The Benefits of Enhanced Rest: Introduction to Floatation Therapy
The idea of floating weightlessly in a silk like environment without feeling, hearing, seeing, tasting or smelling anything may sound scary to some while adventurous to others, but the fact is that there are many who use it daily for anywhere between an hour to two hours as a therapeutic inner healing process.
Floatation therapy has been around for a long time, however off lately it has become a rather trendy health activity that individuals find very rewarding both mentally and physically. Floatation therapy involves suspending an individual in a solution of salt water that is set at body temperature to produce the sensation of weightlessness.
The salt water solution is basically a replication of the content of the dead sea (the salinity of the water in the dead sea is so high that people don’t have to try very hard to stay afloat), for every 1000 litres of water, 525 kg of Epsom salt is added this solution is prepared in a tank that heats the water to exactly 35.5 degrees Celsius which is the average human’s skin temperature to enhance the feeling of being in ‘emptiness’, to add to this these tanks are placed in silent dark environments which basically creates the absence of external stimuli, hence the term sensory deprivation tanks or isolation tanks.
How this works as a therapeutic treatment is that, when the human brain is blocked off from external stimuli it becomes free to focus on other things and although your mind would still be thinking about bills, work or even the leaking roof, the brain has ample resources due to the absence of the 5 general external stimuli (sight, sound, smell, taste and touch) which allows the mind to go into a state of deep relaxation that most people find very hard to achieve.
This state allows the body to mend itself not only mentally, but also physically and the effects linger long after the person exits these tanks. The fact that 90 % of the brain is constantly attached to external stimuli is the reason that these devices seem to work so well on everybody as when a person gets into a floatation tank, he or she frees up this 90 % and allows it to be channelled elsewhere as the brain sees fit.
Muscles are also completely relaxed due to the absence of gravity making it an ideal recovery device for those who have muscle injuries especially athletes who happen to be the most frequent users of these sensory deprivation tanks. Scientific evidence has revealed that an enormous amount of brain power is used by humans and animals alike to deal with the effects of gravity and once the body is ‘freed’ of all these elements, it enters a state of deep profound respite which rejuvenates the entire system.
To put it simply, floatation tank therapy is basically about allowing the brain to go on vacation for an hour or two and come back invigorated and ready to take on the world around you and inside you with full strength!
