Okay friends, I think this may be it! We may actually be entering Fall in a few days and it may finally start to feel like October. Don’t get me wrong I love summer, but I am just ready for the crisp cool air! The end of summer however, has brought me to this post because I realized that my days of being able to “ground” without getting frost bite are numbered. So what is grounding you may be wondering? Well I’m so glad you asked! Today, Jill Comes Clean about this new technique I learned earlier this summer that I have truly fallen in love with, and felt its benefits.
So plain and simple, grounding is just that….standing on the ground…barefoot, and yet, it’s so much more than that too! Hear me out….
The Earth has an electrical charge to it, and we as humans, get our charge out of whack with everything we are exposed to all day long. You’ve heard me talk about my love for Himalayan salt lamps, because with all the appliances and electronics in our lives we take on positive ions and they help neutralize us with their emission of negative ions, well this is a similar idea.
When you think about it, most life forms on the Earth, accept for humans, always walk barefoot. Even back in ancient times humans walked barefoot or with leather shoes that still allowed conduction of the earth’s energy (the rubber soled shoes of today do not), and back then there weren’t nearly the health complications that there are in today’s society. So there is the belief that there is a connection between some of our chronic illnesses and our disconnect from the Earth (Ober, Chevalier, and Zucker, 2018).
When I first heard of this I was intrigued but admittedly a little skeptical, that is until the first article I read on this pointed out that when we spend days at the beach, we tend to sleep better those nights. Why? Because all day long we walked barefoot on the sand. I still wasn’t totally convinced because, if I’m at the beach, I’m on vacation, and more relaxed in general so that could also contribute to better sleeping. I will say this however…..when we went to Hilton Head Island this summer, Leyton hadn’t yet been sleeping through the night, and he did each night there. Again, I chalked it up to us just wearing him out all day, which may still have been the case. But, then I started doing it at home. Several days this summer (when I remembered) I would take Leyton outside and we would ground. We’d sit or stand in the yard for 30 minutes or so and just be. And friends I promise you, I noticed a difference each time. I’d become less stressed, more relaxed, and I swear he became less fussy if he was to begin with, and he slept better. In short, after doing it a few times, I became a believer.
In this article found on Chopra.com, it states that when you are grounded you feel more:
- Centered
- Strong
- Balanced
- Less Tense
- Less Stressed
And some health benefits according to the authors of that article, are:
- Decreased inflammation and pain
- Decreased stress
- Better circulation
(Ober, Chevalier, and Zucker, 2018)
So, how do you ground? It’s seriously the easiest health practice out there. Simply take off your shoes and socks and go stand or sit on grass, sand, dirt, or concrete for at least 30 minutes. All of those surfaces conduct energy (Ober, Chevaliet, and Zucker, 2018). Now, the only thing I did hear from someone once when discussing grounding, was that you have to pay some attention to where you are doing this, in that you don’t want to do it anywhere that has a large electrical current from wires or “man made electricity” (if I’m explaining that right) running under it. So the concrete in a city may not be the best choice, nor would the grass in say Central Park, because so much of the cities electrical current is running under there, and that’s not the energy you want to absorb. Not sure if that’s totally true or not but I heard that and it made sense.
Here I am….grounding at the beach…..which looks a whole lot like walking on the beach, because it is! That’s all it is 🙂
It doesn’t get any easier than that. So give it a try! What do you have to lose? And next time you do it take note as to if you feel any different. I think you’ll find you do. It’s a clean, natural way to help heal your body from the inside out. Even if you don’t have ailments, it’s just beneficial and supportive to our health to neutralize our charge anyways. And it’s an easy practice to start implementing into your life regularly.
Have you already tried grounding before? If so drop me a comment with your thoughts. If not here again is the article from Chopra.com with more detailed information about this centuries old practice. Happy grounding!
Source: Chevalier, G., Ober, C., and Zucker, M. 2018. Grounding the Human Body: The Healing Benefits of Earthing. https://chopra.com/articles/grounding-the-human-body-the-healing-benefits-of-earthing
