Grounding: Who Are You Telling to Calm Down?
When life feels overwhelming, how often have you heard or told someone to "just calm down"? While well-intentioned, those words can feel dismissive or even impossible in the moment. You might know you need to calm down, but how? This is where grounding comes in.
Grounding is more than just a buzzword or quick fix. It’s a set of powerful tools designed to help you regain control when anxiety, stress, or intense emotions take over. It allows you to shift from a state of fight-or-flight (sympathetic nervous system) to a state of rest and recovery (parasympathetic nervous system). When done regularly and practiced over time, grounding can become an essential part of your emotional toolkit.
But what is grounding exactly? And how do you actually use it? Let's break down the three types of grounding techniques—mental, physical, and soothing—while also exploring why they work and who can benefit from them.
Photo downloaded from Unsplash 9/2024 by Clint McKoy @clintmckoy
What is Grounding?
Grounding is a technique that helps you reconnect with the present moment, pulling you away from distressing thoughts, overwhelming emotions, or uncomfortable physical sensations. The essence of grounding lies in distraction—shifting your attention away from what’s troubling you toward something neutral or positive. Grounding isn't about solving your problems, but about creating enough space between you and the emotional storm that you can think more clearly and act more intentionally.Grounding can take many forms, but generally, it falls into three main categories: mental, physical, and soothing.
1. Mental Grounding: Distracting Your Mind
Mental grounding is all about redirecting your thoughts when they’ve spiraled into anxious loops or distressing narratives. When you’re consumed by unhelpful thoughts—like a relentless to-do list, feelings of inadequacy, or hypothetical worries about the future—mental grounding helps pull you out of your head and back into the present moment.
Here are some mental grounding techniques:
Listing categories: Think of your favorite songs, movies, or TV shows. Pick a category and list as many as you can. For example, you might list five favorite movies, or three TV shows you love.
Activity recall: Go through an activity you know well, step by step, in your mind. Cooking a favorite recipe is a great example. Imagine yourself making it from start to finish, from chopping the vegetables to serving the dish.
Count forwards and backwards: Try counting from 1 to 100, and then backward from 100 to 1. The focus required for this task can break the cycle of negative or anxious thinking.
Alphabet game: Choose a category—such as animals or cities—and work your way through the alphabet, naming something for each letter. This task demands your focus and pulls you into the present.
Mental grounding can be particularly helpful when your mind feels cluttered or chaotic. By focusing on something simple and neutral, you shift your attention away from distressing thoughts. This technique is perfect for those moments when you need a mental escape but still want to stay engaged with the world around you.
2. Physical Grounding: Reconnecting with Your Body
Sometimes, your body reacts to stress in ways that make it difficult to focus or feel grounded. You might notice your heart racing, your palms sweating, or a tightness in your chest or shoulders. This is your body’s fight-or-flight response kicking in—an automatic reaction to perceived danger. Physical grounding techniques aim to disrupt these sensations by helping you reconnect with your body and its surroundings.
Here are some physical grounding techniques:
Take a cold shower: The shock of cold water can quickly disrupt your body’s stress response and help you refocus. If taking a shower isn’t accessible to you, you can run cold or warm water over hands or even hold an ice pack. These options will all create similar sensations to focus on.
Progressive muscle relaxation: Starting from your toes and working your way up to your head, tense each muscle group for a few seconds, then release. This technique can relieve physical tension and bring your focus back to your body.
Carry a Grounding Object: Carry a small object like smooth rock, a pop it or even putty/slime. You can use it as a distraction technique focusing on the texture and temperature of it while moving it around in your hand.
Breathing exercises: Extend your breaths to 5-7 seconds. Long, deep breaths activate the parasympathetic nervous system, which is responsible for calming you down. It might take several slow, intentional breaths before you notice a shift, but paying attention to your breathing can be a powerful way to ground yourself.
Breathwork is one of the quickest ways to complete the stress cycle and bring your body back into a state of rest. Simply noticing your breath—whether you’ve been holding it or breathing shallowly—can lessen some of the physiological symptoms of stress. Grounding yourself physically not only breaks the cycle of stress but also serves as a reminder that you have some control over your body, even when anxiety feels overwhelming.
