Why We Return to the Heat: The Benefits of Sauna Bathing & Sweating
A reflection on the physical, emotional, and spiritual benefits of sauna and thermal therapy
A few times in my life, I’ve found myself sitting in silence, in a small wooden room filled with steam, and at complete and utter peace. There is something strange about the process, sitting there in complete silence, while profusely sweating out any of the hardships or stresses of everyday life.
This practice of sauna bathing, long a staple of different cultures in places such as Finland or Estonia, has in recent years grown immensely throughout the world. The modern resurgence of sauna culture has made this simple and ancient tradition more accessible, allowing individuals from all over to experience the power and benefits of thermal therapies.
Last week, we spoke about the deep cultural roots of these saunas in places such as Finland and why they’ve been an important part of our human connection to water.
This week, we are going to take a closer look at why people have turned to heat for healing and why it continues to hold such a powerful place in both ancient rituals and modern wellness spaces around the world.
Because once you experience it, you start to understand: there’s more happening inside a sauna than just sweat and heating.
The Rise of Saunas Worldwide
In last week’s post, we noted that there are an estimated 5.8 million saunas for 3.2 million people in Finland, equivalent to nearly 2 saunas per person. The Nordic nation has by far the most saunas in the world, and has become known as the centerpiece for the practice of sauna bathing.
But around the world, the use of saunas is growing.
According to Harvia, a Finnish sauna interiors manufacturer, there are currently an estimated 18 million saunas around the world. In places such as the United States, these saunas are popping up all over the place, from mobile saunas to entire complexes built around the process of heat therapy.
The market for sauna bathing practices is growing, too. According to VitalityPro, the sauna market is estimated to be worth $181.06 billion by 2028. In 2024, the sauna market generated $250.8 million in revenue in the United States alone.
Saunas have become a centerpiece for a lot of these forms of wellness, and have often been paired with other water-based therapies such as cold plunging, swimming, and cryotherapy. A lot of this growth is attributed to the rise in the wellness industry, especially in places such as the United States.
It’s also a product of the growing understanding of the power of thermal therapies (hot and cold) and the positive benefits they have on our bodies and minds.
The Power of Good Ole-Fashioned Sweat
I never thought I’d say this, but let’s talk about sweat.
Sweat, otherwise known as perspiration, is the salty substance that our glands emit through our skin to keep our body temperature at a healthy and safe level. The process is critical to our ability to keep us from overheating, allowing us to spend time in high heat conditions or to exercise.
This ability to sweat means we can regulate our body’s temperature, because the sweat absorbs the heat from our bodies. This happens when sweat reaches our skin, evaporating and cooling our skin and the tissues underneath.
Our ability as humans to sweat can be seen as a sort of superpower.
In her book, The Joy of Sweat, Sarah Everts writes, “sweating allowed us to forage out in the sun without overheating, while our predators were relegated to the shade for survival."
Sweat is made of more than water, too. As many athletes know, when our eccrine glands emit sweat, they also emit electrolytes, small amounts of sodium, potassium, calcium, and magnesium, which are designed to trigger responses in our body. The release of these chemicals is the reason why electrolytes play such an important role in the rehydration process.
The thing about sweating, though, is that it can be good for other reasons than just thermoregulation, too.
One of the most commonly held beliefs is that sweat can act to detoxify the body.
Although sweating cannot quite help us detoxify those five margaritas from the night before (that’s up to the liver and kidneys), it has been shown to release heavy metals and other toxins in the body, such as arsenic, lead, mercury, and BPA, a chemical found in many plastics
There is also evidence to suggest that sweating improves skin health because it opens up the pores in our skin. The opening of these pores allows our body to get rid of any built-up dirt, oils, bacteria, and other remnants left in the skin.
In a sauna, sweat isn’t a side effect; it’s the goal.
We step into the heat to gently push our bodies into that state where we can experience the positive effects of the release. So yes, sweat is salty and sticky and sometimes inconvenient, but it can also be sacred. Much like the Fremen of Frank Herbert’s Dune, maybe we should be celebrating every drop of our bodies' water.
Interestingly, though, as much as sweating is the goal, the real magic of the sauna isn’t the sweat itself, it’s what causes it, the heat.
