The Art of Jacuzzi Beerstorming

Dipping in hot water has been an enjoyable activity for humans over centuries. No wonder jacuzzies have become such a popular backyard feature. Tons of research show how hot water therapy can positively affect you physically, mentally, and spiritually. There’s even more to it. Financially. Read on!

Regular hot tubbing can sustainably improve your life. It can help you become better at generating creative ideas, focusing your thoughts, getting clarity about your goals, and building your network while doing this together with likeminded people. It can make you happier and richer.

Jacuzzi Beerstorming

My grandfather used to say: There’s nothing better than something good together with something good. Jacuzzi Beerstorming is just like that. It’s one of my favorite habits. It combines even THREE of my favorite ways to spend time: Bouncing ideas with friends, sipping a cool beer and dipping the jacuzzi.

The basic concept is to bring people together into a situation where they are forced to disconnect, relax, rest their minds and can focus on bonding. The warm water and bubbles are helping with the relaxation part. Good beer enables to open up minds, unblocks certain boundaries and lets unlimited creativity flow.

Jacuzzi Beerstorming [ʤəˈkuːzi bɪəˈstɔːmɪŋ]: The activity of brainstorming with likeminded individuals while sipping beer in a jacuzzi.

Financial Imagineer

Disclaimer: Stay hydrated and do not drink too much alcohol while hot tubbing

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In our Singapore condo “The Waterina” we have established an awesome group called “The Jacuzzi Mates”. When in Singapore, we usually meet several times a week in the early evening hours to relax and exchange ideas together. After a few “Jacuzzi Mates” sessions we were surprised by the usually very positive thinking and creative idea sharing without any boundaries.

Following these sessions, careers have changed. Businesses have started and investments in real estate and others have been made. In retrospect, “Jacuzzi Beerstorming” sessions where the incubator for many things.

Giving Birth to Ideas

The essence of Jacuzzi Beerstorming is to create the right atmosphere combining the informal (bathsuits, super relaxing activity) with being away from anything that smells like work or unnecessary distractions (meetings rooms, offices, Starbucks) and simply add good beer to it! While it works best with groups, introverts please feel free to “fly solo” to keep your mind on creative mode. Jacuzzi Beerstorming is very comparable with meditating. It usually gives me the best ideas.

Try to think back in your life: Think about that one time when your most brilliant insight struck you. Chances are you weren’t actually focused on anything. Right? Fact is: The best ideas usually come unexpected and especially when we allow space for them.

Your mind will answer most questions if you learn to relax and wait for the answer.

William S. Burroughs

After having studied the brains’ default modes, the author of the book Hyperfocus: How to Manage Your Attention in a World of Distraction coined the term “scatterfocus” to describe the act of purposefully letting the mind wander. If you’re like most ambitious people out there, there’s a high chance you resemble more a time-management and productivity expert and simply can’t accept the concept of “actively doing nothing”. You might have trouble getting into “scatterfocused” stage.

The actual key is to build (or to schedule if that’s what it takes) sufficient idle moments into your life – while accepting that idleness and getting stuff done aren’t in opposition! Idleness IS getting stuff done as an idle mind is not necessarily a lazy mind.  

Imagination Requires An Idle Mind

“Idle” and “lazy” are two very different concepts, with very little overlap. “Think of it this way — a fisherman is often idle while still at work,” says Celeste Headlee, author of the new book Do Nothing: How to Break Away from Overworking, Overdoing, and Underliving. “The same is true for a toll booth operator or security guard. Idleness means inactivity, while laziness means reluctance to work.

Can a person be idle because they’re lazy? Of course! But a person can be working while idle and active while not working.”

Imagination requires space and time to stew and simmer, to explore and to emerge; imagination dies in the crucible of intense competition (of ideas). It is ironic that humanity created tuition classes for imagination driven by a spirit of competitiveness in schools.

Jacuzzi Beerstorming is the habit that works best for me – and eventually might also work for you. It’s my secret sauce to “Imagineering” my life. It’s just about enough activity to stimulate my brain while my ideas do not have to compete with distraction or conflicting thoughts. With the right friends around plus beer, neurons will be firing on all cylinders and new, creative, and motivating ideas will be born!

If you’d like to work on designing a new life-plan together with your loved one, please read my guest-post on Get Rich Slowly about “How couples can create a shared plan for the future”.

“People often say that motivation doesn’t last. Well, neither does bathing, that’s why we recommend it daily.”

