Introduction
These grounding exercises are additional ways to help regulate your nervous system. They help bring you back to a state of safety and, when practiced regularly, make that sense of safety easier to return to.
Tapping goes further: it not only calms the body but also helps release the emotions, beliefs, and memories that create the sense of social threat in the first place.
Use these grounding tools anytime you need to steady yourself; they complement tapping beautifully.
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Understanding Your Nervous System:
The autonomic system, which handles involuntary responses, has two parts:Â
Sympathetic division
The sympathetic nervous system is where the Fight-Flight-Freeze (FFF) response happens. This happens when the brain perceives a threat.
Parasympathetic division
The parasympathetic nervous system triggers a calming response. It is activated by default when there is no threat. This sense of calm is our normal resting state.
In this state, we naturally restore the damage done by the FFF activation.
How Will These Grounding Exercises Help You
Through these grounding exercises, we deliberately activate the parasympathetic nervous system. Deliberately triggering this sense of calm strengthens the parasympathetic response.
And when you make this natural rest and recovery response stronger, you are counteracting an overactive FFF.
Grounding exercises are calming and soothing to your body. And the practice sends signals to your brain that you are safe in this moment. And over time, it helps in decreasing your anxiety.
They help you âreconnect with your bodyâ and give you a stronger sense of self-control.
These exercises, and many of the tapping and other energy psychology exercises, train your brain to believe you can handle stressful situations. They help you get closer and closer to feeling you can handle anything that comes your way.
All of these exercises tune you to the present moment. Because ultimately, right now in the present, you are SAFE.
Sure, lots of things may go wrong in the future. And anxiety results from potential danger. Fear is a response to actual danger in the moment. Anxiety is a response to potential danger.
And when youâre in the comfort of your home doing these exercises, you are actually totally safe.
The present moment in the comfort of your own home doesnât pose a threat. And so we aim to ground ourselves in the safety of this present moment.
Three Ways To Use These Grounding Exercises
1. To practice a sense of calm and counteract the FFF
The more you feel something, the more likely you are to feel it again.
By practicing a sense of calm, you begin feeling this more and more. This does a world of good, and helps in decreasing anxiety over a period of time. You create an internal environment that soothes anxiety.
Since this doesnât happen overnight, this is a practice you do. Perhaps you pick one of the exercises, and you do them each day before going to bed.
Do the exercises first when youâre in a good emotional place already. And when youâre not disturbed by anything. Donât begin practicing these when youâre already in a stressed state. Practice them when youâre in a calm state.
2. Before you do some inner work
For deep inner work, you need to feel safe. These exercises can help you feel that sense of safety. So doing a little grounding exercise prior to your tapping can be beneficial.
3. When youâve gotten triggered badly.
When youâve gotten triggered badly, these exercises help you come back to the reality of the present moment. Now it might just help a little, but be open to it being very helpful. And, if it only helps a little, that little bit is helpful!