WHAT I LEARNED NAKED IN THE SNOW

You wouldn’t guess that being naked in the snow would teach a man about himself, about his male power and personal fortitude, but life’s lessons have a way of sneaking up on a guy. Going bare is a specialty for the boys here at allknight.com, showing off the gear, demonstrating the products, etc. And we’ve always understood the value and power that comes from having the confidence to strip bare. But until recently, we had never really considered how being naked—in our natural state—and being confronted with the elements could expand the mind. This is not a trapped in a blizzard story—thankfully, that’s not what happened. This is more of a shamanistic story, a personal adventure, boys’ day out in the woods, rite of passage kind of thing. It’s not about anything going wrong, rather it’s about something unexpected going right. And ultimately, It’s about finding inner strength in an unexpected setting while being butt-ass naked.

It was a few years ago, when we had an office in the snowy Pocono Mountains of Pennsylvania, that we discovered the innate power of the cold to test, expand, and unlock a man’s inner power. You could call it a team building exercise, the occasion that found the three of us: myself (Evander), C.J., and Chris, in the company of a practicing Shaman.

It was mid-December and we were about twenty minutes into a hike, in the dense woods of the Poconos; following a well-marked trail by memory where, on this vibrant day, a blanket of snow had covered the ground. We had just arrived at the top of a ragged bluff with a breathtaking view of the snow-coated hills below us, rolling down to a rushing creek. I can remember how the late afternoon sun made the world of green and brown and white appear dipped in gold; and how the rushing wind lifted sheets of powdery snow, like icy ghosts ready to chill you to the bone.

We were all taking in the amazing view when our shaman asked, “Do you always stay on the path?”

This had raised a few quizzical brows and a few jokes regarding not wanting to get lost and stuck in the woods until nightfall—stuck with the local bear population.

“The bear is our friend,” the shaman said, smiling. “The trees. That stream below us… all friends. Nature knows what we have forgotten.”

Curious now, I asked him, “What does nature know?”

“I will tell you, but first a few things about you.” Palms expanded to encompass all three of us, he said, “You boys like being naked. There is power in that. And truth. I have seen your website. I have had an eyeful during this visit and will certainly be leaving with the tools to improve myself sexually. The question is, will you let me give you the tools needed to find greater awareness?”

We stared back and forth not fully following his gist.

“Right now, all these clothes,” he said. “Why? Because of the cold?”

“To keep from freezing our asses off,” C.J. quipped.

Our shaman gave a knowing look to this and began unzipping his parka. “Not necessary,” he told us. “You boys like to strip, but will you take off your clothes right here… right now… in all this so-called cold?”

The temperature could not have been a tick above 45 degrees, with a foot of snow on the ground, two feet in some spots where the snow had drifted. It was not just the “so-called” cold, it was the real deal. If you were very still you could hear the wind singing as it moved between the branches of the looming trees around us, those that had shed their leaves to the chill and those that were evergreen.

When adventure comes calling, boys—rain or shine or in the dead of winter—you just need to be ready. Often these are the moments that expand our world view. And HARDWEAR penis gear is just the equipment needed (call it a cock ring, a dick stretcher, or a talisman) to be certain your next naked adventure is an awesome one.

Our shaman, meanwhile, had shed his coat and was pulling off his sweater. Shortly he was shirtless, with the orange light of the sun stabbing through the canopy of branches to bring out the red hue of his Native American skin. Slowly we followed his lead, knowing that this was precisely what we’d invited him to spend time with us for—to expand our awareness. Though we’d had no specific idea exactly what shape this expansion would take.

“It’s cold,” I remember saying, standing shirtless. “It’s really cold. I can see my freakin’ breath.”

Our shaman was on to his pants then, unzipping his fly, shoving down his denims and boxers all in one sweep. Grinning, he was amused by our hesitation.

“You are shy now, Evander, but that is not like you.” He expanded bare arms to again include the entire group. “All of you, so eager to bare everything in a climate-controlled setting, but fearful with just a little nip in the air. We must learn to let that fear go.”

“Maybe the fear is good,” Chris volunteered. “Maybe it keeps our balls from turning to ice cubes.”

We were all grinning now. Continuing the group strip-down with a playful level of resistance and a swell of curiosity. Where was this going? What would we learn?

Nipples hard as darts and shivering, we were all standing in a rough circle, every man with his pants in a bunch around his ankles. Three of us wearing various cock paraphernalia (cock rings, weighted glans rings… ‘cause serious enthusiasts that we are, we don’t go out the door without that shit).

