Full transcript from the Ultimate Human Podcast with Gary Brecka, featuring Sam Maxwell and Kyle Ponton (Cold Life Co-Founders). Click any timestamp to jump to that moment in the video.
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My favorite part about cold plunging is that it changed my life completely. I was diagnosed with severe ADHD when I was young and I was just googling what can help me with an aderal addiction. So when I found the cold therapy, being able to substitute that, I was buying ice every single day. I'm a walking testimonial of what we sell and what we created. I literally call it my drug of choice because nothing makes me feel better for longer. That aspect of getting out and just being so clear. people are realizing, man, there's so many ways to feel really good without drugs and alcohol.
>> That's when we then connected on how much he believed in cold plunging. He was like, "Dude, let's stop everything we're both doing right now, put our brains together, and let's create our own product."
>> Most people see comfort very aggressively. They avoid any level of discomfort, not realizing that some level of discomfort can make you stronger.
>> There's really something to be said about pursuing the discomfort to where then when stuff comes at you, you just feel like you got it. I always say if your morning is hard, your day will be easy.
>> Doing that very hard thing in the morning just sets me up for my day.
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>> I feel like cold exposure is one of those things that is going to still be mainstream 5,000 years from now. When you look at the intelligence, really break this down. You get into a cold punch. What is the body going to do in that situation?
>> One of the things that I found very interesting was, and I didn't really learn about this really until this past year or two, is...
Ultimate human. Hey guys, welcome back to the Ultimate Human podcast. I'm your host, human biologist Gary Brea, where we go down the road of everything anti-aging, biohacking, longevity, and everything in between. Today's going to be a really special podcast because it's on a broad topic that so many people are interested in and even more people are confused about. So, I'm really really excited to run this podcast on cold plunging. And I've asked two of my very good friends and partners to come to the podcast today. So, welcome Sam and Kyle from Cold Life Cold Plunges. Welcome to the podcast, guys.
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>> Thanks for having us on, Gary. We're pumped to be here, man.
>> This has been an awesome journey. I mean, in full disclosure, um I'm a shareholder in in in Cold Life, a proud shareholder. Um I met you guys a few years ago through uh through my son. I I fell in love with the purpose and the passion. It reminded me a lot of, you know, when I was getting going off the ground, young entrepreneur, passionate about an idea, unrelenting.
>> Um, but what I really appreciated about you guys was the the level of intentionality that you had in in bringing your product to market. You wanted it to be Americanmade.
>> Um, you wanted to have the best motors. You wanted to have the most durable plunge. Um, and I don't want to turn this into a commercial for cold life because I want to go into the science of cold plunging, but want to get that out of the way first. This is not a podcast to sell you a cold plunge course. The podcast, uh, you know, talking about all all of the benefits. So, let's just rewind the clock a little bit. I mean,
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>> how and and why did you decide to take the leap into cold plunging and make that your life?
>> I I'll start. So, for for me, my journey was was honestly a little simple. You know, I got invited one Saturday morning. I don't know, this is probably four or five years ago now. Probably right before CO era. Uh I'm from Atlanta, so in Atlanta in the winter time, it gets pretty cold. So thankfully, we have some pretty cold water near us and all the showers and such. And so I had a couple crazy buddies of mine and uh we said, "Hey, let's just go to a local pool and do this in the morning." It's like 8:00 a.m. Saturday morning. You know, what else better do I got to do than than go jump into a pool of cold water? Um so I started to do this and and it just it was it was incredible for me. I literally came out of there, I had no idea what any of these benefits were. I didn't know any of this the mental clarity, the inflammation. I didn't know any of these buzzwords. I just knew I felt like incredible and and it was just so addicting. So, we kept on coming back and then five of us turned into 20 of us turned into 60 of us turned in almost hundreds of us getting together weekly back in Atlanta and uh jump in the lake to just jump into a
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>> There used to be something in um uh Chicago. I I lived I went to grad school in Chicago. It was called the Polar Club. Do you remember that? Like once a year they'd all go I actually didn't do that for the record, but they would all go bum rush Lake Michigan. I was like you guys are crazy. Yeah. Yeah. But it was like women and
>> Yeah. Everybody a big community of everything. So that and that's what this turned into. It was just a big community which is why I loved it.