Zig Ziglar

How Billionaires Use Hot Tubs

As Tim Ferriss shared in his excellent book Tools of Titans, Chris Sacca, a Silicon-Valley early-stage investor in dozens of companies such as Twitter, Uber, Instagram, Kickstarter or Twilio, took a very out-of-the-box approach to get started focusing more on his business back in 2007. He started by buying a cabin in rural Truckee, Tahoe’s less-expensive neighbour. That’s where he moved to, away from the Valley, with a super convincing rationale:

“I wanted to go on offense. I wanted to have the time to focus, to learn the things I wanted to learn, to build what I wanted to build, and to really invest in relationships that I wanted to grow, rather than just doing a day of coffee after coffee after coffee.”

Now he had the perfect excuse to escape the Valley’s “busy-ness”, he no longer attended meetings he didn’t want to, no day-in-day-out coffee dates or late night socializing. Chris turned his life around and started to invite founders and people he liked to get closer to for a day or two to his cabin.

And guess what, the cabin sports a hot tub!

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Despite all his fanciful and successful investments, Chris considers the cabin the best investment he’s ever made. “Everyone loves coming to the mountains. Over the years, that’s helped me build lasting friendships. Some of those have been the catalysts for my investments in Uber, Twitter and others.”

Over the years, Sacca has perfected his “due diligence” in order to avoid bad deals. Besides hot tubbing, he observes the new entrepreneurs at his cabin to see how they act over a series of home-cooked meals, hikes and ski trips. While the Andreessens and Thiels are taking their chances in a boardroom, Sacca wants to see what money-hungry nerds will do out in the nowhere. This way he will gain insight on how well they are prepared to navigate the crazy world of the tech biz.

If you really want to get cash from Chris Sacca, then you better get yourself ready for an epic “tub session”. Travis Kalanick, chief executive officer of Uber, impressed Sacca through his hot tub resilience: “Travis can spend eight to 10 hours in a hot tub,” Sacca said. “I’ve never seen a human with that kind of staying power in a hot tub.” – Chris Sacca invested in Uber!

How long can you stay in a hot tub?

Sir Richard Branson

Sir Richard Branson, another Billionaire, has refined “bonding events” with entrepreneur even more. You can actually “buy time” with him directly here. If you attend the event, you “might” get to meet him on his own island, Necker Island, located in the British Virgin Islands.

There are great success stories about people bonding with Sir Branson either in a hot tub or around his bonfire on Necker Island. Branson particularly believes in taking relaxing bubble baths for brainstorming purposes.

Become A Jacuzzi Brillionaire

To enjoy a hot relaxing bubble bath, you don’t have to be a billionaire. Depending where you live, you may have natural hot-springs around or can find facilitated hot tubs in public pools. You can also find them in hotels, gyms (wellness section, Spa area) or your friends and neighbors might own one.

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Only in 2020 did I realize owning a hot-tub is significantly cheaper than I previously thought. As this year we can’t travel as freely as in earlier years, we have redirected parts of our travel budget and bought an inflatable Intex SPA hot tub for our garden. It reminds me a lot of our condo jacuzzi in Singapore where many friendships were made, and ideas were born. Similar products are available on Amazon.

Hot Spring Culture Around the World

Did you know that across the world dipping hot water is widely enjoyed, cultivated, and respected?

Most often bathing in hot water is done for health benefits: The heat widens blood vessels, which sends nutrient-rich blood throughout your body. Warm water also brings down swelling and loosens tight muscles. And the water’s buoyancy takes weight off painful joints. A dip in the hot tub might also help your mental state, lets you relax and sleep better!

If you happen to travel, please do take your time to enjoy the local bathing culture in different locations. We have dipped hot-waters in Taiwan (“Wenquan”: Yangminshan, Beitou, Wulai, Taroko Gorge hot springs), Japan (“Onsen”), New Zealand (Hanmer Springs) and Iceland (Blue Lagoon!). Each place has a different feeling and background story.

Thanks for reading this far. Chances are, you might be someone enjoying hot water and/ or beer a fair bit! What was your best experience dipping a hot spring, jacuzzi, onsen, wenquan or hammam??? Do you also like to sip a good beer along? I’m sure we’d all be more than curious to find out. Not just location wise, but also if you’ve had some great ideas, met interesting people or something else happened while dipping!

Happy Jacuzzi Beerstorming to You!

Cheers, Matt

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