Total Health: Dr Marcus Coplin of Murrieta Hot Springs Resort On How We Can Optimize Our Mental, Physical, Emotional, & Spiritual Wellbeing
Rest — Quality sleep and active rest are key ways we can regulate and prolong our physical health. The process of sleep allows for so much repair work to occur in our body, and regular good night’s sleep is associated with a reduction in all causes of premature death. Sleep hygiene like cooling the temperature in your room, blocking out lights, not eating too late at night, limiting caffeine and alcohol, and not using your phone/tv/computer for 30–90 minutes before bed can all help ensure the benefits of a good night’s sleep.
Often when we refer to wellness, we assume that we are talking about physical wellbeing. But one can be physically very healthy but still be unwell, emotionally or mentally. What are the steps we can take to cultivate optimal wellness in all areas of our life; to develop Mental, Physical, Emotional, & Spiritual Wellbeing? As a part of our series about “How We Can Cultivate Our Mental, Physical, Emotional, & Spiritual Wellbeing”, we had the pleasure of interviewing Dr. Marcus Coplin.
Dr. Marcus Coplin is a primary care Naturopathic Medical Doctor specializing in the field of integrative Physical & Rehabilitation Medicine and integrative Oncology. He also serves as the Medical Director at the historic and newly reimagined Murrieta Hot Springs Resort. Dr. Coplin incorporates various geothermal therapies and detoxification practices into Murrieta Hot Springs Resort’s programming, combined with the Power 9 Principles: A set of habits linked to improving health, longevity, and happiness — commonly associated with Blue Zone areas where people consistently live to the age of 100.
Aside from serving as the Medical Director for Murrieta Hot Springs Resort, Dr. Coplin is the Director of Hydrothermal Medicine for the Balneology Association of North America and the North American representative to the International Association of Medical Hydrology and Climatology. He is a consulting Balneologist and Medical Hydrologist for many other health reports, urban bath houses, and health and wellness interests around North America. He is the Medical Director for The Springs Resort in Pagosa Springs, CO, as well.
Thank you so much for joining us in this interview series! Before we dive into the main focus of our interview, our readers would love to “get to know you” a bit better. Can you tell us a bit about your childhood backstory?
I was mostly raised in the Bay Area in California, but my family lived in a more rural part of New York state for a few formative years as well. Both of these places had a profound influence on me.
When we lived in New York State, our house was ½ mile from our closest neighbor. I became a child of the woods, hiking around in all types of weather, making forts, climbing rocks, and allowing my imagination to run wild. I became very comfortable in the natural world, and saw the rhythms of nature at play, and noticed their effect on me. The wisdom of the natural world and the interdependence of the systems and creatures that live within it gave me an important context for how I viewed the rest of my life.
When we moved back to the Bay Area, I had become a teenager in a rapidly changing environment of the dot com and tech boom. This combination of natural teenage angst and the environment of rapid cultural growth instilled in me an understanding that anything is possible, and the world can be seen as an evolving dynamic picture, that one’s influence and disposition can affect.
What or who inspired you to pursue your career? We’d love to hear the story.
I had been studying the concept of a community for my undergraduate bachelor’s degree. I was looking at historical time periods, cultural movements, oral histories, and more all based around the question: how do we identify ourselves as individuals within a larger collective context? At that time, I was introduced to an old health pamphlet on a German system of health assessment using neural-circulatory patterns found within the Iris of the eye. Something clicked! If the microcosm of the iris could be seen in the macrocosm of the body, perhaps the collective could be seen as a holographic map of the individual. Although that is a heady thought (I was a philosophy major at the time) what was born from that was a general interest in systems of analysis that looked at the holistic and systems-based interdependence of the body in health. I continued to pull on this thread and it led me to pursue a Naturopathic Medical degree, where I could work as a primary care physician integrating medical science and tradition.
None of us can achieve success without some help along the way. Was there a particular person who you feel gave you the most help or encouragement to be who you are today? Can you share a story about that?
