What Doesn't Kill Us

by Scott Carney

Brown fat is different. Most people create it automatically when they’re in cold environments by way of a process called beiging. Essentially, the body detects physical extremes and starts to store mitochondria. When brown fat starts to work, the mitochondria suck white fat through the bloodstream and metabolize it directly to generate heat. Because most people do everything they can to avoid environmental extremes, they never build up brown fat at all. If we lived without clothing the way our distant ancestors must have, then we would have to rely on the internal properties of brown fat to keep us alive during the winter months and cold nights. As we sit in the sauna, I ask Hof how someone activates brown fat consciously. Instead of explaining, he launches into a demonstration. He clenches the muscles in his body in sequence, from his toes to his rectum then from there up to his shoulders, as if pushing something up from below. Then he furrows his brow and squinches down his neck as though he is trapping that energy in a point right behind his ear. The process turns his skin bright red, as if he is catching fire. Suddenly he kicks out his leg and falls against the wall gasping. “Oh my God,” he says, dazed. In his eagerness to teach, he didn’t factor in the heat of the sauna and almost blew a fuse. He lurches out of the sauna and rolls in the snow outside. The few of us pupils exchange concerned glances, but in about 15 minutes he returns with an embarrassed smirk. “That’s...