Podcast – Episode 8: Grounding
Written by Ségolène
Did you see the rain this morning? What a downpour! And now the sun is shining, the sky is incredibly blue.
Now that’s Autumn for you: full of changes and surprises.
This week, we’re talking all things Grounding. Because we’re already living in uncertainty, and the temper of this seasonal new season will have us needing a lot of it too.
When we’re stressed, full of uncertainty, or fear even. All of these lovely parts of life come together and make us restless, it can be difficult to keep focused, sleep suffers, anxiety kicks in…
And all of these factors have a huge impact on your Voice: on a vocal (external) and internal level.
when you’re prone to stress, your cortisol level rises. This causes for your brain to “heat up”. Your thoughts are unsteady, you have a disconnect which happens between your breath, your body and your mind.
AND IF YOUR BREATH IS DISCONNECTED…
from your body, from your thoughts… Then your voice suffers too.
We’ve talked at great length on the importance of the breath and today is no exception.
When we’re stressed, our diaphragm tenses up. You’re not sending the oxygen all the way down our air column (see Episode 4, Episode 5 and Episode 6 for all the voice and breath knowledge!)
We need that conection for our voices to be strong, steady and to flow.
If your thoughtts are all over the place, paralyzed by fear, infused with stress, it affects your voice too.
So what can we do?
We ground.
We take space.
We reconnect with our surroundings, our environment and all the parts of our day that we usually just speed through, or even forget.
We rebuild our connection to the things we know are real. The few elements we can rely on. The parts of our body and our environmnent that we take for granted.
In this episode I run you through 3 ways, 3 aspects of your day-to-day that you can work on to anchor yourself.
Because that’s what grounding is: throwing an anchor in the sea of today, so you can focus on the present moment, and deal with the things you can handle.
Anxiety infiltrates itself into your life when you focus on something that “is a possibility”, that “could happen”, a future with a negative outcome which you dread. How are you meant to be present in our actions, in your speech if you’re trapped in a world of probabilities that you fear.
Come back to what you know:
The floor is always underneath your feet. Feel it.
Your heart is always beating. Hear it.
The air flows through your lungs. Breathe.
As well as looking at your breath…
As well as focusing on your awareness…
Look at your food.
Food is still often overlooked when looking at Grounding. But it’s such a great and simple way to bring our minds to ground, whilst fuelling our bodies at the same time.
So, make time for meals, leave phones and other screen-distractions aside and just take time to appreciate your meal, its flavours and ingredients. Be present in the action of preparing the food and eating it.
Have fun with your plate and give it the colors you see outside in nature!
There’s some food that are recommended when you need grounding, just as luck would have it: we’re at the beginning of Autumn and all that stuff is in season.
Here’s some foods to favour to ground yourselves.
All the potatoes & sweet potatoes
Squashes and pumpkins
All your turnips, carrots & beets
Make some soups and stews with lentils and pulses.
Add some mushrooms of all sorts.
Season with Ginger, Turmeric, Cardamom!
Top up your oats with walnuts, almonds, pecans or peauts.
Grab an apple on your break, treat yourself to some blackberries and pomegranate or pears.
Use Coconut oil or coconut milk to add a bit of sweetness to your life.
Mother Nature has everything you need to bring you closer to the ground wou walk on.
And if you need inspiration, check out my Instagram for some autumnal recipes! Including my Beetroot and Red Lentil soup!
Another way to look at grounding to understand its importance is by looking at the way electrical circuits are build.
The Ground Wire / Cable is here to connect your circuit to the “earth”. Because if you didn’t have that connection, your machine can become a danger to you and your home.
In the event of a shortcircuit, or some other wear & tear damage – and without your ground cable – your whole house could be set on fire.
So look after YOUR ground cable. Because if you don’t, you will experience your own fire from within.
And this will disconnect you further from your self, your world, your truth.
And without the support of those, your Voice will weaken on every plane.
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