The People, Process, & Progress Podcast - The Trifecta of Recovery - Reset Friday #1

Episode Date: September 5, 2025

I’m kicking off a new weekly series called Reset Friday. Each Friday, I’ll share a short, practical way to reset your mind, body, and spirit. These episodes aren’t long lectures. They’re tools you can put into practice right away.For our first Reset Friday, I’m sharing what I call the Trifecta of Recovery: Wim Hof breathing, yoga, and the cold plunge. Breathing primes your nervous system, yoga centers your body, and cold exposure builds resilience and focus. Together, they form a reset you can feel.Take a listen, and then try one of the three this weekend. You might be surprised at how much better you feel.

Welcome to the very first reset Friday. I'm so glad you're here. Who's what this Friday series is all about? We all carry stress, fatigue, and distraction through the week, right? I know I do, and I bring it into the weekend. So by the time Friday rolls around, our minds and bodies are asking for a reset, right? Reset Friday is going to be short, practical, and focused on things you can do to feel better and start fresh. It's not about long lectures or complicated routines.

these are simple tools you can actually use that I use to take care of yourself. Each week I'll share one reset. Sometimes it'll be movement, sometimes mindset, sometimes something faith-based, maybe even. But always something you can put into practice, right? Think of it as a reset button at the end of your week. So today our reset Friday, I want to share what I call the trifecta of recovery, Wim Hof Breathing, yoga, and Cold Plunge. So let's get into the first part.

So the first thing I do on my recovery days is Wimhoff breathing. I just pull YouTube up on my smart TV, fine whim-off breathing guided, and I'll put that in the show notes. But we start with the breath, right? The method is simple. You have do deep controlled breaths, followed by breath hold. So you do in and out, real deep breaths 30 times. Then on the last one, halfway on the out, you hold your breath, right? What it does is it spikes your body with oxygen, right?

Your stress system for the moment. And then it brings you back to a calm, balanced state. So you're on purpose hyping yourself up. It also feels like a breathing treatment like you've gotten a hard work. work out because you're really working those lungs. And science shows that it lowers inflammation, right? It improves your stress resilience. It activates the vagus nerve, which helps regulate the heart rate and calm the nervous system.

So the science of it is cool. Here's for me practically. So after I do three rounds of this, I just feel a bit more energized, like my lungs are bigger. And again, I do this while I'm sitting on my couch in my living room, right, with the TV going. You can do it from a laptop and iPad, your phone, whatever. It's on YouTube. It's great. it's very helpful.

And some days I can't hold my breath the whole first minute. Some days I can hold it the whole first minute in both of the two minutes and a half and maybe even longer. And that's okay. Just do what you can. If you're just starting out, you're not going to be able to hold your breath as long. But really breathe in your nose and out your mouth and just follow along with what happens.

There's cool tempo music with it. So it really is helpful. So for me, the first step in my trifecta of recovery is Wimhoff breathing. And then from the other second part is yoga. I've done yoga, all different types, yoga for Jiu-Jitsu, the hard yoga where you're moving a lot and you're really holding hard poses or super. I've done yoga on the couch, which I get some business from from people, but it's kind of a neat thing to try a thing, right? It's not just stretching.

It's also balance and breathing and mindfulness kind of all wrapped into one. So it's a really cool way to do that together, right? And so it shows that it lowers cortisol, right? So there's a theme. We're low in inflammation. We're chilling out of nervous system. We're lowering cortisol with the breathing now with the yoga. Right.

It improves flexibility and balance, right? That's kind of its whole game and strength, right? It can help with sleep, reduce anxiety. I did a lot of yoga when I was really anxious, right? It helps get you back into your body feeling what, what does my body move like? And if you're part gym bro like me and you're lifting weights and you're doing those kind of things, it also keeps you flexible, which also helps reduce injury. So it's huge for recovery, especially alongside Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu.

