaming.

Figure 1. This chart from my Oura ring shows the different sleep stages that I was in throughout the night. You can see that most deep sleep comes in the earlier half of your nightly slumber and REM comes during the latter part.

It sounds then very much like floating is pretty much the same as sleeping, right?

REM sleep is only one component of our total nightly sleep cycle. It often comes in the later stages of sleep and is associated with creativity and memory consolidation. REM sleep also plays an important role in re-energizing your mind and body. Reaching a theta brainwave state while floating is, therefore, one of the reasons why people love floating for the boost in creativity and energy that they get.

Most of the later hours of sleep are dedicated to REM (see Figure 1).

Sleep is a fascinating component of our lives and has a multitude of aspects that are necessary for good health, REM being just one of them. Another very important part of sleep is the deep sleep stage which is when our bodies release a beneficial cascade of hormones to help repair and grow muscle, making it the most restorative sleep segment.

There is no evidence thus far that floating can induce a deep sleep state and the associated release of healing hormones (that is unless you sleep in a float tank).

This is where making claims like sleep replacing 6 hours of sleep can cross the line from benefit to simply being misleading because people who only get about 6 hours of sleep each night might think that they can get away with replacing that with an hour float. (6 hours of sleep is simply not enough, for more on this read the excellent book Why We Sleep by Matthew Walker)

Perhaps an even bigger issue with people making claims like this is that it puts floating at risk of being converted from a trend into a fad and lumped into the likes of fidget spinners and pogs.

Floating has strong scientific support that is growing every day but if we keep having people trying to sensationalize it for a quick buck or clickbait then it’s going to start being that much harder to get further research taken seriously if floating is just seen as quackery.