Based on the accounts of the interviewees, the sauna was perceived as evoking feelings of pleasure and relaxation. In addition, the sauna was considered to contribute to mental well-being and healing, by providing a special place to be alone with one’s thoughts. The belief that sauna possesses mental healing properties emerged strongly from the data. Some of the respondents remarked that they might sometimes take a sauna purely in order to relieve stress, and to achieve a better mental balance. Even though the socializing aspects of taking a sauna were predominant throughout the interviews, taking a sauna alone or quietly in the presence of others was also preferred and considered to be a meditative experience, thus beneficial for one’s mental health:
[…] If I have had hassle and stress in my life, then I might decide to take a sauna, which helps me to relax. So, in those circumstances, I would take a sauna by myself for personal reasons, and I mean completely alone. […] In my opinion, it’s the primary purpose of it, in some way, it is a place for quieting down. (No. 3, female)
[…] It (sauna) gives you the mental benefit of quietness. No music, no nothing. Just a place to be with your own thoughts. (No. 4, female)
Based on the data, sauna is understood as inducing relaxation, or ‘rentous’ as it appeared in the accounts of the respondents. The respondents ascribed the relaxation to ‘löyly’, the mystical and hot water vapor that provides a cure for the stresses and strains of modern life. The sauna was described as a place out of this world, since it excludes the outside world and allows a person to be present in the moment:” ... It is a place out of this world. It is a meditative place. If you take a sauna by yourself, then you are truly and exceptionally alone with yourself...” (No. 5, male). Additionally, the sauna was described as a stress-free place, and taking a sauna as “having a break from everything”. In the sauna, one doesn’t ponder about the matters that are stressful, but instead strives to relieve the stress through the serenity of the sauna. However, a few respondents remarked that although the mental healing properties, primarily encapsulated in the notion of relaxation, serve the Finnish people, they might not have the same influence on people of different nationalities.
[…] It (sauna) calms you down. If you are stressed and going into overdrive, then it brings the level of the overdrive down, more or less, to half. (No. 7, male)
Sauna is not a place to get upset, or go through stressful things, such as work-related problems, and trying actively to find solutions to them, or overall like actively pondering or furthering other matters. But of course, if you have something on your mind, that might be a negative thing, then you are allowed to discuss those issues. But it is not a place of like “let’s go to sauna and think of our money problems” etc., that is not the purpose. […] (No. 8, male)
In order to maintain the relaxed feeling acquired in the sauna, respondents reported that they do something ’light’ and stress-free, such as making and eating supper, watching television, listening to the radio, drinking beer or just hanging out. The myth of the mental healing properties of the sauna is reinforced, for example, by obeying the norm of being silent and discarding alcohol consumption in connection with those sauna occasions that pursue mental healing.
It is supposed to be quiet there (in the sauna), because people ponder there, it is a place for pondering. Because…it (sauna) makes you ponder! (No. 4, female)
6 Discussion
In this chapter, the central findings presented in the previous chapter are linked with the theories introduced in the theory part. I will base my analysis on the theoretical framework, which is built on Consumer Culture theory, and, more precisely, on previous researches that are related to the studied subject. Connections and interrelations between the identified themes are explored in the light of the selected theories. In addition to linking the central themes with theories, the objective of the discussion part is to contribute to prior theoretical assumptions of marketplace mythology theories. Since the previous chapter of the findings included analysis and discussion, to some extent, this chapter will present more elaborate viewpoints with regard to the theoretical framework.
Firstly, in this chapter, I will provide deeper insights into employment and reproduction of consumer myths building on Thompson’s (2004) articulations on marketplace mythologies. I will discuss how the identified consumer myths are employed and reproduced through ritualistic behavior within the sauna marketplace. Moreover, cultural meanings (Peñaloza 2000) and the juxtaposition of Romantic and Gnostic mythoi (Thompson’s 2004) embedded in the sauna marketplace mythology are discussed. This chapter also sheds light on Marshall’s (2005) view on how consuming objects ritualistically exposes underlying fragments of cultural capital. In addition, building on Rook’s (1985) study on ritual dimensions and Wallendorf & Arnould’s (1991) study on consumption rituals, the discussion part suggests that consumers contribute to the process of constructing and reworking sauna myths through rituals, as well as through cultural meanings embedded in those rituals.
I will also provide insight into the theory of the sacred and the profane presented by Belk et al. (1989), by presenting evidence on how the sacred is surrounded by deep cultural meanings and mystery, that cannot be rationalized. I will underpin Belk et al.’s (1989) view on the sacred time and place being created through shared rituals, and I will also contribute to Fernandez et al.’s (2011) perspective on the sacred that is associated with the notion of purity. Lastly, I will broaden our understanding on romantic discourses of nature and, more specifically, the concept of the return to nature and primitivism.