>> And then um Sam and I had you know had met and we were doing some different you know business things on the side. And so one day
>> I walk in this is while I'm doing these events and such. I walk into uh Sam and I'm I'm going over there to say, "Hey, you need to come check out this coal punch thing we're doing. We're doing pools, you know, next weekend. You got to come by." And I walk in and uh I'll let Sam share his side of the story on that. But that's really where I discovered, "Wait, you're doing cold plunging, too?"
>> Yeah. I had I had just discovered coal plunging. And my favorite part about cold punching is is that it changed my life completely. Um you know, a lot of people do say that. And for people that are watching this
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like, "Okay, gold changed your life." Yeah,
>> sure.
>> I get it. Where's the affiliate link, guys? So, you know.
>> Yeah. No, seriously. But for me, I'm I'm, you know, I'm a walking testimonial of what we sell and what we created. And going into that, I was diagnosed with severe ADHD when I was young.
>> And when I met Kyle, I was just trying to get over my addiction of taking Adderall.
>> As I got older, I hated that I was absolutely dependent on a medication.
>> Wow.
>> And the older I got, the more I was aware of how horrible of a person it made me.
>> Uh my tough one, too, man. my my family, my everyone that was close to me was scared to confront Sam about his addiction at all. I wouldn't sleep for days. I would take multiple a day.
>> Um I got down to like 145 pounds
>> and I was oblivious. So the older I got, I was looking for an outlet, a natural way to battle my ADHD but not take the medication anymore.
>> Right?
>> So after doing some research, I saw that cold therapy was a possible solution to fix that. and I tried Cairo and just for
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me personally, it didn't didn't make me get over that edge. I was still craving the medication.
>> Then I discovered Ice Bass. So, I bought a plastic barrel at my office. I didn't want to spend thousands of dollars on the few that were on the market at the time and I bought a a barrel and I was buying ice every single day and I didn't miss a day for like 14 days
>> really.
>> And within 14 days, I reflected and I was like, I'm not craving the apple.
>> But who was the one that was like, "Hey dude, you I think you need to try co." Was that you? It was you.
>> Yeah. Well, it actually wasn't me. I I won't take the credit for that. I came in, it was completely independently, which is probably why
>> like an article. I was like up at the office like late at night, didn't have my prescription. I was just struggling, right? Take drinking so much caffeine every single day. And I was just googling. I was out of curiosity like what can help me with an aderall addiction?
>> And I looked at cold therapy. There was a few articles at the time that said that it could help.
>> Yeah. um which we'll dive into in a little bit. But I started doing ice bass in a plastic barrel and he walked into
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my office at the time when we were doing a different venture together.
>> He's like, "Bro, what's going on? What do we got going on?"
>> Bro, he's like, "What's this trash over here? This Jeffrey Dmer bucket in the corner of your office."
>> It is true.
>> This crusty thing. He's like hiding over there.
>> He walks over to it and he's like, "Dude, this water is disgusting." And I'm like I'm like, "Dude, I I don't care." I'm like, "I'm I get ice every day." I'm like, "I'm tired of buying ice." But I was like, I don't miss a day, dude. And that's when we then connected on how much he believed in coal plunging. Yeah.
>> I started telling him about I want to start a coal punch company. And he was like, dude, let's stop everything we're both doing right now. Put our brains together and let's create our own product.
>> And what were you guys doing at the time?
>> I was I had my own prior like e-commerce business selling uh 360 spinning photo booths. Okay.
>> Um I used to always follow trends. And what I like to say about the cold plunge is that I'm not in this because it's a trend. I'm in this because it changed my life. And now we want to imp every day communicating with customers
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and possible prospects to join the cold life and be a customer.
>> People are battling ADHD and it's not talked about enough.
>> Yeah. You know, um I talk about this a lot, you know, because I've I've studied genetic methylation pathways and how the body converts nutrients and what have you. One of the nutrients that we make in the human body, we make dopamine, we make serotonin, we make norepinephrine, we make the neurotransmitters, y that create our mood, that create our emotions. And so if we're making them inside the body, when we take things from outside the body and put them in in an effort to try to fix that deficiency, it never works, right? I mean, it works for a period of time, but it creates dependency or creates something called tacophilaxis, which is desensitization. So I mean unknowingly you st you basically stepped on a physiologic secret and that is that your body can produce these kind of
>> it was so powerful within within myself. I was 25 at the time and I was like this is me going to the next chapter of my life
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trying to become a better person.
