Have you Experienced Challenging Floats? – DSP 197

Graham and Ashkahn share stories about their most challenging floats. Everything from extreme physical discomfort to literally staying in too long.

They also share stories of floats from friends and customers that they’ve accumulated over the years and discuss the value of experiencing these difficult moments in the tank and how you might approach them when one occurs at your center.

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Transcription of this episode… (in case you prefer reading)

Graham: Question. “What’s the most difficult float you’ve ever had, whether emotionally, physically or other?”, which I guess, spiritually?

Ashkahn: Okay.

Graham: Socially? You had a weird community float, you know?

Ashkahn: All right. You want to go first?

Graham: Yeah. I’ll just wing most difficult float ever. Let’s talk about a difficult float.

Ashkahn: I know my most difficult float.

Graham: Oh, well then you go first. Go for it. Yeah.

Ashkahn: Mine was actually, I was just really hungover. I mean, that’s the crux of the story; I was super hungover but I had a float booked the next morning. And I was like, “Yeah, I’ll go in for this float.” And it was really hot; just the temperature was, I think, too warm and I was hungover, and it just made me real uncomfortable.

I started to feel nauseous and I was sweating. I’ve never not wanted to be in a float tank so much as that. And I still stuck it through. I was like, “No, you’ve gotta float.” I don’t know why I didn’t just get out. But I did, I floated the entire time and it was miserable for the entirety of it because I just felt horrible, so that wasn’t fun. That was my worst float.

Graham: Yeah. I’ve had floats where parts of them are really, the most uncomfortable time that I’ve spent in a float tank, but there were other parts of the float that were okay, so it’s interesting. I don’t think I’ve had a float that’s just been awful the entire way through.

So one example is, and this is the beginning of the float being bad was, I just exercised that morning and done some stretching and then I went on a jog. And I literally jogged up to the door of Float On after going for a couple miles, and went in and showered off and got all ready and hopped in the float tank.

Normally I like the float tank a little cooler, so I have a note on my account; the staff turns down the temperature on the float tank for me when I go in, which they’d done that day, but I was already so hot from exercising. And going in there, I left the door to the float tank fully open just to try and get some cool air coming in there. And even with that I was just overheating and actually had to get out and take a cold shower and sit on the bench for 10 minutes or something, just to cool down my system so it was comfortable enough for me to get back in the float.

But hopping directly into a tank right after heavy exercise, for me, was one of the most unpleasant experiences where I just couldn’t stay inside a tank.

Ashkahn: Yeah.

Graham: And I got another one too.

Ashkahn: All right.

Graham: The other half of the float, so that was a bad intro. But then afterwards, it was actually really nice being in the float tank. I think if I were to have exercised and then waited a half an hour, I’d still have a nice experience.

On the flip side, when I was trying to do my 24-hour float, I only ended up making it for 12 hours. And the reason is, for the last hour, when I’d been in there, my scalp just started tingling. And then the tingling turned to a slight itching, and the itching turned to a burning. And it turns out when you’ve been in the float tank by yourself for 11 hours and then your scalp starts burning, it’s really hard to think of anything except that there’s too much hydrogen peroxide in there and you’re just burning off your hair and you’re going to permanently damage your scalp, and your thoughts are all weird and floating.

And eventually I was just like, “Okay, I gotta get out of here. I gotta get out of here.” And I checked the mirror to make sure I hadn’t dissolved all the hair on my body, which I hadn’t. But yeah, that’s what ended up cutting my 24-hour float down to a 12-hour float, was just things started getting so-

Ashkahn: Just worrying that your head was melting off?

Graham: Yeah.

Ashkahn: Totally normal into a float, I think.

Graham: So I think those were the two most uncomfortable experiences I personally had in a float tank, and both of them where I actually had to get out because it was so unpleasant.

Ashkahn: Yeah. I mean, I drank a bunch of coffee before going in once. That wasn’t very-

Graham: Fast floats.

Ashkahn: Yeah. I was not really enjoying. I was all over the place and I was having a lot of trouble relaxing or anything like that. And I stuck in for that entire one too. I don’t know why. I should just get out at a certain point if it feels like it’s not happening.

Graham: But I actually like this question because it’s a reminder that you can have customers coming in and they can have bad floats like this.

Ashkahn: Yeah.

Graham: I mean, these weren’t our first floats or anything like that, so even after hundreds of floats, you can still have a bad float. So on your first time, I think it’s even more likely that something like this goes wrong, or you didn’t prepare properly.

For me, I end up getting hot in the float tank, so I need the temperature turned down. Other people might not feel that, so it might just be even your first float, you don’t even know how your body interacts with the float tank.

Ashkahn: And when you’re not experienced like us and you know how the whole thing works, if it’s your first time, you don’t know what it’s supposed to feel like. You don’t know if you’re feeling too hot that it can be cooler and that would be a more pleasant experience for you. You’re just like, “This is what floating is.”

Graham: Yeah, or if you forgot to not drink caffeine and no one at the front desk says, “Did you drink caffeine?” Specifically coming in, you might not even associate a bad float or one where you can’t relax with that cup of coffee you had three hours ago or something.

So I mean, how do we take this into the real world then, knowing that, Ashkahn?

Ashkahn: Well, I mean, obviously this is why we warn people about things before they come in, right?

Graham: Yeah.

Ashkahn: We warn them to not drink coffee, we warn them to not shave or wax so it doesn’t feel like their head is melting off.

Graham: Not get a full-face tattoo.

