Grounding

While my step-daughter was here visiting, we spent a few days in Seattle. Seattle is a beautiful city with many wondrous things to see and do, but we all agreed that the highlight of our visit was the Seattle Aquarium. We spent the morning touching anemones, starfish and sea urchins, and staring face to face with fish large and small of every color. Everyone came away with a favorite exhibit but my favorite by far was the octopus.

The large and beautiful specimen was in a hamster cage-like tank that was actually two large tanks with a tube of water connecting the two. I watched in fascination as the almost red animal moved across the bottom of the first tank - always connected to the rocks underneath him. He then sent one long arm through the tube to then be in contact with the rocks on the floor of the second tank before he began to move through the tube in route to his destination. By the time that he was fully through the tube and his body settled onto the floor of the new tank, he had changed colors to match the new tank's floor and was now almost white.

As I stood appreciating this magnificent creature, I was reminded of another spiritual practice that can help us to discover our true essence and help us to find what makes our hearts sing. Creating an empty interval and spending time connecting to the higher aspects of ourselves and the Divine is essential but if we are always connecting up without staying connected to the stability and the constancy of the earth beneath us then we can be too flighty to be able to bring the gifts of our higher selves down into our everyday existence.

I have been taught many different ways to become and to stay more grounded. One is to create an empty interval while having both feet securely on the floor. While in this calm and peaceful space, spend several minutes visualizing your feet sprouting roots that grow deeply into the earth and feel them bringing you more stability and quiet strength. Another method is to do a visualization as you did before but instead of visualizing roots, see a heavy rope or cord extending from the base of your spine and descending deeply into the earth and becoming connected to the center of the earth. As you watch, you can imagine the cord tightening and making you feel more secure and less vulnerable. Another method is to go out into nature and sit on a rock or on the earth or stand with your back against a tall deeply rooted tree, close your eyes and relax into the groundedness of nature. Any of these methods will help you to feel less tossed about by strong emotions, more secure in who you are and what you are doing and like the octopus - help you to stay connected to where you are trying to go. Another way to think of this is, without a grounded lightning rod - you will never attract a flash of lightning. Without being deeply grounded - you will never attract a down flow of Spirit - from your higher aspects or from the Divine.

A regular grounding visualization or activity done for several minutes a couple times a day can make a real difference in how you move through the world, how you handle difficult parts of your day and how you connect to and pull down higher aspects of who you are. Happy grounding!