You're Grounded!!!
The benefits of being Grounded as much as possible
This post is a short explanation about Grounding, also known as Earthing. If your health and well-being was a piece of music, Earthing would be the chord progression. Its not exciting and fun like the melody line, its not catchy like the bass or the drum track, but its necessary to the song. If it was absent, the song would be disjointed and disrupted. So with that perspective in mind, let’s take a look at Earthing.
What is Earthing and why do it?
Earthing is electrically grounding yourself to the Earth. The Earth is full of negatively charged particles, and the atmosphere is full of positively charged particles. When there is an imbalance between earth and atmosphere, this imbalance is corrected in the form of lightning. Planet-wide, there are an average of 5000 lightning strikes per minute. Electrical energy is part of our planet and environment and it is also part of our human physiology.
We are electrical beings, as well as chemical and biological beings. We are constantly absorbing positively charged particles from the atmosphere as well as the electrical gadgets we have. The negative side of the equation is the Earth and in order to balance our body’s electricity we need to be connected to the Earth, grounded. (This is a rather simplified explanation, for more details, check out the resources section below.)
For millennia, humans have lived connected to the surface of the earth, keeping our bio-electricity in balance. We walked barefoot, or with animal-hide shoes. We slept on the ground - or on animal skins. We were connected to the ground, without even thinking about it, just as much as we were connected to the air around us. What changed? Modern life. Shoes, beds, well insulated houses and other buildings, vehicles, and asphalt. I am NOT recommending we return to primitive life, but ask yourself this; How often do you physically connect to the earth with your bare skin? If you’re like most of us, the answer is not much, if ever.
Most of us wake up in our well-insulated homes, put on our synthetic-soled shoes as we head out the door, and get into our vehicles with rubber tires, where we will head to our insulated work places or schools, after which maybe we’ll go for a walk or another outdoor activity to get some sun (wearing those insulating shoes) and then head back to our insulated homes to sleep for the night.
The problem with this scenario is that this complete disconnect from the Earth results in an imbalance in our body’s electricity. Among other problems, this can cause inflammation: Free-radicals do not have enough negatively-charged particles to complete their job properly within our body and start destroying healthy cells to get the electrical energy they need, causing chronic inflammation, pain and leading to more serious diseases (again this is a simplified explanation and for more details, see the resources below).
After 20 years of research in electrophysiology and biofeedback, and another ten with Earthing, I have come to regard the contemporary biochemical model of the human body as severely lacking. What’s largely missing is a fundamental understanding of the bioelectrical nature of our physiology.
The body is a highly intelligent electro-bio-chemical system that is strongly influenced by its internal electrical environment….Our research leads us to conclude that a lack of grounding leads to internal electrical instability that in turn results in physiological dysfunction.
-Gaetan Chevalier, Ph.D.
Most of us remember how good we felt after a day at the beach, or a holiday in a warm location, but we tend to chalk that up to the sunshine, fresh air and taking a break. While all of these definitely contribute to better health, there is one more ingredient that we are missing in that equation of “feeling better”: Earthing.
What can you do to ground yourself? Going barefoot outdoors as much as possible definitely makes a difference, but depending on where you live, this may not be possible for much of the year. Thankfully, there is another way to ground; you can use the electrical system of your house to ground yourself while you sleep! There are products called Earthing sheets (and Earthing pads) that are made with conductive materials that you plug in to the grounding port of the electrical outlets in your home to connect yourself to the grounding rod of your home’s electrical system—and through it, to the Earth.
Grounding/Earthing is a potent tool for your self-care handbag but it needs to be taken seriously. If you are on any medication and/or have a chronic disease, you need to do this slowly and in conjunction with your doctor. It can work very quickly and cause issues like die-off (flu-like symptoms from parasitical die-off), thinning of the blood (not good if you’re already on blood-thinners) and other contraindications with medication. So before you use a grounding sheet for a full night, speak to your health practitioner and make sure you can be monitored properly, then start with only a small amount of time each day, working your way up to a full night.
To be continued next week with my personal story of how Earthing helped me and what conditions Earthing can help with.
More Information About Earthing
Earthing: The Most Important Health Discovery Ever! by Clint Ober, Stephen Sinatra and Martin Zucker . This book is written partly by the original researcher behind Earthing. Its an amazing resource full of references to the studies performed, and stories of people who have been helped by Earthing. It also explains in detail exactly how earthing works.
The Science of Grounding, a video overview of grounding and its benefits.
There are many Earthing products available on Amazon, and also from Earthing.com
“Part of being naturally healthy and functioning optimally appears to involve connectedness to the Earth. Being disconnected seems to be both unnatural and unhealthy. The disconnect creates unnecessary suffering in the form of sickness, inflammation, pain and poor sleep—the consequences of an electron deficiency. Connecting to the Earth remedies that deficiency and its consequences.”
-Clint Ober