Mindfulness: Grounding Techniques for Calming Down Quickly

Transcript

[Music] hello everyone and welcome to another day of mindfulness with operation health at home my name is Jennifer Nuland and I am the expressive arts therapist and yoga instructor at home base a partnership with the Red Sox foundation in Massachusetts General Hospital today I will be reviewing some grounding techniques these grounding exercises are ways to firmly anchor yourself in the present moment they can be especially helpful any time you find yourself becoming overwhelmed or distracted by distressing thoughts feelings or memories grounding exercises are similar to the practice of mindfulness or meditation where practicing these skills daily and preventative ly will support the longevity of their benefits if you are interested in learning more about mindfulness please refer to our earlier videos the following exercises will be helpful to reduce and reevaluate in moment anxiety or overwhelming stress if you ever find that you have thoughts that ruminate or there are particular parts of your day that might be more difficult than others try using some of these techniques to decrease your stress level the first method that we will be going over is the 5 4 3 2 1 method in this method you'll name five things you can see 4 things you can feel 3 things you can hear 2 things you can smell and one thing you can taste really the goal of this method is to engage all of the senses that you have in order to ground yourself bring yourself into bodily awareness and present moment awareness the next method is take 10 slow breaths now you can take 10 slow breaths on your own without any action and just breathe for a moment or you can take the first four breaths with your hand on your chest or your hand on your belly or one on your chest and one on your belly as you breathe having your hands placed on your body gives you biofeedback and it will allow your body to recognize its breath ground itself and take a moment to relax this biofeedback also initiates the parasympathetic nervous system that's the nervous system that helps you to calm yourself it takes you out of fight-or-flight you can use the next six breaths to just smooth the edges of that inhale and that exhale so what I mean by that is to try to feel as though your breath is one continuous motion so I'm gonna inhale and then fall into the exhale and then cycle back into the inhale fall into the exhale instead of making it a static inhale exhale you're allowing it to become a cycle so the next grounding technique that we're gonna review is called object permanence in this method the goal is to just remind yourself and take a moment to say facts about where you are and what you're doing so this could be your name where you are what year is it what age you are who you're with any permanent recognition of this moment in time that you can use to appreciate your surroundings another grounding technique you can use is called body awareness and in this technique the goal is to recognize more feelings and sensations that you have in your body and really break it down so you can start by just tapping your feet on the floor and really notice the different motions or different feelings that you have in this just small movement so recognizing the tips of your toes on the floor the balls of your feet on the floor feeling your heels digging and tapping into the ground and really breaking down this motion after tapping your feet on the ground you can take your hands and just give your legs a little massage may be feeling your calf muscles and your quad muscles and again just breaking down this movement so maybe feeling the tips of your fingers touching your calves feeling the pressure of your fingers in your calves any little movement or feeling that you can break down in this movement next you can move to massaging your hands and really feeling the pressure in your palm maybe taking a stretch in your fingers our forearm gets to be a bit tight sometimes so just taking one hand and pressing down a little bit on the tips of your fingers can be a really good way to engage the body the last few grounding techniques we will review are practicing self kindness and appreciation of the moment so in practicing self kindness you create a mantra that is positive that will reassure you of your positive qualities so for example phrases such as I am enough I am safe I give love and I receive love I am strong and I will persevere repeating these phrases just allows our brain to get a sense of calm and stability lastly practicing appreciation in this practice you will recognize one moment that you appreciated from the day that you need it or the day before so maybe this moment is a moment of peace or it was just a positive part of your day maybe it was a time that you laughed or just something that gave you a little bit of pause so for example it could just be that your tea in the morning tasted really good or your coffee was just right maybe you woke up in the morning with the sun shining on your face and it just felt really warm and comforting maybe you had a good hug with a family member or you watched a TV show that made you laugh and if you take that moment and really expand on all of the details of it for example pulling out colors that you recognized during that moment the color of the coffee cup or the color of your kitchen the color of your couch or the shirt that the comedian was wearing in the TV show that made you laugh just recognizing those little pieces remembering certain phrases that were said during that moment or remembering any smells or tastes just breaking it down and recognizing some of the senses of that moment and really allowing all of those details to fill you up to a point where you're almost reliving this moment can give us a sense of appreciation for a time that was positive and it solidifies that memory in our brain so those are our grounding techniques for today I hope that they can be helpful to you today and the days to come thank you so much for tuning in to Operation health at home continue tuning in for more nutrition fitness mindfulness and mental skills support and reach out to us at home-based org for more information about our clinical programming thank you so much for practicing your health with us today