Barefoot and Badass: Behind the Scenes of Grounding Techniques

EP66: Barefoot and Badass

Erin: [00:00:00] Hey, we are back. Well, I should probably just say me as in Erin. I am back this week for a solo episode. So that's pretty exciting. We always have fun kind of jumping on here, given our own takes on various things that we're passionate about and love. So today it's my turn.

And today we are going to touch on Something that some of you may consider a little bit woo woo, and it's called grounding techniques. but before we get into today's show, I want to touch on a couple of exciting things that we have kicking off for all of you.

And the first one is our new program called Copper Warrior and Copper Warrior is something we're super excited about because we've been trying to figure out a way of how to tools and resources and healing into the first responder community. nationally. And since Cinnamon and I are based in Ohio and are only licensed in Ohio and Kentucky, we have [00:01:00] created a very special program just for you to all partake in.

So Copper Warrior is a 12 week intensive and transformative program that we've put together, touching on various areas and dynamics of your life to create resilience, healing tools. power, a different conversation with the relationships that you're having, an opportunity to really grow and evolve and thrive into the person that you are meant to be.

And here's the deal. If you do it, And you do with the way that it's structured. We honestly can't see how folks can't come out completely transformed and coming from a different place and the end of this whole thing. So this is a coaching program. It's not a therapeutic program. However, we are going to be using some of our understanding of the brain and the body to incorporate techniques and.

Practices for you to thrive in your life. So we're real excited about that. In [00:02:00] addition, we are going to be rolling out a very special program for relationships just for you and your spouse, you and your partner, whoever that might be in your life. If you want to develop, evolve, grow, understand how to better and effectively communicate, understand maybe even what your partner's thinking, even though that can be scary sometimes.

Really learn the tools that it takes to blossom a strong, powerful, loving, committed, connected relationship. We will be rolling out that program very soon as well. So if any of this sounds interesting to you, please click the link in our show notes and fill out the little form and we will circle back around to you to get you some more information on what those programs look like.

Enough of that for today. I do want to touch on grounding techniques. Okay, so let's just get all of [00:03:00] the yeah buts and conversations out there because here's the deal. I know that if I am in front of a group of first responders and I say, if I say the word mindfulness, What comes to mind, you know, sometimes I get like some real honest answers and other times I hear folks say things like, um, or some kind of silly like hippies or patchouli or something like that.

Okay, I get it, right? There's been so much conversation in our culture about mindfulness and it's almost overused, I would say at this point, because it is. Something that people are beginning to utilize as a tool in their life to help them mitigate stress, to help them get more present, to heal from even some stressful experiences in their life, various reasons that, folks might get [00:04:00] into various mindfulness practices, but it's a really, really loose term.

Just like the term grounding techniques is a very, very loose term and they all incorporate though into one another. And so the reason I want to really highlight more of a grounding technique versus your generalized mindfulness techniques is because this to me is something that can be brought into Your morning routines, your breaks at work, if you get a break, your opportunities for pause at work, and they look a little bit different in the way that they bring you back to the present moment.

So grounding techniques work by grounding you in that present moment, and it pulls you away from intrusive thoughts or feelings. This also refers to not only having your feet on the ground, but also your mind on the ground. So when you can turn your attention away from thoughts, memories, or worries, you can really [00:05:00] refocus on that present moment.

And any of you that maybe have practiced any form of grounding techniques or mindfulness practice know that in the present moment, Everything is just as it should be. That is where stress can leave our body. That is where the story of what we have to do tonight when we get home, the conflict we might be having with our spouse, or the conflicts we might be having with our children, or the fears that might be coming up about our future, or maybe even some of the pain from our past.

All of that is washed away. When we are in that present moment. And so part of the reason that we experience so much freaking stress all the time is because we are living in the past or we are living in the future. I touched on some of this stuff back, gosh, a long time ago. I don't even know, last year sometime in an episode called simple ways to get present, Which was just three [00:06:00] different techniques that you could use as a way to get present and so This is very similar, but really, I want to touch on the importance of grounding techniques in why it matters.

