Remove everything, and drop
Nadeem Jiwani runs Float Valley in Markham, Ontario — and has for over seven years. The idea is beautifully simple: take away every external input and see what the body does on its own. In a float tank there is no light, no sound, no feeling. With nothing to react to, the nervous system drops, by itself, into a very deep state of relaxation — a meditation you don’t have to work for.
It’s biochemistry as much as psychology. You float in a dense solution of Epsom salt — which is magnesium, and magnesium is best absorbed not orally but through the skin. So while the mind quiets, the body takes up one of the minerals modern life most often lacks. This is exactly the kind of low-risk, high-return intervention that belongs in Biohacking Upgrades.
Nadeem is candid that this is also a tool for going deep. With no stimuli to hold onto, attention turns inward fast — he describes hours-long floats, and how the tank can amplify inner work. For people who struggle to reach a meditative state quickly, he pairs it with gentle cues like a soft strobe (eyes closed) to guide the brain there faster.
What he keeps coming back to is rest as medicine. In a culture that treats stillness as time wasted, an hour with nothing — no phone, no light, no gravity — can be one of the most restorative and, over time, longevity-protective things you do. “That’s why,” he says simply, “it’s a great tool for longevity.”