It’s Really About Bringing the Heat
Although sweating is beneficial as a thermoregulation mechanism and has positive side effects on the body, the real catalyst of positive health is heat.
Heat benefits the body in several ways and is becoming increasingly understood as a mechanism of wellness and health. The main ways heat can help the body are through the increase in blood flow and circulation.
The most anecdotally shared way this happens is when your body heats up and your blood flow increases, your body tends to feel relaxed, leading to positive feelings of happiness or contentment.
Beyond pleasure and relaxation, emerging evidence suggests that sauna bathing can lead to a reduction in the risk of vascular diseases such as high blood pressure, cardiovascular disease (CVD), stroke, and neurocognitive diseases. It can also benefit nonvascular conditions such as pulmonary diseases, including the common flu, specific skin conditions, and, according to some studies, chronic pain.
One long-term Finnish study tracked over 2,300 men for more than two decades to assess the effects of sauna bathing on overall health.
The results? Those who used saunas 4 to 7 times per week had significantly lower mortality rates and lived longer than those who used them less frequently.
But it’s not just the body that benefits; researchers are increasingly paying attention to the mind, too.
As Journalist Max Levy explains in an article for Wired, researchers have noted that patients with depression have been seen to have higher body temperatures. They have since realized that when depressive symptoms seem to improve, the temperatures in the body begin to level out and regularize.
This has led some researchers to wonder whether using these high-temperature therapies can induce a form of temperature regulation that can help individuals with depressive symptoms.
Some recent research suggests it can. Participants in high-heat therapy sessions have shown reduced symptoms of depression and anxiety, and increased feelings of calm and overall wellbeing. There has even been research to suggest sauna bathing can lower the chances of diseases such as Alzheimer’s and Dementia,
In short, saunas are becoming increasingly known as potential practices that can offer both physiological and psychological relief.
Now, while not every study has a definitive answer and there is still much more research needed, the anecdotal evidence of saunas appears overwhelmingly clear: people feel better after spending time in the sauna. They feel less stressed and more present. In a world that often feels overwhelming and taxing, that sense of clarity and stillness is worth paying attention to.
The Ways of the Water
In many ways, the practice of sauna bathing is a reflection of our evolutionary relationship with the natural world, a sort of quiet acknowledgment of the rhythms that shaped us.
For most of human history, our bodies have responded to heat, stress, and danger by initiating the same ancient sequence of events: we warm up, our bodies sweat, we cool down, and then we rest. This cycle, which is present in the natural world, is replicated almost perfectly in the ritual of the sauna. In many ways, it’s not an invention of modern wellness, but a return to something deeply human.
And then there’s the sweat itself, a strange and beautiful reminder of our own connection to water.
To sit in stillness and feel your body release water, drop by drop, is to become aware of just how reliant we are on the substance for hydration, balance, healing, and survival.
It helps bring the presence of water to the forefront of the mind, highlighting how important it is for our use and our existence. It’s a good ritual reminder to build a reverence for water and its critical role on our planet.
Now, maybe we’re not quite at the level where we need to start capturing our sweat like the Fremen of Frank Herbert’s Dune, but there is something to learn from these musings of science fiction.
Because when you think about it, our relationship with water is miraculous. It’s an ancient, intimate, and molecular thread that’s formed a connection with a substance that is critical to the existence of life (like ours at least) in our universe.
Maybe that’s a lot to say about a few beads of sweat in a wooden room. Or maybe it's magic that is worthy of ritual and acknowledgment. Either way, as it turns out, saunas and the release of water are pretty good things for our minds and bodies.
Story of the Week: A New Way to Get Water
This week’s story of the week highlights recent research out of MIT that has developed an innovative device resembling black bubble wrap that can extract drinking water from desert air without external power.
The passive water harvester was recently tested in California's Death Valley, and the device successfully collected over 50 milliliters of potable water per day, demonstrating its potential in arid and drought-prone environments.
With over 4.5 billion people lacking consistent access to safe drinking water, this technology presents a promising avenue for addressing global water scarcity. It’s also incredible to see how researchers are finding ways to adapt to the world, creating devices like this that could provide decentralized, sustainable water sources for communities all over the world in need.
You can read the full ScienceAlert story here.
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With Love,
Keegan
Lovely!