So like I said, it might get kind of woo woo, bear with me. my goal today is not only to kind of like educate you and teach you about why grounding techniques are important, but to also provide you with a giant, big fat list of Of different techniques that you can use in your life to help get you grounded, recentered, and refocused. And here's what I'm clear on.

There are certain things that do not work for me. There are also certain things that may actually induce stress, and by things I mean certain techniques that may actually induce stress as opposed to help mitigate stress. so the tools and the resources that I'm going to give you today in our show notes are various different types of things that you can do.[00:07:00] 

So I invite you to try a few of them, see what feels good, see what actually makes a difference, because you might totally hate one. And love another one, but I guess the key is to not try once and say, Oh, this doesn't work and just give up. The key is for you to actually use this, be committed to it, find the ones that work for you.

And then, Make them part of your daily practice, not just when you are feeling stressed out, because the more that we can practice when we're not in a heightened space of stress, when our nervous system is freaking out of whack, the better that we're going to be able to utilize these tools when that stuff does happen.

 So if we're able to do it when things are calm and when we're just waking up in the morning, and there isn't a whole lot going on, then when shit hits the fan We're definitely gonna be more readily available to use these tools at that time [00:08:00] because we've practiced them when there isn't a lot of noise going on around us.

 I don't know about you, but often I, get this feeling of like, I can't, I just cannot calm down. Like my brain is going faster than necessary. I am in a panic. You know, it feels like nothing is going my way, all of those things. And so grounding is really like a self soothing skill. And you can use this whether you're having a bad day or you're dealing with a lot of stress or overwhelming feelings or some even extreme anxiety.

But again, like I said, you can use this just in your everyday practices to really, really become comfortable with using these as a tool.

But let's get into a little bit more of what grounding means. this is where the woo comes in. Okay. you may or may not know that we as human beings are just part of an energetic system. And so everything in the world is really [00:09:00] simply made up of energy. Okay. 

so when we're thinking about energy and we're thinking about the energy that. is going on all around us, and we're talking about grounding. I am actually physically inviting you to go out with your bare feet and stand on the Earth. And here's why. Because what it does is it connects our body's energy with the Earth's energy.

And it uses that natural electric charge to stabilize ourself. I get it. It sounds woo. And I have clients, I'm telling you what, who never in a billion years would ever consider doing this, but do this as a everyday practice and really have found great benefits in what that is. So, one of the easiest ways to ground yourself is definitely by going out and walking barefoot.

this can be in the grass or the sand, mud is always fun, feels a little squishy, [00:10:00] but also gets you very, very connected if you want to feel risky. but allowing your skin to actually touch the natural ground can provide you with real grounding energy and recenter you.

And it's all because we are all. energetically connected, and it really does make a big difference.

so an even deeper theory behind grounding is that it helps people to connect with their inner and outer reality. A lot of our stress is in our brains, right? It's like we're, it's stuck inside of us. And so what this does is it's kind of an interruption of, okay, let's get back to reality here so that I can better engage with my emotional and psychological problems.

I'm going to get connected to the earth to remind myself where my feet are quite literally. Sometimes when I watch folks feeling off kilter or stressed out, I'm like, Hey, where's your butt right now? Yeah. Because it reminds them like, Oh, wait, whoa, wherever I am in this story or in this fear or in this conversation [00:11:00] is not where my butt is.

It is either in the past or in the future and there's actually nothing I can do about it right now.

Let me touch on one more time because I really kind of glossed over this, but I want to touch on how grounding techniques can help create a space from distressing feelings in nearly any situation. But they're especially helpful for improving things like anxiety, your overall well being, um, stress management, depression, mood, post traumatic stress disorder, dissociation, which also can look like numbing, like just kind of vanishing off of, Um, even though your body's still here, your mind is not, you're gone. These techniques can really help with all of that stuff. But what it's actually doing, like, let's get kind of nerdy here just because it's fascinating and important that you understand is that it is impacting the brain in such incredible ways.