I have been very fortunate to have an amazing list of mentors and supporters along my path. Professors, colleagues, family members, spiritual advisors, and friends have all been so crucial at pivotal moments to encourage and counsel my growth and development, both as a physician and as a human. To not single out any one of these amazing people, I will point to an influence that I did not know personally, but whose life and work has directed my own profoundly. His name is Fr. Sebastian Kneipp. Father Kneipp was a 19th century Bavarian priest. After learning about certain self-care techniques such as cold-water bathing, herbal medicines, and simple diets to treat his own illness, he used his knowledge to help countless others.
Father Kneipp saw the great amount of suffering that existed amongst his flock and noticed that many couldn’t afford medical care. With his knowledge he would provide help to anyone in need. Word of his success spread, and people would travel from all over the Austro-Hungarian empire and beyond to seek his counsel. He did not charge for his services and would often even allow those who couldn’t afford lodging to sleep in the church he ministered. His successes were so great that he was persecuted by local medical authorities for practicing medicine without a license. He was also under persecution from the Catholic Church for abandoning his calling as a priest and focusing on aiding the suffering of those who sought his counsel through his methods of simple diet, herbal teas, rest, and hydrotherapy.
Politically he earned the respect of the Emperor and religiously that of the Pope; who both allowed his practice to continue. His methods were documented and eventually they were brought to America with the founders of Naturopathic medicine. Even though today Naturopathic medicine is a primary care medical discipline, it has its roots in the humble practices of this Bavarian Priest. I list Father Kneipp because he is a constant reminder to me of what the human body is capable of when given the right conditions to heal, as well as one of my primary inspirations for using water as my favorite and most effective therapeutic.
Can you share the funniest or most interesting mistake that occurred to you in the course of your career? What lesson or take away did you learn from that?
There have been many mistakes, and with humility I have learned so much. The lessons from the missteps have fortified my knowledge far more so than that of any book or text.
The mistake that comes to mind however is one of those stories of fate intervening in one’s life when we least expect it. In 2012 I had conducted a research sabbatical across Europe studying at a variety of hospitals, health resorts, and thermal spring facilities on the topic of Balneology — the therapeutic use of mineral water, steams, and muds. At the end of this incredible and life changing tour I was in Granada, Spain where there was to be an international gathering of all the scientists, researchers, and medical professionals in the field of Balneology to present the most up-to-date research.
I was taking the bus — and mind you this is before smartphones were common — and got the strange feeling that I was heading in the wrong direction. Of the many people on this crowded bus, one woman looked to clearly be American. Something just moved in me and I said, are you headed to the Balneology conference? She looked at me puzzled, and said, why yes I am. I told her we needed to get off the bus because I was certain we were not going the right way although I didn’t know why I knew that. She followed my lead for some reason. After getting on the correct bus we began talking even more and it turned out that she had recently founded an organization to promote mineral spring therapy, “like they have in Europe,” in the USA. I told her about my recent sabbatical, and she asked me to join the Balneology Association of North America. Now over a decade later, I still volunteer my time with this organization, and in fact have become the Director of Hydrothermal Medicine where I can organize our efforts around education and research on this topic for North America.
Is there a particular book that made a significant impact on you? Can you share a story or explain why it resonated with you so much?
There have been so many books on the topics of hydrotherapy, naturopathic medicine, other health topics, and philosophy that have impacted me that it is hard to pick just one. The mind and work of Buckminster Fuller has always been a place I come back to when I get stuck on how to approach a thought pattern or problem. Fuller wrote the book, Critical Path, which had a profound impact on how I think about the world. As I mentioned earlier, my experiences in youth gave me inspiration to not feel boxed in by dogma, to consider the world for the potential of its adaptability, and to seek wisdom from nature in concepts of design-based thinking and biomimicry. Buckminster Fuller embodies all of these ideals, and Critical Path lays out his rationale and plan for seeking a sustainable and respectful future for all people.
Can you share your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Why does that resonate with you so much?