I do yoga-like stretches and warm up before class and after class. And if you stay consistent with yoga, you're going to. really feel a difference in your body. Just like the Wim Hof breathing, I use YouTube a lot. I do. I follow Sarah Beth Yoga, Yoga with Adrienne, yoga for BJJ, breathing flow. There's so many different free, right? If you have YouTube, if you have a smart TV, I guess that you've already paid for,

and you have the YouTube app on it, just look up yoga for and look at the thing you're trying to do. So I often look up yoga recovery, recovery yoga, you know, mix up the words, something like that. But they're free and they're quick and they're easy to use. and they make your body feel really good. So we've done our breathing, we've worked out our lungs, we've done our yoga, we've stretched our body and muscles and tendons and things. Now we're going to get cold.

This is a hard part. This is a mental part, but it's very helpful, right? For me, the third piece is a cold plunge. I used to do cold showers and then I started getting into plunging. Now I do a mix of those, right? This one raises some eyebrows because why would you want to get in cold water? But I'm going to tell you why. Because what it does is it constricts your blood vessels, right?

and then they relax and then improve circulation. So practically, when you're cold, they're going to clamp down a little bit. You'll feel cold, right? Don't start out with super cold water. Start out with, you know, between 50 and 60 is the magic spot or a cool shower. But you'll get a spike in Noraphafen and dopamine, which will feel good, right? You'll feel more focused and energetic and mood and not quite like jittery focus energy from coffee. It's even better.

And it's a mental test. So the next time you're showering, start with this, right? In the last 30 seconds of your shower, turn it halfway so it's getting a little colder. And then each day, do a little colder until you're all the way cold. A plunge is a different thing, right? You need to buy a tub or you can do it in your tub. Just use cold water. But look up videos.

Go to People Process Progress YouTube channel. Obviously, I'm going to promote that. But I have tons of cold plunge videos. I have a cold plunge. I use the mod tub, no affiliation. But it's great. It's just a big cooler you're filled with water. But do this mental test.

And you'll feel the physical properties of it. You'll feel really energized after the, cold shower or after the plunge, right? So for me, I've opened up my lungs by starting with this breathing, which also is a bit of a mind workout, right, holding my breath. And then I've moved my body around, stretch and recovered from sore muscles from lifting or jihitsu or just recovery. Maybe I have an injury. And then the cold plunge, it's like putting an ice pack on your whole body, reducing inflammation. It helps release these cold shock proteins. You can Google that. But basically, it helps many areas of your body.

So I put all these together because I just tried it one day. I was like, hey, let me do some breathing. Let me try this yoga. Let me get this cold plunge in and it works. So now that's my go-to recovery routine, right? And so I'm helping my nervous system. I'm helping, you know, center myself and move my body and get some oxygen in there, which is great.

It's a great reset, right, for your mind, body, and spirit. So here's your reset Friday challenge. Try one this weekend. Just one. Go to YouTube. Do a round of Wim Hof, right? Do 10 minutes of you. yoga, finish your shower with cold water. Then pay attention to how you feel after. Notice it,

right? Is there a shift? Do you feel kind of that reset power? Does it feel good to you? And let me know. Let me know in the comments either on one of my YouTube videos on people process progress. When you listen to this, reach out to me. But that's the first reset Friday in the books. So each week, I'm going to cover something else that helps me get better in my mind, body, or spirit that I know can help you all as well. We'll dig into these simple tools, practices. right, they can help you feel better, reset, get back to balance. Thanks so much for listening. If this helped you, share it with somebody else, subscribe on Apple, Spotify, all the platforms

right at People Process Progress. I'm also on X and Instagram at PennLKG, P-A-N-E-L-L-K-G. I mentioned the People Process Progress YouTube channel, so the audio feed for my podcast is there, but also videos on exercise, right? So a minute or less videos where we get ideas on different exercise routines that I do to stay in pretty good shape at 51. jih Tjitsu after action report. So I'll go to a jih Tzu class, then I'll talk about it for about 30 seconds, what I learned,

what you should focus on, or what I'm going to try and keep focusing on. And then things like this, recovery routines. So I hope that this helps you. And if so, again, like, subscribe, share. Remember, own your mind, move your body, anchor your spirit. And I wish you all, Godspeed.