Our bodies and our brains know what to [00:12:00] do. it knows and they know how to handle situations. It's just, we've gotten so used to external things. to be the fix for us that we forget that we have everything within us to be able to resolve certain situations in our life as far as mitigating these adverse reactions that we're having in our body that feel so freaking uncomfortable.

So, you've heard me talk about this before if you listen to the show, but it activates our parasympathetic nervous system. And that parasympathetic nervous system is what I like to think of as like a parachute. That is our rest and digest. So I think parachute, which is how I remember it, kind of like I'm gliding down to rest.

these exercises activate that parasympathetic nervous system. They increase our prefrontal cortex activity.

So when I say it increases our prefrontal cortex activity, what I'm talking about is that's the part that regulates our thoughts and our [00:13:00] actions and our motions.

So, it's important that we're activating that space so we can get out of that fight or flight, which is where we are just really in a survival mode. And in survival mode, we cannot calm down because we are quite literally trying to run from the bear and stay alive. And so, we want that prefrontal cortex activated so that we can get back into our, healthy decision making and back into our response control so that we can actually shift the conversation, if you will, with what's going on in our, our minds. Brain in our body and how they're completely off kilter. The other cool thing is it releases all those yummy internal drugstore, things that we love like the endorphins and the serotonin and the dopamine.

So those positive yummy juices get flowing. it decreases our amygdala activity, which is again going back into that survival, space. Thanks. We don't want to [00:14:00] have amygdala activated because then we are just trying to survive. It improves our neural connectivity. We've talked about this too, about, the idea that our brains are kind of like running on some super highway.

And we have the ability to build new pathways to healthier, Ways to cope and thrive that with practice if we're up against a stressful experience When we practice these different techniques, we no longer have to go down that bumpy road anymore that causes us distress and discomfort.

We'll get to where the fork in the road in our brain, we will actually be able to slow down enough to choose. Okay, do I want to go down that old school, bumpy ass, pot hole filled road that causes me discomfort? Okay, do I want Or do I want to go down this other pathway, which might take a little bit longer, [00:15:00] but it will be smooth sailing the whole way through. It allows us to create the pause before we go into reaction when we're up against something stressful. And that's so freaking important.

So I touched on a little bit about how the brain is impacted, but what are you going to see in your body? When doing these grounding exercises when making this a practice and part of your life You're gonna notice regulated heart rate Which for me that's like one of the first things I notice is my heart starts pounding Many of us aren't even aware that that's happening anymore because it's just something that our body naturally does so often that we might not even be noticing or There's the other side too, where we are so used to being in a stressful environment at all times that we no longer even get activated and our heart no longer responds in that same way.

And that's a whole nother conversation. [00:16:00] But getting into this kind of work can also help lower your blood pressure, can relax your muscles, and improve your breathing. It reduces those. Cortisol levels, which those are actually quite damaging if you know anything about that, and I know we've touched on that before.

It can help with your digestion and increase your blood flow and even improve your sleep quality, which who doesn't want better sleep? I know that that is a huge concern that goes on with the first responder population is not being able to sleep. 

So again, let's highlight some stuff. The idea is to reduce the anxiety and the panic and decrease those feelings of anxiety and help manage that anxiety, even manage what some experience often, which is those panic attacks. it improves the ability to manage and respond to those emotional experiences.

They provide increased resilience. practicing [00:17:00] grounding techniques can build resilience to stress and enhance the ability to cope with situations a little bit differently. That's what I was talking about with having the ability to actually pause before a reaction occurs. I know for me, I often feel really, really out of control that I can't pause, that I get so stressed.

I went through this. training years and years ago, and it was really about embodying feminine power and so on and so forth and different like poses that we would do to kind of embody these different ways of being, and one of them was called the neutral position.