The question before got me thinking about the quote ascribed to the Dalai Lama, “When you lose, do not lose the lesson.” I think in all things in life there is information about how we can improve. The question becomes for me, improve toward what end? I think the answer to this is deeply personal and individual, but in all things if we can keep ourselves and our awareness awake and attentive to take stock without judgment of who “I am”, from this point we can view the direction we wish to proceed. From there we work to take a step in that direction, at which point we almost paradoxically arrive back at the beginning where we observe who now, “I am.” Fundamentally this practice calls me to a place of focus and integrity as the impermanence of the moment to moment is gauged within something that feels more transcendent or eternal. You see, I never really put that philosophy degree down. The quote says to me, in all things — good/bad, joy/sorrow, sickness/health — there is an opportunity to learn and grow.
What are some of the most interesting or exciting projects you are working on now? How do you think that might help people?
My main project right now is preparing to open the Murrieta Hot Springs Resort, where I am the medical director. This is a one-of-a kind place in North America. For the better part of the 20th century the hot springs in Murrieta functioned as a famous Health Resort where people would travel from all over to use the benefits of the thermal mineral water, rest, and take other treatments based on the property to successfully treat a variety of health conditions. Although we aren’t bringing back the medical side of things yet, the Murrieta Hot Springs Resort is being built to help guests restore their vitality. We are doing this through being highly intentional with all the offerings of the property.
When a guest comes, every moment they stay with us (whether it’s a day trip to soak in the springs, or a weeklong deep-wellness retreat) is built to facilitate health and vitality. This is so much more than just jargon or pampering spa experiences. We have taken the science of mineral spring bathing, hydrothermal medicine, nutrition, exercise, and sleep and built all our offerings from this foundation. The best part is our guests can enjoy the benefits without even “doing” anything more than just having fun at the resort. For guests who want to go deep, we have guides, programs, services, and trained staff to help facilitate personalized health and wellness stays. Many of our guests live within an easy drive, as the resort is only 1 hour from San Diego and 1 ½ hours from LA. This proximity means that using the springs as a regular space for advancing health and vitality, and including coming to the springs as part of one’s self care routine is very accessible.
OK, thank you for all of that. Let’s now shift to the core focus of our interview. In this interview series we’d like to discuss cultivating wellness habits in four areas of our lives: Mental wellness, Physical wellness, Emotional wellness, & Spiritual wellness. Let’s dive deeper into these together. Based on your research or experience, can you share with our readers three good habits that can lead to optimum mental wellness? Please share a story or example for each.
My top 3 are Breathe, Bathe, Bounty
Breathe — taking time to focus on your breath can help regulate the balance of your autonomic nervous system. Contrary to popular belief, your sympathetic nervous system is not BAD for you. The healthiest individuals have the ability to gracefully swing between sympathetic (stress response) and parasympathetic (rest/digest) function. The breath is the mechanism by which we can regulate, and even retrain dis-regulated autonomic function. Taking a few minutes once or twice a day to focus on your breath and the sensation of your body as you slowly expand the breath down into the belly and rhythmically let the breath fall out, can begin to foster a sense of balance in our nervous system.
Bathe — As a doctor specializing in hydrotherapy, bathing is naturally part of my top three. The easiest thing to do is take a contrasting shower every morning. It is easy to implement and effective. Take your normal shower (however that looks) and at the end, turn the water to a cool or even cold setting. At this point make sure to breathe (see point 1) as this will really help your body adapt to the healthy stress of the cold water. Make sure to allow the water to sheet down the limbs (ideally moving toward the heart), and ensure you spend time spraying the armpits, groin, low back, chest, and neck as these regions have a high degree of lymphatic and endocrine (hormone regulation) benefit. You can warm back up after 30–90 (or longer) seconds and try to do three rounds ending with the cold blast and followed by a rigorous toweling off. The physical and mental effects from this practice are deep acting and long lasting.