3. Soothing Grounding: Offering Yourself Compassion
Soothing grounding is a little different. While mental and physical grounding focus on distraction, soothing grounding is about offering yourself self-compassion and support when you're feeling harsh or judgmental. Grounding techniques in this category help you soothe your emotional state and develop a more compassionate inner dialogue.
Here are some soothing grounding techniques:
Neutral self-talk: Grounding in this way often involves practicing non-judgmental thinking. You don’t have to believe it at first, but try experimenting with neutral statements. For example, if you’re feeling self-critical, practice saying, “I’m doing the best I can right now.”
Use a coping statement: Create a list of positive affirmations or coping statements that resonate with you. Examples include “I can do hard things” or “I’ve gotten through tough times before, and I can do it again.”
Imagine a safe place: Close your eyes and imagine a safe, comforting place. Be as detailed as possible—where are you? What do you see? What do you smell? Who is there with you, if anyone? This mental image can help you feel safe and secure in moments of distress.
The goal of soothing grounding is to soften the harshness of your internal world. You don’t need to force yourself into positivity, but rather adopt a neutral, non-judgmental stance toward yourself. Over time, this practice can help you develop a more compassionate, balanced inner voice.
Grounding Object Photo downloaded from Unsplash 9/2024 by Markus Spiske @markusspiske
Grounding vs. Mindfulness: What’s the Difference?
At first glance, grounding and mindfulness may seem similar, but they serve different purposes. Mindfulness is about observing the present moment without judgment—whether that’s your thoughts, emotions, or physical sensations. The goal is to become aware of your experience as it is, without needing to change it.
Grounding, on the other hand, is an active way to distract and bring yourself out of distress. While mindfulness encourages acceptance, grounding provides a mental or physical shift away from discomfort. Grounding is about distraction, while mindfulness is about observation.
Both techniques are valuable and can complement each other, but grounding is particularly useful when you need a quick way to reduce distress and regain control.
Who Can Use Grounding and Why It Helps
Grounding is an accessible technique that can be used by anyone, regardless of age or experience with therapy. Teens, young adults, and adults alike can benefit from grounding when faced with overwhelming emotions, anxiety, or distress. For teens navigating the stress of academics, extracurriculars, and social pressures, grounding offers a way to step back and regain control. For adults managing life transitions, grounding provides a moment of calm in the storm.
Grounding techniques help deactivate the sympathetic nervous system (the fight-or-flight response) and engage the parasympathetic nervous system (the rest-and-digest system). By doing this, you bring your body and mind out of a state of high alert and back to a place where you can think more clearly and react more calmly.
Grounding Tips: How to Make it Work for You
Grounding isn’t one-size-fits-all. What works for someone else might not work for you, and that’s okay. The key is to practice grounding regularly—even when you’re not feeling distressed—so it becomes a skill you can access automatically in moments of need.
Here are a few additional grounding tips to keep in mind:
Keep it simple: Grounding techniques don’t have to be complicated. Sometimes the simplest exercises are the most effective.
Carry reminders: Write down your favorite grounding techniques or coping statements on a card or on your phone. Having them handy makes it easier to access them when you’re feeling overwhelmed.
Practice: Like any skill, grounding takes practice. The more you use it, the more automatic it becomes. Start practicing grounding in low-stress moments so that when distress strikes, you’re already familiar with the techniques.
Stay Neutral: Stay free of judgment and don’t over intellectualize this skill. Start by doing.
Conclusion:
Whether you're a teen navigating the pressures of school, a young adult managing life transitions, or an adult dealing with the stressors of daily life, grounding can help you find your footing. It’s not about calming down instantly but about building the tools to handle whatever comes your way with more balance and ease.
How does Patch Counseling help you?
If you notice a loud inner critic, racing thoughts or the physiological symptoms of stress and anxiety (i.e. racing heart, difficulty catching breath, sweating, nausea and/or tension in head/neck) then grounding can be a helpful skill. Patch Counseling provides a collaborative and compassionate place to learn concrete skills to support your day to day. Schedule your initial phone consultation to start feeling grounded.