Well, at this point. I didn't have a lot of techniques and tools in my life. I didn't know how to regulate myself. I just constantly felt like I was a ticking time bomb getting ready to freak out. so when they [00:18:00] taught us this pose, if you will, of neutral, my brain was automatically freaking the heck out.

It was like, there's no freaking way I'm going to be able to Do this pose in order to shift myself into neutral when there is like milliseconds between an activating event, which we touched on when we talked about the behavior chain and my reaction to the activating event. it's like, thing happens, I'm flipping out.

There was no ability to pause whatsoever to even squeeze this pose in there. But what I learned was with practice, I could do it. 

It's a right to feel like, yeah, no way, this might work for them, but it won't work for me. It's okay to have that feeling because we all have those feelings, but with practice it can be. And something even as simple as putting your tongue to the roof of your mouth is a [00:19:00] beautifully effective tool in pausing before we react.

The biggest benefits that I've noticed by practicing. Any grounding techniques and various mindfulness practices, including meditation, is that it elevates my mood. I'm in a better mood. I am more present, which allows me to not be in the story of what's going on in my life. It just creates this overall sense of well being and then in addition, because I am in this like elevated, more positive mood, it also enhances and helps my mental clarity and it helps me focus a little bit better.

It in fact allows me to be more productive. So instead of like a hamster on its wheel, I'm able to. Just do the next thing in front of me and the next thing in front of me instead of doing a bunch of crap Not well, I'm able to Do one thing at a time well, and then move on to the next thing [00:20:00] now that I've kind of like gone over a few of those things I'm going to explain a few different techniques to you.

Just, I like the number three clearly because I did three last time, but these are three new ones that I haven't touched on before. And then again, like I said, I will put in the show notes a whole list of other things that you can do.

Okay, now that you kind of understand why Erin is coming at you with some woo woo grounding techniques, the first one I want to talk to you about. And if you are on Instagram and want to dig through our Instagram page, I do a whole little video on it actually guiding you through how to do this process.

And I'm happy to put that link in the show notes too so you don't have to go digging through our Instagram so that you can kind of watch me go through the process as a more guided option, because I know sometimes that helps to have somebody guide me through things. But this first technique is called 4 7 8 breathing. And I use this [00:21:00] technique so many times a day and it really does help it's broken down into three simple steps. the first step is you're going to breathe in through your nose for a count of four.

You want to make sure that you fill your lungs with air. Get them full and try to fill your lungs all the way down into your belly because I don't know if you know this, but for most of us that are. Under a lot of stress, a lot of the time, we breathe really shallow. I know for me, sometimes I'm like, holy crap, I just realized I was holding my breath and I was completely unaware how much I was not filling my lungs with air.

So that's the important part is breathing in through your nose for that count of four and really getting your lungs filled. And it's not like one, two, three, four. It's like one, two, three, four. One, two, three, four. So slowly, okay? Once you get that first [00:22:00] breath in for your count of four, you're going to hold that breath for a count of seven.

 Then you're going to trust your body is going to know how to exhale and you're going to slowly and naturally let that air leave your lungs by exhaling through your mouth this time for a count of eight. So one, two, One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight. Just like that. Okay?

Then ideally repeat that. Repeat those three steps five to eight times. I would even encourage you to repeat and do this as a morning practice for yourself. To just get it implemented into your life. That breathing in for a count of four. Holding it for a count of seven and releasing it for a count of eight.

And what this does is it activates that vagus nerve, which is part of the Parasympathetic [00:23:00] nervous system. Remember the parachute or floating down. We're getting into that rest and digest that chill area where we can calm ourselves down. So. Not going to lie, it is one of my favorites, but again, some of these aren't for everybody.

The next technique that I want to teach you is 5 4 3 2 1 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13. Well, you know how we always feel like we got to sing because it's how our brain works, but the 5 technique is super simple and it's using your senses because why? Our senses? our senses are what brings us back to the present moment. So simple. All you're going to do is you're going to identify five things that you can see around you. You're going to identify four things that you can hear, three things that you can touch, [00:24:00] two things that you can smell, and one thing that you can taste.

