For the Love of the Heat: The History, Science and Social Impact of Sauna

How this revered Finnish health practice improves our well-being and enables us to connect more deeply (and helped me kick seasonal depression)

A little post-sauna stretch at Soma Institute, the day I finished writing Psyched, August 2021.

It’s the beginning of October, and in Vancouver, the cool air has rolled in, bringing with it the dark clouds and heavy moisture that feed our lush temperate rainforests—and unfortunately, many people’s seasonal depression. Historically, I’d have included myself in this group of people, but this is the first autumn in years I don’t feel a sense of dread about the impending winter. Like… not an ounce of it. In fact, part of me is looking forward to the cold weather that awaits. It’s downright weird. 

I’m not sure if it’s entirely to blame for my chipper attitude, because I know seasonal depression is not just about what the sky looks like, but over the last year, I’ve developed a habit that I’m almost certain has made an impact on my aversion to winter. I’ve finally found a reliable way to satisfy my absolute love—nay, lust—for hot temperatures that doesn’t involve expensive airline tickets or beachfront getaways: regular sessions in the sauna.

On Taking a Hot Finnish Lover

I’ve always had a thing for uncomfortably warm weather (the stickier, the better) so it’s natural that eventually I’d take this hot Finnish practice as a lover. My affair with the sauna began in August 2021 while writing Psyched. I had rented a small cabin in the woods on a rustic property near Princeton, BC, complete with an old-fashioned wood-fired hot tub and sauna. I’d chosen the spot strategically: more than three hours from the city and a full thirty minutes by car from the nearest grocery store, I knew it was a place where I would be able to focus. 

Using the tub and sauna became an evening ritual. Every day at lunchtime, I’d light a fire to heat up the hot tub (unless my generous hosts had already taken care of it for me). After a few more hours of writing, I’d save my work, close my laptop, roll a joint, and head around the cabin to make another fire; this time in the sauna. With steady plumes of smoke pouring out of each respective chimney, I’d take a short walk around the forested property before hanging up my towel, slinking into the warm tub of water, and enjoying a little soak-and-toke. Some days, I’d cycle back and forth between the tub and the sauna, and other days, I preferred the sauna to the tub, ending with an ice-cold outdoor shower. One rule, though, was unbreakable: I was always in the nude. 

After a day of sitting at my computer, stripping down and sitting in the hot tub until my fingers pruned felt like a woodsy luxury (especially in the rain)—but the sauna was a bit more work. Where a lengthy soak in the tub might lull me to sleep, an extended session in the sauna made me feel alive, steadily sending my heart rate up until sweat poured out of my skin and fell onto the cedar floorboards beneath me. I came to relish the sauna for how present it forced me to be. In the sauna, I had no room to obsess over sentence structure, quotes, or citations. All the space in my brain became occupied by the strange sensation of feeling sweat from beads across my skin as the litres of water I’d spent all day so diligently drinking slowly left my body.

Returning home to my tiny, sauna-less apartment in the city after my stay in the woods, I found myself going through withdrawals almost instantaneously. My Google search for a space-friendly solution yielded few results: I didn’t want to spend $3,000 on an infrared sauna. Spas nearby with similar offerings charged close to $100 per visit, if not more. None of the gyms or facilities in my neighbourhood offered reasonably priced access to a sauna and the community centre that did had just shut down indefinitely. Then, a friend turned me on to the pop-up sauna: a portable tent made of silver nylon, sold alongside a steamer that plugs into the wall. (Available on Amazon, of course.) It wasn’t sexy, but it was small, cheap, and would afford me the opportunity to sauna at will, in my own home. I was sold. For about $300, I had a solution—albeit one that looked like a tent someone might grow a few cannabis plants in. Compared to my Finnish lover, it felt a bit like a blow-up doll, but it satisfied my lust for heat for a full year and a half. (I used it so frequently, I recently had to replace it.)

After just a month of regularly exposing myself to uncomfortably hot temperatures, I knew I felt different: clearer, stronger, healthier. I slept better, I ran faster, and I was more in touch with my emotions. In the sauna, I could turn off the world, silence my mind, and step into my body without having to move a muscle. On particularly long writing days, sweating the day out in stillness gave me the reset I needed to sit down at my keyboard again the next morning with a sense of joy. Taking the practice home with me and integrating it into city life has certainly brought with it many physical benefits, but it’s the mental ones that keep me hooked. The more I reflect, the more I’m convinced it’s had an effect on my winter blues.

