Getting grounded isn’t just something your parents did to you and it’s not just about sitting out on a rock being still or calming down. Grounding is an active process, half of the equation for healers and spiritual practitioners. Without it we get sick, or overwhelmed, dealing with a host of symptoms as we get stuck with our clients energy and issues. Yes, grounding is about…drum roll…. the ground. Which is all about earth and rock and stability and support, slow moving things and geological time. But it’s more than that.
There is a counterbalance to our bodies and our lives in each and every moment. If all we do is reach upwards, we lose our balance and fall. We’ve all experienced this when stretching up to grasp something on the highest shelf while standing on our tiptoes. Or think about heavy lifting. If we are going to lift something (safely without tweaking our backs) then we get a wide stance and sink low to the ground first, then push up. We go down to go up. Grounding is this process in our spiritual life as well as the physical.
Energy moves through our bodies in a multiplicity of ways, but the main channel is the prana channel that runs from top to bottom, head to feet. Energy runs from top to bottom, but also bottom to top. We are like the hollow bone as described in the medicine teachings of my North American elders, allowing the energy to move in both directions at the same time to maintain our balance, our health, and our strength. The energy coming through the top of us is Akashic. It is the universal energy which reminds of us who we are, spiritual beings living an embodied life, and which inspire us to action. The energy coming from the bottom to the top is earth energy, embodiment energy, supporting us in our actions and reminding us of what we can become, of what we came here to be, and that the point of it all is love. It is as active a force as Universal energy, but, for some reason, it is one of the most neglected of all the resources we posses.
Grounding is an active process. Just ask anyone in the downward dog position in yoga. Pressing your palms into the mat, getting your hip bones in the air, pushing back with your thighs to get your legs straight. The hope that one day your heels will be on the ground -come on hamstrings, come on – Or think of being inverted. Shoulder stands or head stands teach us quickly how active grounding is. Because if you aren’t securely grounded in the pose you will quickly become grounded as you topple to the floor in a heap and that type of grounding can either be ridiculous or injurious depending on the moment.
Grounding is how the hollow bone of the healer works with clients and keeps themselves healthy. Because as the client releases, the healer absorbs and then releases themselves. Releases the negative, the no longer necessary out of themselves and into the earth. Let’s the earth recycle, letting it accept this raw material to make things new and fresh again. Without grounding the healer must process this energy out as if it were their own, taking on the issues of the client and making a wreck of their own lives.
Ground is no joke. It’s an amazing, active, blessing in our lives. Get grounded more often and see how much better life can be.