Listen, I'm not telling you to carry around a mint or a piece of candy with you doesn't hurt because if you really pay attention, you can taste something in your mouth, whether you want to or not, the onions from that burger, the coffee from your breakfast, whatever it is, but just get present to that taste that's in your mouth. Okay?

One of the final things I do want to share with you is a tool called progressive muscle relaxation. I'm not sure if you're aware, but we are freaking balls of tension all the time, whether we are aware of it or not. Sometimes I, love to get a good massage and I will notice like, holy crap, I didn't realize that my shoulders were up to my ears until someone started touching me and actually moving them down to where they're supposed to be.

Like we are just [00:25:00] tense. We hold that energy. it was our body's response to automatically react to those stressful situations. And then we become tense. so The way that progressive muscle relaxation works is we are intentionally making ourselves tense so we can experience what it feels like to not be tense. So what progressive muscle relaxation really is, is. An opportunity to tighten up each muscle group and we are turning on that tension and then experiencing what it feels like for the sweet release of it all. what I will say is that if you have injuries in anywhere in your body, you can still do the exercise, but maybe skip that body part.

 So if you have like shoulder issues or a foot issue or anything like that, maybe skip that body part on that side. But ideally, I personally like to start from my feet and work my way up because it's easy for me to remember where I am. All [00:26:00] you're going to do is you're going to kind of put your attention on your feet.

You can do this sitting down, you can do this laying down, whatever feels comfortable to you in that moment or whatever is available to you in the moment is all that matters. But you're going to start with

taking a deep breath in. Breathing is super important, folks. On every single thing that you do, remember to breathe. So take a nice deep breath in. Once you get to that top of that breath, just hold your breath. And as you're holding it, as you get to the top of that breath, tighten the muscles in your feet as tight as you can.

Tight, tight, tight, tight, tight, tight, tight, tight, tight. For a count of five, let that breath out and release that tension in that foot. Then you're going to move up to the other side. Your calves, then your thighs. Each time being sure to take a deep breath in, hold that breath and tighten that muscle, whatever muscle you're [00:27:00] at, and then letting that breath out.

releasing that muscle, get to your butt, get to your stomach, get to your hands, tighten your hands up really tight, tighten up those pecs, tighten up the shoulders, tighten up your face. Oh my gosh. Talk about RBF. How many of you have been told you have RBF? some of us just look like that, but also some of us just have such tension in our face that we don't even realize.

you can take. As much time with this process as you want or it feels supportive to you, but really being able to experience that Release of oh my gosh. How good does it feel to? Experience what it's like to not feel tense all the freaking time. It's awesome

 I hope that you will begin to use these techniques in your life Call it woo. I don't care what you call it. Be a skeptic. That's fine with me, but do it anyway. See if it works. I [00:28:00] really, really, really am putting you on a mission to be curious about this stuff. Give it a chance.

Give it a real chance. I know that we have had various guests In fact, the majority of our guests who are really putting their mental health first and really focusing on healing use some type of mindfulness practice, a grounding technique in their life every single day because it actually does. Jason Warn talks a lot about it. Tim Sears talks a lot about it. AK Dozanti. I mean, the list goes on and on of people who have talked about their relationship with these kind of practices and how they have helped them mitigate the stress in their life, improve their relationships because they're not freaking a ticking time bomb all the time, and feel like they have some control in some way, shape, or form in their life and how they are experiencing stressful situations.

So, be sure to go [00:29:00] to Today's show notes to make sure that you have access to the many, many, many various grounding techniques that are in there. Also, you can find out and learn a lot, lot more about why these techniques matter, how they work, how they can improve your life if you so choose. I really hope that this helps you, that this brings you some peace and some ease in your life and this really can work for you. So until next time, we'll see you soon.