After a long day of writing, August 2021

A (Very Brief) History of Sauna

These days, we can attribute increased interest in saunas to prominent scientists and doctors like Andrew Huberman and Peter Attia, who have used their podcasts and social media platforms to extol the benefits of the practice. But there’s nothing new about it: using saunas for health and relaxation dates back thousands of years, with roots in Northern Europe. The word ‘sauna’ itself is of Finnish origin, however, similar traditions exist in other regions. Take the Russian banya, Estonian smoke sauna, and Native American sweat lodge as examples. While historians agree most people around the world have had their own forms of sweat bath, the Finnish sauna is most often emulated. 

In Finland, early saunas were simple pits or dugouts in the ground covered with wood or animal hide and heated with fire and warm rocks. Water was poured onto the stones to create steam and generate warmth, and fires were maintained with birchwood for its slow burn. It wasn’t until around the Middle Ages that saunas began to resemble the wooden structures we know them to be today.

Sauna: A Portal for Life and Death

Traditionally, saunas were built first, and while the rest of a home was being constructed, families would reside in the sauna. Women gave birth in saunas, and when people died, their bodies were prepared for burial in the heated rooms. Over the centuries the sauna has remained one of the most important structures in Finnish culture and was even inscribed on the UNESCO Intangible Cultural Heritage List in 2020, recognizing it as an important aspect of the nation’s way of life, and one worth protecting. 

Today, thanks to the development of the modern sauna stove, and to Finnish settlers who’ve taken their practice around the world, sauna culture is not isolated to Finland, although the Scandinavian nation is home to about one-third of all saunas worldwide. (It’s been said there are more saunas in Finland than cars.)

The Science Behind Sauna: The Benefits Are Real—and Major

Researchers have studied sauna extensively and the decades of science behind it are pretty conclusive: regular heat exposure through sauna is very, very good for your health. But there are variables: dry, or wet? Will a steam room do the same thing? What about an infrared sauna? 

The data (discussed in-depth by one of my favourite science daddies, Dr. Peter Attia, in this podcast) support a practice performed in a dry sauna of about 80 degrees Celsius, at a minimum of 20 minutes per session, four times per week. This kind of heat exposure can send one’s heart rate up to 150 beats per minute, mimicking the physiological and protective responses induced during cardiovascular exercise.

Improved Cardiovascular Health and Blood Pressure

The effects of sauna on the cardiovascular system have been some of the most studied. One study published in JAMA Internal Medicine in 2015 tracked 2,315 participants and found that after a 20-year follow-up, regular sauna bathing had reduced the risk of sudden cardiac death, fatal coronary heart disease, fatal cardiovascular disease, and overall mortality. 

Regular heat exposure through sauna can also improve blood pressure. A Finnish study published in 2017 found that regular sauna bathing was linked to a decreased risk of hypertension. 

Infrared Sauna May Also Offer Benefits for Pain, Fatigue

While most studies support longer, more intense heat exposure as described above, other, less intense options may still offer benefits. A review of studies published in 2018 found that both dry and infrared saunas may benefit people with rheumatic diseases such as fibromyalgia and rheumatoid arthritis, as well as patients with chronic fatigue and pain. 

It also found that sauna bathing may improve athletic performance, skin problems, and overall quality of life. 

Implications As We Age 

According to a study published in 2021 by Dr. Rhonda Patrick, a sauna practice could have special implications for the elderly population: it found that sauna use provides a means of preserving muscle mass, and can counter sarcopenia, the age-related loss of muscle mass and strength. 

Another review, also published in 2018 noted that sauna can reduce the risk of stroke and neurocognitive diseases such as dementia, as well as headache disorders and nonvascular conditions including pulmonary diseases such as the flu. It also states that there is evidence sauna exposure could boost the immune system, reducing susceptibility to colds, while also reducing oxidative stress and inflammation. 

The review concludes that sauna bathing “may be a remedy to the call for additional lifestyle interventions needed to enhance health and wellness, particularly in populations that have difficulty exercising, and also as an adjunct to exercise.” (This is another thing I love about sauna: it makes the benefits of exercise available to those who may not have the capacity for intense physical activity.)