Bounty — I really just needed a third B, but Bounty is about cultivating gratitude for the gifts we have in our life. For some people this can be a very difficult practice, but even connecting with the simple joy of watering a plant and watching it thrive, or taking in the splendor of a tree in a park can serve as a gratitude practice to cultivate a sense of bounty. Those who are oriented toward experiencing gratitude find that they are more apt to be prepared to receive more of it when those times arrive, but also be less apt to be taken down by harder moments.
Do you have a specific type of meditation practice or Yoga practice that you have found helpful? We’d love to hear about it.
I have practiced many traditions and disciplines over the years, and I have taken gold from them all. What I would advise is finding a practice and system that you like and that keeps you coming back, but that also challenges you. The key to any practice is to do whatever you can do to take a moment to connect with yourself, feel the sensation of your body, quiet the mind, and breath in silence is a good practice in my book. It may only last for a couple minutes (for me that is often the case) but these little moments of cultivation add up.
Thank you for that. Can you share three good habits that can lead to optimum physical wellness? Please share a story or example for each.
Eating Well — There is no one diet that is perfect for everyone. So, I remind everyone to eat a moderate amount (not too much, not too little) a variety of foods, in a variety of colors, as close to their original form as possible (try to avoid processed food). More than what we eat, pay attention to how we eat. If we are eating in a dis-regulated state of being (stressed, distracted, without joy) we undermine our digestive power to fully break down and assimilate the foods we eat (no matter what those foods are). When we don’t break down and assimilate (digest) our foods well, the food passes through our system and becomes substrate for bacteria in our gut. This extra substrate sends the bacteria into overdrive and can increase the numbers of non-health promoting bacteria (dysbiosis) which can lead to persistent inflammation in the body and drive any health condition in a downward spiral. So, chew your food, relax before you eat, and try to eat at times or with people or in environments that create joy for you.
Exercise — Movement is key. Using your body ensures healthy circulation, and the preservation of lean muscle. Plus, it feels good. Find an activity you enjoy doing, rather than an exercise that feels punishing, and do it often. Don’t overdo it, a simple walk around the neighborhood can be a fine form of exercise — as long as you are not doom scrolling the news on your phone as you do it. Taking a walk after dinner can help regulate your blood sugar and improve your energy distribution. Simple calisthenics can be implemented without much of a barrier and can produce encouraging results. Whatever your choices are, find your comfort zone, and try to regularly push yourself just outside of it to put some healthy stress on the body. This light and healthy stress is what causes the body to react to the exercise and grow stronger.
Rest — Quality sleep and active rest are key ways we can regulate and prolong our physical health. The process of sleep allows for so much repair work to occur in our body, and regular good night’s sleep is associated with a reduction in all causes of premature death. Sleep hygiene like cooling the temperature in your room, blocking out lights, not eating too late at night, limiting caffeine and alcohol, and not using your phone/tv/computer for 30–90 minutes before bed can all help ensure the benefits of a good night’s sleep.
Do you have any particular thoughts about healthy eating? We all know that it’s important to eat more vegetables, eat less sugar, etc. But while we know it intellectually, it’s often difficult to put it into practice and make it a part of our daily habits. In your opinion what are the main blockages that prevent us from taking the information that we all know, and integrating it into our lives?
In addition to what I said above about “how” we eat, I always say to increase your non-starchy vegetable intake. If you put all the food you eat in a day on one big plate, half of it should be non-starchy, high fiber veggies. This approach has been shown to offset the inflammatory effects of other dietary indiscretions. But you are right, mostly we all “know” what we can do to eat a healthy diet. It goes back to something I hinted at earlier about regulation of our nervous system. When our body is in a state of dis-regulation, which can often occur without us even being aware of it, our “neuro-biological regulatory response,” that is the unconscious behaviors our body takes on to alleviate a sense of stress or danger, will often bypass our ability to consciously change that behavioral orientation. This is a fancy way of saying that what prevents us is that our body is calling the shots without us knowing it! It sounds wild, but the work of a few researchers in this field have proven it to be this way.