“Do we need to take these off?” C.J. asked, pointing at the 1lbs weight swinging from his sausage.

“No,” the shaman responded. “That can serve you, as a talisman against the cold.”

I remember laughing and saying. “That ring is designed to grow your dick. It’s not gonna keep you from freezing.”

Our shaman had only grinned and said, “You would be surprised.” Then he was kicking off his shoes and stepping out of the wad of his pants. Standing on one foot he was next reaching to peel off his socks. “There is power in your gear, in your rings and stretchers. Those you should keep. But a wad of jeans around your ankles will make it difficult to walk, much less hike. And shoes… and socks… these are not needed.”

Then, with a foot of snow on the ground he was standing barefoot, buck-naked, more than ankles deep. “We can leave our clothes here,” he was saying. “I do not believe the bears will steal them.”

We were all shivering by this point, still with our shoes on, and he was rather buoyantly making jokes. And it was very impressive. I’m borrowing one of his pet phrases when I say, there was power in this. We could feel his power. The level of certainty and confidence he had in his own personal fortitude—in his own male energy—to stand bare-assed and barefoot in the cold, in the snow, with the knowledge that he could and would withstand it.

We wanted that power too, but this was where I had to interject. Despite how mesmerizing the experience was, I could not have my team needing their toes amputated all because of a team building exercise gone wrong. And frostbite is real. And the snow under our feet was real. And it was cold.

“W-wait, I can’t have these guys getting frostbite, losing their toes.” I pushed these words out through a hard shiver, still with my boots on but otherwise bare-assed. It was in this same instant that the wind picked up and a gust of sparkling snow dust crashed into my body. I remember while my teeth were chattering, I also felt invigorated. The wind was singing louder, I no longer even had to be still to hear it. It was like the cold was waking something in me.

“Keep your shoes then,” the shaman said. “It is more fun barefoot. But, if you must, then keep your shoes.” He was digging in the pocket of his discarded parka, coming back with the sparkling Hardwear Ice ring we had given him. “You all look so macho with your cocks fully armed. I will have a talisman too.”

So, we got ourselves untangled from our jeans and underwear while he was putting on his ring. And having thrown off the shackles of clothing we were free men. Dicks swinging. Balls drawn tight by the chill. Asses bare and cold, but at least we three still had our boots.

Our shaman was taking us off the path then, over the bluff and down the hill toward the rushing stream.

Our shaman said, “I will tell you now, Evander, what nature knows.”

He was ready to answer the question I’d asked him before, and I wanted the answer, but my nose was running with nothing but my forearm to wipe it with. I was hugging myself for whatever warmth could be squeezed from that action as we trudged down the hill. I wanted the answer, but I wanted to be home, sprawled on a plush sofa in front of a roaring fire even more.

My teeth were clicking madly, involuntarily in my mouth, and I wasn’t sure how much longer I could withstand this abuse. Looking over at the others on my team, I could see that they were in a similar condition. Chris was a pale freckled blur with fog-breath rising to make a cloud before watery eyes. He’d slipped at some point and there was snow in his blonde hair: the hair on his head, on his chest, even in his pubic hair. Observing my scrutiny, he gave a thumbs up in the way of proving he was fine, but it didn’t look like it.

C.J. was on my left side then, in my ear. “Man, I don’t think I’m made for this,” he said. I could tell his teeth were chattering just like mine. “I’m Brazilian; we don’t really do cold weather shit like this.”

I remember laughing, even with teeth click-clacking. “I feel you. I’m black, dude… do I look like I grew up in the Swiss Alps?”

We had arrived not at the stream but in a clearing where the sun was raining through overhead. Our shaman slowed to a stop then, speaking. “Evander,” he began, “what nature knows, is that something has been taken from us—but not really taken. Hidden is a better word. This hidden aspect of ourselves waits for us to find it. Each man in his own turn”

“Hidden,” I said. “Something hidden.” The word resonated in my mind. I said this and it wasn’t a question but a statement.

The shaman gave a nod, seeming to find something in my frost-glazed eyes that he approved of. And what he saw, I felt. It was the first spark of awareness. The wind all this time, singing, had been trying to tell me. And the stream, we were close enough now to hear its babble—there was a message in the sound. And the sunlight spilling down through the branches, even the swaying of those same branches. The message was everywhere around me, in everything. Everything.

“We’re supposed to be a part of all this… of everything,” I said. “Not separate but together.” And suddenly, while I could still feel the cold, its ability to incapacitate was diminishing.

