By: Erin Alexandra
Until I began having panic attacks myself, I never gave much thought to grounding. I cannot repeat this enough. Grounding works. And it takes practice.
It may sound silly or easy to dismiss at first. I am listing things I can see and feel? It can sound too simple to be effective. How could this possibly help?
Sometimes it’s the simplest things that are the most effective. The act of noticing brings us to the present. This is Key in grounding. Our minds cannot focus on the past and present simultaneously. When we begin to name things we can see, and smell, and hear and feel, we cannot also be worrying about the future or living a past trauma. It brings you to NOW. Your mind might like an elastic, snap back to whatever you were worrying about, and that’s okay. You can return to the grounding practice as many times as you need. Grounding is not trying to fix the past, or predict the future, it’s keeping your attention on the present moment to help minimize your distress so that you can carry on with your day, or find solutions to whatever is causing you the distress in the first place.
Through grounding, we can also begin to rely on ourselves to support our needs. We won’t always have someone with us who can offer support. When we build the skill of grounding ourselves, we also build trust in ourselves, along with strength and confidence. Grounding doesn’t only support us in moments of distress. It also shapes how we view ourselves and how we understand our own distress. Sometimes the tough way is through. And grounding can be our guide.
If the intensity of distress is higher, you may need to engage in grounding for longer. This can feel frustrating. And at the same time, the more we practice, the faster grounding can begin to work. Our bodies and minds start to lean into the safety of it.
If one grounding technique doesn’t work, it can be easy to throw the baby out with the bath water and decide that grounding doesn’t work at all. Sometimes it’s not that grounding isn’t effective. It’s that we haven’t found the right kind yet, or we stopped before it had time to settle. It is important to note that not all grounding techniques have the same level of efficacy for everyone. If you find yourself too much in your body, a mental grounding might feel safer, if you are too much in your head then a physical grounding might feel more effective. Grounding is about what works for you, and that means experimenting with different techniques to figure that out.
Grounding does not require perfection. It requires engagement. And that can be hard.
Another reason some folks might find grounding doesn’t work, is that they’re outside their window of tolerance and in such high distress that grounding won’t be nearly as effective. If you’re like me and you never realize it until it’s too late and your in high distress, what might be supportive with this challenge is to learn to notice your early warning signs that you’re moving outside your window of tolerance, or the moments when anxiety, panic, or distress begins to move into your body and mind. You can even say out loud, or quietly to yourself, I need to ground myself. This can act as an anchor. And this way you can learn to begin grounding before the intensity level increases.
Keep trying. Your nervous system is learning, even when it doesn’t feel like it.
In the spirit of grounding, attached is a vagus nerve meditation that has brought me out of a storm more than once. Please give it a try and perhaps include it into your tool box for when you need it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hHFEL63eyCo