Whats the deal with Cold Showers?

I think they mean the full shower - the goal of which is to build endurance and stanima, such that, if you can voluntarily take on such discomfort, you'd be more willing to face other discomforts that would improve your life - like PMO withdrawal symptoms, or volunteering for the task no one likes to do at work (thus getting noticed by your boss, who rewards you with promotion or pay raise -- somewhat simplistic as stated - but that kind of thing). It opens you up to more of life's challenges, which turns around and gives you more in life. Of course, cold showers are not the only voluntary regime that one can come up with - but any voluntary discipline that can achieve the same - fasting, regular meditation, unpleasant chores around the house, giving up a time of play for an altruistic endeavor, etc. You don't actually have to do the cold showers.

 

There are two types of cold shower commonly practised: One, the traditional cold shower means to take the entire shower cold. The second is to take half of the shower hot and then switch to cold.

I personally do the latter, and then remain in the cold for a while even after I finish showering, because both hot and cold showers have benefits - hot showers improve blood flow/circulation by allowing all the blood vessels to dilate and blood to fill the extremities, then the sudden cold forces that blood back into the organs, giving an additional boost to your circulation as it rushes through the veins to the heart etc, as well as providing all the usual benefits of cold showers. It's the best of both worlds, plus, for me personally at least, it's easier to get into a cold shower than to go from nice and hot and lovely to freezing my ass off, so I personally find the combination shower to give me a bigger willpower boost.

Your mileage may vary though, try both, see what works!

Also, if you find it unbearable at first (like I did, I've always been super sensitive to both too high and too low temperatures) - just start with a short period in the cold, and then increase it each shower. At first for me I really only could blast myself with cold and then turn it off, it was pretty embarrassing - but now I can stay in it and I just feel lukewarm pretty quickly and it's not even a challenge.