Our very own chief engineer, Evander Strong, when not having a nude snow adventure (which doesn’t happen often), can be found speccing out the latest designs to help guys be BIGGER and BETTER. And of course wearing his own HARDWEAR gear, showing off the awesome penis he’s built – still horny, huge, and veiny approaching age fifty.

Again, the shaman nodded. “Yes, what voices told you?”

My answer was... “The wind. The stream.”

He smiled broadly at me then. “Excellent teachers. These have the power to shape the face of the world: the gusting wind that might lift a house, the rushing water that may carve a mountain. But man has power too.” He pointed down my body. “You have shaped your physique. Your penis. You make these devices to bring positive change to the masses, but you fear a few minutes in the cold. Does that make sense?”

I shook my head. He was right, it didn’t make sense.

He said, “Someone told you, as they tell us all, that we are fragile. But we are stronger than we think. Stronger than we can ever know.”

I remember nodding and understanding. Completely understanding. “We’re stronger than we can ever know,” I repeated; and lowering to one knee, I set to unlacing my right boot.

“What are you doing?” C.J. asked.

“Becoming a part of everything,” I said. “But you shouldn’t follow,” I told him. “If you still feel cold. If your teeth are still chattering.”

Chris had drawn near as well. “Y-you’re taking off your shoes?”

I nodded. I was wearing a prototype Magneton H80 cock ring. I remember it catching the light where I was crouched, the late day sun glinting off the big gold magnet. “I don’t need boots,” I said to Chris, “I’ve got my talisman.” And before, where the shaman’s talk of using a dick ring as a talisman had seemed silly, now I understood. Anything could be a talisman. Anything you channel your energy into. It sounded a little silly, me saying this to Chris; but the wind and the rushing water had already told me everything was fine. I wasn’t shivering anymore. My teeth weren’t chittering as if to jump from my mouth. Sure, my nipples were still hard, but that came with the territory. “Don’t do what I’m doing,” was my instruction to the others as I stood barefoot in the snow, now holding my boots in my hand. “Unless you feel it. Unless you’ve found it. Don’t do it just because I’m doing it.”

“See,” said the shaman. “I told you it is more fun barefoot.”

We continued the short distance down to the stream, with the shaman explaining. “The cold is our friend. Like the bear, it can be a deadly friend; but only if we misunderstand the nature of the relationship. The cold can heal. The cold can cure. And yes, frostbite is real, hypothermia, all of these are real. But tensing up and cowering does not keep the cold out. These are reactions. For you three who work with computers all the time, perhaps it will help you to simply think of these symptoms as data. If you learn to process this data in a meaningful way, allowing the fact of the cold to pass through your anatomy, then you can coexist with it.”

Are you ready to drop your drawers and strut with confidence in the locker room? Do you walk down the street with swagger, oozing big dick energy? You can do all this and more with HARDWEAR all day gear.

By the stream everyone took their boots off if only for a few minutes to experience everything and to coexist—completely—with the cold. We couldn’t believe we were butt-ass naked in the snow, in this arctic setting, but we were, and it was empowering. Reading this, you may be prone to suspect that we had done a bunch of shrooms on the way down the hill, especially with all this talk of the singing wind and the babbling stream; but I promise you, we were perfectly sober. For centuries, many cultures have used the extremes of temperature to illicit a kind of personal, mental, spiritual awakening. It’s one of those things that will always seem hooky until you experience it.

We stood by the stream for a little while, every now and then teasing a toe into the water. Our shaman had jokes then, saying “Whatever I have told you so far, I make no promises about that water. If you fall in, you very well might freeze to death.” And part of his charm was that, when he made a joke, it was so deadpan that you couldn’t be sure he wasn’t absolutely serious.

So, we made sure not to fall in.

And standing in my birthday suit by the stream with snow between my toes, I knew I was exactly where I was supposed to be. The whisper of the rushing water and the sunlight glinting on the surface assured me.

Final Thought

We put our boots back on again for the return hike up the hill. Our shaman of course had left his boots at the top and remained barefoot—he was a pro at this. All told, we were in the snow without clothes, in the woods, for between thirty and forty minutes. No one got sick. No one lost any body parts to forstbite. And the experience was mind expanding. The filmstrip of that entire day sticks with me, but the phrase that resonates the strongest from those moments in the woods is this…

“Someone told you, as they tell us all, that we are fragile. But we are stronger than we think. Stronger than we can ever know.”

That phrase has implications in every part of a man’s life. There is always some obstacle, some hurdle, that we have been told is insurmountable to us. If we blindly believe the “someone” who is telling us these things, then we will never know what we are truly capable of, and what we are capable of is always much more than what we think it is.