Sauna May Improve Depression

There’s data to show that mental health can also be improved through regular sessions in the sauna. A study conducted in Japan in 2005 found that mildly depressed subjects who received 15-minute infrared sauna treatments five times a week for four weeks had improved appetite, decreased pain, and were more relaxed than those who did not. 

Another study published in JAMA Psychiatry in 2016 found that in subjects with major depression who were not taking medication, a single infrared sauna session led to an improvement in depression symptoms for up to six weeks.

What About Seasonal Depression?

While there isn’t much in the way of research papers investigating sauna for seasonal depression, I’m certainly not the first person on the internet to suggest the connection: from clinics and spas to infrared sauna manufacturers, it seems everyone in the sauna industry is using seasonal depression as a selling point. When we consider the well-documented benefits of a regular sauna practice, making this connection doesn’t feel like a stretch.

Of course, I’m not sure sauna and sauna alone is the recipe for success. In the second edition of the textbook Seasonal Affective Disorder: Practice and Research (2010), Sharon Grimaldi and Timo Partonen suggest that, in addition to “keep[ing] yourself warm during the day” by taking a hot bath or shower or visiting a sauna or spa, those prone to seasonal depression should do the following:

• spend more time outdoors

• increase exposure to sunlight

• spend more time with friends and family

• eat a healthy diet

• get regular physical activity

• maintain a regular sleep schedule

Sauna for Social Connection

In Finnish culture, the social aspects of sauna are just as valued as its health benefits. It’s common for friends and family of all age groups to spend an evening socializing around the sauna, taking regular breaks and perhaps enjoying a beer or two in between. Inviting a guest into your sauna is a sign of considerable respect.

It’s common in Finland to be nude in the sauna, with men and women often taking turns when there aren’t gendered facilities (public saunas will offer separate visiting hours for men and for women). Nudity is not frowned upon; rather, Finns believe the shared element of vulnerability makes it easier for visitors to let down their guard and connect more deeply. 

The Unexpected Role of Sauna in Politics and War

The sauna is so revered for its unique social environment that in Finland, every government building is required to have a sauna. According to an April 2023 article in Politico, "sauna has… played a role in its politics, proving a collaborative atmosphere for officials to bridge divides as they bargain in the buff.” In the story, Finland’s European Commissioner Jutta Urpilainen describes the sauna as “a holy place… that brings people together — to relax, to discuss… It’s also the place where people share their deepest thoughts.”

“When people are in there, they are equal,” says Jyrki Katainen, a former prime minister of Finland in the piece by Ana Fota. “You never raise your voice, never insult, never argue. It’s understandable that people would find a common tone in this kind of environment.”

“When people are in there, they are equal… You never raise your voice, never insult, never argue. It’s understandable that people would find a common tone in this kind of environment.”

Jyrki Katainen, Former Prime Minister of Finland

Saunas are also currently playing an important role on the front lines of the ongoing Russo-Ukrainian War, where Estonian filmmaker Ilmar Raag is crowdfunding mobile sauna units for Ukrainian soldiers. The units include built-in showers and washing units for military uniforms, “and are carefully camouflaged to keep them safe from Russian fire,” according to Katya Adler at the BBC. For soldiers who have had trouble maintaining good physical hygiene, the portable units have been both good for their health and their morale. 

My little pop-up sauna doesn’t quite offer the capacity for social connection, so I’ve started visiting a dry sauna at a newly opened community centre in a neighbouring city. Every Friday, my partner and I pay a whopping $7.50 each to spend an hour swapping back and forth between the sauna and cold water pool. (It may not be as luxurious as an adults-only spa, but for the price, I’ll put up with the smell of chlorine and screaming children interrupting my cold plunge.) Some evenings, it’s standing-room-only in the sauna, and other times, it’s so quiet, you could hear a pin drop. It’s not uncommon for us to run into folks from our jiu jitsu gym, and even when we don’t, the experience is never without a friendly nod or smile from a familiar face.

The honeymoon phase may be over, but I’m proud to say my relationship with this hot Finnish lover is still going strong. (I have a good feeling we’ll be growing old together, given the data.) I have a newfound appreciation for the seasonal shift I once detested, and while I absolutely would not say no to a beachfront vacation between the months of November and April, I’m grateful that my lust for the heat has helped me cultivate a love for the cold.