So, what can we do? This comes back to the basic advice of breathe, bathe, and bounty. If we create a mindful breathing practice, we can help our system feel better regulated, contrast showers have a similar effect from a bottom-up approach through circulation and nerve function, and gratitude is the attitude — when we are cultivating an orientation of gratitude our body is regulating toward a feeling of safety. From a place of feeling safe we can truly begin to implement behaviors and practices, and gently guide ourselves into the next steps we want to take toward our goal. As I said earlier, take stock of who I am at this moment, set your sights on the horizon you are aiming toward and take the next step toward that goal. Then do it all again.
Can you share three good habits that can lead to optimum emotional wellness? Please share a story or example for each.
Honestly, if the advice above is attended to, the emotional health will flow forward. I only add that practices such as journaling, and doing social things that make you laugh can also really help.
Do you have any particular thoughts about the power of smiling to improve emotional wellness? We’d love to hear it.
As I just said, laughing is good medicine. Don’t fake the smile, find something that sparks a laugh or a feeling of joy and cultivate time around that. Bounty and gratitude practice will typically put you in a place to receive the humor and smiles life has to offer up.
Finally, can you share three good habits that can lead to optimum spiritual wellness? Please share a story or example for each.
Spiritual wellness is about connecting with something unknowable outside of yourself. That point on the horizon I mentioned earlier, well, spiritual practice is how one seeks to set that point. Find a practice or a community that offers you support and seek without expecting to ever fully know. In my experience the true litmus test of spiritual wellness is asking: does this cultivate love? Love is the ultimate paradox; it will negate all our selfish and self-preserving programming. Love is the only truth worth seeking.
- Practice Bounty — seeing gratitude in your life helps cultivate love.
- Whatever your spiritual framework, practice it regularly. Offer devotion, attend services, or pray with regularity.
- Connect — the feeling of love is what drives home the reality of the interdependence of everything, it can be as simple as bird watching in the park, or volunteering in your community, but having a regular time to connect is powerful spiritual food.
Do you have any particular thoughts about how being “in nature” can help us to cultivate spiritual wellness?
It is known that spending time in nature affects the body, it lowers the stress hormones, and puts us in a more balanced regulatory space. Nature can look many ways, from forest walks, to sitting in a park, or contemplating a potted plant. Nature has the imprint of something much larger and more transcendent than our short lives within it. Nature can allow us the space to connect to something outside of ourselves.
Ok, we are nearly done. You are a person of great influence. If you could inspire a movement that would bring the most amount of good for the greatest number of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger.
Radical empathic love. If we could see ourselves from each other’s perspective, realize the experiences and backgrounds we each have has colored who we are, and if we could see that perhaps we aren’t even that separate, but at the end of the day all parts of a larger stream of consciousness, limited only by the physicality our bodies — then maybe we can act from a place of compassion and love and forgiveness. Radical empathic love requires us to forgive and is truly beyond our ego. This would change everything.
We are very blessed that some of the biggest names in Business, VC funding, Sports, and Entertainment read this column. Is there a person in the world, or in the US, whom you would love to have a private breakfast or lunch with, and why? He or she might just see this, especially if we both tag them :-)
Years ago, I had the opportunity to meet Peter Diamandis at a conference where he was speaking about longevity and technology. We have fundamentally different approaches to the questions of health and longevity, but I loved his passion and curiosity, and willingness to invest in seeking an answer to the questions he was asking. I think he and I may share some heritage so the menu for the breakfast would be assuredly agreeable to the both of us. My only stipulation is that we meet at a breakfast table set in the forest, with no cell service or tech involved, and that he would be open to a post meal hike.
How can our readers further follow your work online?
You can learn about my work at DrCoplin.com, follow my Instagram @drcoplinnd, and check out the Murrieta Hot Springs Resort at Murrieta-Hotpsrings.com
Dr. Coplin Website: https://www.drcoplin.com/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/drcoplinnd/
Murrieta Hot Springs Resort Website: https://www.murrieta-hotsprings.com/
Thank you for these really excellent insights, and we greatly appreciate the time you spent with this. We wish you continued success.