Ashkahn: Yeah. That’s to prevent things like that from happening. And temperatures is frustrating. It’s one of those things that is the most common complaints you get, are things were a little big warmer or a little bit cold. And so letting people I know beforehand. I mean, you could let people know going into the float tank that if they feel a little warm or cold, to let you know and you can adjust the temperature, or reminding people afterwards is what we do a lot. After their first float, if they say something like that, we’re like, “Oh, we can adjust the temperature for you.”

Graham: Yeah, it’s a weird one, because a good amount do get hot or cold, but also a lot of stuff is in our heads just as human beings.

Ashkahn: Right. Just we run on different temperatures and whatever.

Graham: Yeah. We don’t really check in with people beforehand about being able to correct the temperature afterwards, nor do we check in about a lot of things other than avoiding caffeine and stuff like that, just because priming people feels weird. You’re almost priming them to pay more attention to the temperature if you’re like, “Hey, some people feel a little hot or a little cold. Let us know.” I feel like they’re actually paying more attention and might be more likely to just feel something’s off even if it otherwise would be comfortable.

Ashkahn: Right.

Graham: So I don’t know. Again, that’s not like it’s the right decision. It’s one of those where we’re like, “Oh, I don’t know what to do here,” so we decided on that.

Ashkahn: Yeah. I mean, I think a lot of what we do is just making sure people know every float can be different in that light.

Graham: Yeah. Yeah.

Ashkahn: You come in and it’s hard to tell exactly what’s going to happen in there or what it’s going to feel like or where you’re going to be, physically or emotionally or any of that stuff. And that’s just part of the float experience. And I think, for the most part, people get that.

Graham: Yeah. Yeah. And I think it’s a great reminder to just really make sure you have great systems for checking in with people afterwards in place as well.

Ashkahn: That’s where we get most of our complaints about temperature. Sometimes people don’t even tell us, but it’s because we have some sort of post-float check in system where they’ll actually be like, “Well, actually, everything was great but I was really cold during the second half of it.” Then we can be like, “Oh, well we can turn the temperature up for you next time you come in.” And they’re like, “Oh, great.”

Graham: Yeah. Yeah. And we double down too. We try to catch people when they come out of their floats in the shop. We actually have our staff members do email-behinds or call-behinds to people who have already come in to ask them how their experience went. There’s an auto email that gets sent out 90 days later. We avidly check all of our online review sites to see what people are saying and hopefully get in touch with them.

So multi-prong approach too. Anything that we can do, up to three months out, or even longer, to actually get that feedback someone might not have given any time sooner, is sometimes the only way you’ll find out about weird experiences that people have. And they’re likely.

Again, if you’re listening to this, you’ve probably had weird floats and it’s probably really fortunate that that wasn’t your first, second and third float were all weird because you might not be listening to this podcast and so excited to start a float center if that had been the case.

Compassion, I guess, is what I’m getting at. Just a good lesson in compassion.

Ashkahn: I don’t know about that.

Graham: I don’t see where you’re coming from at all.

Ashkahn: What about emotionally? I don’t think I’ve ever had an emotionally difficult float; negative, I should say. I’ve had floats where I have these moments of thinking through things that I don’t think I would have thought of outside the float tank, and they’re important thoughts to me or difficult things to come to terms with, but I’ve never had one that I felt was a negative experience.

Graham: Yeah, me either. I’ve definitely had floats where I’m just crying inside the float tank and dealing with some serious stuff.

Ashkahn: Salt getting in your eyes.

Graham: Emotionally, not physically, is what we’re talking about now.

Ashkahn: Oh, I see.

Graham: So metaphorical salt getting in my metaphorical eyes.

Ashkahn: Coming out of your eyes.

Graham: Yeah. Coming out of my eyes. Yeah, it’s the other direction, yeah.

But even that’s not a negative experience necessarily, nor did that make me get out of the tank or anything like that.

Ashkahn: Yeah. We did have someone. Remember that person who was telling us about their dark floats?

Graham: Yeah.

Ashkahn: Do you remember that? Someone who had floated, had a great experience, to the point where her friends and family were like, “What’s going on? What are you doing? You just seem like a different person.” And the floating was what she was attributing to totally just changing the way she was approaching her life.

And she, after a handful of floats, had one that she just said she came out of and had a weird experience inside, went to some weird places in her head, and came out of the float in a really weird place and it just carried with her. She called it her “dark float”.

And then her friends and family, again, afterwards were like, “What’s going on today? What’s wrong with you?” So I don’t know. I guess that there are some dark floats out there.

Graham: Yeah. I mean, yeah. The float tank is just a body of salt water.

Ashkahn: And it’s dark.

Graham: The human brain is vast and complex and can get pretty dark. So the experience in the tank, of course, is only as vast as the human being having them.

Ashkahn: I think most people have the response that we have though. If you’re going to those places or thinking those things, it’s because you need to or it’s something you need to work through, and you ultimately find that to be a useful or productive experience.

Graham: Yeah. Yeah. And I mean, I can think of people who haven’t been able to stay in the tank. I mean, just today someone stopped by to float on their way to their wedding.

Ashkahn: Right.

Graham: And we gave them a free float but they couldn’t stay in the float tank for the entire time.

Ashkahn: They’re just super antsy.

Graham: Yeah. Our manager said they were just too worked up, which was completely understandable. But I’d describe that as an emotional enough float that you can’t stay in. You’re just too excited for the fact that you’re getting married that day. Yeah.

All right.

Ashkahn: Yeah.

Graham: So there you go. Got a little bonus answer there too. What’s the takeaways from you having challenging floats?

Ashkahn: Right. Well if you guys have other questions, you can go over to floattanksolutions.com/podcast.

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