>> Yeah. I literally call it my drug of choice. And the reason why I say drug of choice is because nothing makes me feel better for longer. Yeah. And there's no there's no downside to it. crash.
>> Other than other than the apprehension right before you get but then that gives you that kind of
>> which you'll kind of learn as a side down the road, you know, doing that hard thing. Yeah.
>> What are the top three reasons why I prefer a vertical cold plunge versus a layown tub? Well, I've used both. When you're in a vertical position, your body naturally regulates your breathing better. So, if you're holding on to the sides and you're in a vertical position, you can just focus on your breath work and you can stay calm. A lot of people feel more calm when they're in a vertical position than when they're laying down in the water and think they might slip under the water. So, when you're vertical plunging, you're fully immersed faster. You can focus on recovery, inflammation reduction, and you're not struggling to just stay in a lie down position. Your body floats in an awkward way sometimes. So, it's just a more efficient, comfortable experience in my opinion. It takes up way less space, too. It has a smaller footprint,
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so you can put these on your patio, your garage, your bathroom, your locker room. You can really put it anywhere. I've got one on my balcony. I've got two in my bathroom. So, this is why Cold Life is my favorite cold plunge on the market. So, click the link below and you can order yours today. Make sure you get the Ultimate Human version.
>> Now, let's get back to the Ultimate Human podcast.
>> Yeah, that's great. So, how about you? What What was your first kind of
>> For me, you're you're into the cold plunging now. Yep. You got a little bit of background. You walk in, he's in he's in the dirty algae water.
>> That's a guy I want to be in business with. The dude in the [__] bucket full of algae.
>> Give him the honest.
>> Great choice, dude.
>> Well, you know what? It's you know this because you know now we've gotten to know each other for some years now and so we know this but in life everything is about relationships of course.
>> Um and so um when I met Sam uh we actually had a completely different uh business uh together. I had given him some money for um really just kind of an investment into some e-commerce stuff he was doing and it completely flopped and failed. And um through that process uh Sam really showed the kind of person he was um by not only making me whole and
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and making efforts to do that but the communication and showing and being transparent and showing all the effort. And so I like to judge a character when things are not good, not when things are great. It's very easy to hide things when
>> you guys have done proven that to me too.
>> Well, thank you. We appreciate that because it's easy to hide when things are good. U you know numbers help right know everyone's doing well and no one wants to really poke the bear but when things are tough everyone looks to go point fingers. Mh.
>> Um, and and that's not what Sam did, which I really respected. And I said, "Hey, I don't really, you know, I want to do something with you. Let's find a project together." Um, and so for me, I was I was I was starting this coal plunges out and it was just five of us and then so fast it turned into 20 and and then 30 and then 100 and I was like, there's so much more people who want to do this. There's so much more people who want to be a part of this. And so when I talked to Sam about it, I said, man, we should start something. Well, and it happened for a reason clearly because he was actually coming to my office to pick up a partial check to meet to me to get him closer to being home.
>> I didn't want him to come by that day. Just being honest with you. I was
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>> That's why the cold punch was dirty. It's like getting here, bro.
>> Yeah. Literally. Literally. I I I was dreading that day. To be honest with you, it was a rough like season of life I was in and the business flopped and he came by and we didn't talk about the check for 3 hours.
>> Um he was just like, we just talked about it in the corner of the office forever. He's like, "Dude, what do you like about it?" you know, what do you want to do about this? Like we just looked up on Google trends, like the search volume on Google of cold plunging was slowly increasing. And then um thanks to Kyle truthfully, he just was dedicated and every single day after that day, he showed me that
>> I got a real sense for that too when I met you guys cuz you know the the cold plunge space was by no means saturated, but I was actually just coming out of a very difficult uh cold punch experience. You know, with the my clinics, we invested heavily in this cold plunge company that was actually sourcing everything from China. Yeah. Um, and uh I don't have anything uh against China except everything that comes out of China. But um
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[Transcript continues...]
Duration: 53m 9s | From the Ultimate Human Podcast with Gary Brecka
