By Justine Buckley
Can you relate to feeling 'grounded' and 'ungrounded' at times? We've all heard the idiom to "keep your feet on the ground". This phrase conveys so much common sense and we seem to know intuitively what it means when we hear it. With feet firmly on the ground we remain calm and stable, practical and down to earth (grounded) - we're not so easily carried away (ungrounded).
Intuitively we kind of know what getting carried away is all about as well. Half the time we sense when we're getting carried away... by excitement, anxiety, anger, ideas, hurrying, stories, greed, addictions, expectations, solutions, self-criticism, exhaustion, judging, endless busyness and even other people's energy can knock us off centre. Sometimes we think we're grounded only to discover we're actually more desensitised and numb than calm and stable.
It's been a theme in clinic this month and so I want to mention some practical tips that help you find your feet when they've left the ground.
Firstly - it's not an either/or situation though mostly we think we're either up or down, grounded or ungrounded, overwhelmed or numb. Try acknowledging to yourself that you are both grounded AND ungrounded AND notice how that feels. Stepping back a little allows us to take a look at the whole of the current experience as a level playing field. This means not making any aspect of what is actually going on any more important than everything else. Just take in the vista a little.
Now you've allowed a sense of space to develop - just by letting there be an 'AND' plus stepping back a little. Think about your feet... we kind of sense them as being 'down' and this is the direction we want to feel into; down into ourselves, down with the exhalation of our breath. Actually feel the sensation of this in the body. Breath is the great integrator of experience. Continuous contact with exhaling and inhaling starts to allow us to settle ourselves again (find our feet). Think of sediments on the bottom of the ocean and take in the whole situation for a moment. Can you see that there are deep still, silent sediments that are always there while fresh on top are turbulent waters... here we see some chaotic movement meeting the seabed where things are beginning to settle. We're like this too.....
While noticing the space.... literally the space around the body as you exhale, bring your attention to your senses. What are the ears hearing, eyes seeing, nose smelling, the feel of your feet on the ground, your back against a chair if you're sitting down. Now you're starting to come back into connection with the physical environment. There will be some turbulent feeling still going on as well. Let it be. Just know it can be there while you get on with the actual physical business of grounding - through the breath, through shifting your attention to the bare facts of your physical world..... and feeling into a sense of space.
Love Justine
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