Video transcript
Ok, so I’m going to run through the centering and grounding exercise that was covered in the videos.
Just going to go into a bit more detail. So one of the things about anxiety is that we can be very much in our heads. We can be very top-heavy so what we’re doing here is to just drop our attention downwards to to get more centered. To feel more in our bodies and more connected to the ground.
So you know in western society, we are very head driven and analytical and we think a lot. But in Eastern philosophies and traditions they are more about being centred so martial arts and things like that emphasise being centred and they talk about putting your attention on your ‘dan tien’ which is just below your belly button.
So this idea of centering it kind of brings that emphasis out of our head, where maybe we’re having panicky thoughts and starting to feel overwhelmed. Just down into a more gathered space where everything is included. So we can do this standing, sitting, we can practice in the shower – that’s something that’s nice to do.
Lying down, and we don’t need to be connected to the actual ground. You know we can do it in bedrooms or we could do it being in a plane. We’re just bringing your attention downwards.
When I did my psychotherapy training, one of the projects I did was to interview yoga teachers, acupuncturists, massage therapists and so on about this whole idea of grounding and they also used it to feel connected to the ground and to get a sense of flow with the client, and then earthing whatever’s going on.
So standing or sitting – here with me sitting – It’s the same few steps of bringing your attention to the tummy area and our hands here so that we can notice the breathing just lifting the hands gently. Closing your eyes if you want, and getting that quality of feeling a bit more centred. You can spend 20-30 seconds doing that.
And then like with this tree metaphor we’re then looking at connecting to the ground. So we’re feeling our feet on the ground and our weight being held by the chair. And maybe imagining roots going down into the ground.
Our attention continues to move downwards. And then we just imagine a wave, just starting at our heads and just moving down through the body down towards the ground and then into the ground. And just repeating this, this wave, then you can imagine the wave as a wave of light or water – whatever works for you really.
This quality of like this sheet that’s moving down and as it’s moving down, it’s taking with it any blockages, any stuck energy any however you want to imagine it, any tension, just moving it down through into the ground.
And repeating this. So in the shower, we can use the water that’s coming down, over us and It’s then going down through the drain into into the ground. So just repeating that pattern a few times visualising that wave moving through us and clearing. And you might even notice where it sticks a little bit. It might go more easily in some areas and then stick little bit. So just go back to the wave again moving down clearing us through and grounding us.
We can do this in the garden standing on the grass. Obviously that is you know, that’s really going to be grounding ourselves. They’re showing now tin terms of static electricity and negative electricity in the body that we can actually ground that into into the grass and into the earth, in the same way that your home electricity network has an earth wire that goes and discharges into the ground again.
Just doing that for maybe 1-2 Minutes. However much you like. And then you might notice that if you’re combining that with the breathing you might start feeling calmer and less in your head, less top heavy, and instead more centered and balanced.
Again in martial arts some practices talk about having a low centre of gravity because its harder then to be pushed off balance. So this is the quality that we looking for.
So just give it a go, see if you notice any feelings. As with all the practices the more that you do it, the more that your body and mind will get to know what’s going on and get into the pattern more easily. and when we do this then we start to notice more subtle sensations and qualities. Again this can be done in the office, standing in a queue in the supermarket, wherever.
This is another one that has worked for me and is easy to do.