Too hot? Don't boil too! (or: the physics of the liver)

There comes that time of year when the air thickens, the asphalt turns into a radiant plate, and half the world's population finds itself evaporating while sitting and staring at a glass of ice water. The official narrative tells us that it's the humidity, the African anticyclone of the moment, or the global warming.

Our tolerance for the summer heat isn't just a matter of the weather. It's a bizarre cross between the physics of matter and the chemistry of the liver. A real emotional thermoregulation which combines the engine capacity of our body with the revs at which we make our brain travel.

If the indoor temperature seems unbearable this summer, perhaps it's not just the thermometer on the terrace that's to blame, but the way you're managing your engine.

1. Engine physics: masses and radiators

Let's look at it from a purely mechanical perspective, without beating around the bush. Our bodies produce heat simply by existing and breathing. But the proportion in which they disperse it depends on precise geometric rules.

Slimmer bodies, mathematically speaking, have a much higher ratio between skin surface area (our natural radiator) and total body mass. In effect, they have more "cooling area" available to dissipate excess heat through sweating.

Conversely, when the body needs to move a larger structure or is simply a little weighed down by winter laziness, the muscular effort required even just to climb stairs or walk in the sun is greater. More effort means more metabolic heat generated by the internal engine. Add to this the fact that adipose tissue retains heat like an electric blanket, and overheating is served. Physics is an honest science: if the engine is big and revs high, it produces more energy.

2. Liver Chemistry: Anger Turns Up the Thermostat

While the geometry of the body plays a role, the real short circuit remains emotional. Our temperament has a direct and measurable impact on our internal temperature, and we experience this every day in the construction site of everyday life.

The states of agitation, frustration over the nonsense that we read online, or that dull anger that grips us when things don't go our way, immediately activates the sympathetic nervous system. It's a biological reaction: adrenaline is released, your heart rate accelerates, your blood pressure rises, and your basal metabolism soars. You're literally lighting up from within. It's endogenous heat, the kind generated by the mind's idle revving.

A calm temperament, on the other hand, acts like a long-acting coolant. Without the hormonal surges caused by agitation, peripheral circulation functions normally, sweating is efficient, and the body can release excess heat effortlessly. Those who remain calm, biologically, cool down faster. Those who get heated up over every trifle will boil over even in a freezer.

The Air Conditioning Matrix: The Performance Trap

And what do we do instead to remedy this global and individual warming? We lock ourselves in concrete boxes and blast the air conditioning at 18°C straight down our necks.

It's the automatic reaction of a society plagued by hyper-productivity and hyper-consumption, which demands high-performance, responsiveness, and readiness to invoice and purchase even when the asphalt outside melts. God forbid the assembly line slows down simply because our human nature demands the exact opposite: to retreat into the shade, slow our heartbeats, and breathe.

The reckless and obsessive use of air conditioning is the doping with which society and the market anesthetize our biological signals. We slip into artificial winters artificially recreated in offices, ignoring a slew of physical, joint, and environmental side effects that an entire encyclopedia wouldn't be enough to explain. Anything to avoid stopping. Anything to push the engine beyond its natural limits, consuming energy on the outside to hide the fact that we're boiling inside.

Living in calm to survive the heat

The summary of this brief journey into our physiology is almost life-saving. Being able to combine intelligent management of one's body with wise emotional cleansing is the only true air conditioner that doesn't weigh on the bill and respects our nature.

Summer, after all, is a great reminder. It forces us to slow down, lighten our load, and sort out what's truly worth our energy. If we want to get through the hot months without evaporating, the strategy isn't to argue with the weather or hibernate in an office, but to slow down. Less weight in the stomach, fewer toxins in the head, and much more tolerance for the world's twists and turns.

Let the temperature rise outside. We seek shade, a good record, and we keep the liver thermostat below safe levels.

“I seek beauty everywhere. And if I don't find it, I create it.” (Tonight I'm creating it by cultivating a bit of healthy, refreshing slowness.).