I am NOT telling you to strip bare and run through the woods in winter (LOL). Absolutely, I am NOT. Following this experience, I did not decide that I was the next Wim Hoff (the famous Dutch “Iceman” who holds several world records for enduring the cold). Following this experience, I was further energized in my mission to help guys everywhere be the best that they could be. To help others discover what they are capable of by transforming their sexual anatomy.

Standing by that stream and feeling that I was in the right place, wasn’t just about bare feet in the snow and swinging balls in the woods—it was about being in the right place in my life.

If you’re just itching to go out and do a cold challenge of some kind, then, as a followup to this article, we’ll be releasing a Naked Hiking Survival Guide in the next few days. In this writeup we'll share some ideas for how you might brave the wilds in the buff as safely as possible. But even armed with the best guidance in the world, you need to recognize that the cold is dangerous and every man is different. Frostbite is real. Hypothermia is real. The risk of cold exposure is real. I can’t guarantee that letting your cock and balls swing in the snow, you’ll have a spiritual experience, or a personal awakening, or that you won’t freeze your toes off. I’d suggest you get yourself a Hardwear talisman instead (a cock ring, a stretcher, etc.) and use it for what it’s made for (not fending off the cold—LOL), but for super hard erections and to grow your dick. That’s the stuff I can make promises about.

The point of sharing this experience isn’t to spur you into trying on a cold test. Not at all. This is allknight.com and what we’re about, is helping men be the best they can be… sexually and beyond. And the point of telling you this is to highlight an event where I discovered I was capable of more than I believed I was. I think we all have these kinds of experiences, some more subtle than others. There is another story, a run-in with a savage Rottweiler that I survived relatively unscathed. But I had clothes on, so I like the snow story better. The point here, is to reflect on something you’ve done, accomplished, endured, succeeded at… and let that success empower you toward other successes. With your penis. With your sexual performance and your relationships. With your job or whatever.

As men, we tend to wallow in our failures and let those bring us down. But I want you to pick a victory—it could be from last week or it could be from your childhood—and remember what that felt like. Let it radiate forward. Let it help you to realize that you can do anything you set your mind to. Because what we are capable of is always much more than what we think. That's what I learned naked in the snow that day, and that's what I hope to share with you.

—Evander Strong

Editorial Footnote:
About Nude Snow Adventures

As for personal and spiritual awakenings in the snow, this concept is not a new one. Our boys took the path of an unexpected naked winter hike. But many cultures have rituals involving the snow, the cold, and transitional states between extreme warm temperatures and frigid temperatures to illicit various mental and physical reactions. Some examples include the sauna in Finland, the banya in Russia, the onsen in Japan, and of course the Native American sweat lodge. These rituals typically involve alternating between hot and cold environments, for example going from a sultry hot room to a snow-blanketed yard, or going from a hot spring to a frozen lake. The benefits of these practices are said to include improved blood circulation, detoxification, improved immunity, of course relaxation… and in some cases spiritual and\or mental expansion. As a general rule, however, these rituals are not recommended for persons with heart problems, high blood pressure, or other medical conditions. The cold in general and alternating between extreme temperatures can be hazardous.

We have an entire survival guide on the way dedicated to how to more safely enjoy some wintery nude fun. But in the meanwhile, if you embark on this kind of adventure, here is a short list of tips. You should absolutely start slow (try 5 minutes of exposure and then put your clothes back on), let yourself warm up before trying again, maybe for 6 minutes the next time. Never do a cold challenge alone. The chance of two, three, or four guys succumbing to the cold all at once is very slim. For anyone thinking to have a nude adventure in the cold, there should be a designated spotter who probably keeps his clothes on and definitely has a cellphone ready. The spotter must be strong enough to lift\drag the adventurer. That way, if the the guy with no clothes on falls over in the snow—because it could happen—the other dude can drag his ass to safety, or call for help, or whatever. It’s not a perfect scenario, but at least there’s some degree of a safety net with a buddy spotting you. You can take turns getting naked and spotting each other. And once you’re both familiar with how your bodies react to the cold, you can both strip at the same time if you like.

Going bare is one of life’s joys. It’s okay—more than okay in fact—to enjoy our natural state. It’s more than okay to love your body, to love your penis (showing it, using it, etc), and to love being a man. This essential message is what lies behind every thought expressed at allknight.com. A man should feel good about his manliness. He should shape and improve those things that are within his power (his sexual performance, penis size, physique, personal education, spiritual wellbeing); embrace those things that are concrete and unchangeable (his height for example); and ultimately, love himself.