Grounding, With Grace 002
Releasing anxiety stored in the body (a series on grounding practices) + recs from April
Grounding techniques—practices that help distract from fears and unwanted memories—offer a way to control unhelpful anxiety responses. They can help you pull out of a frozen or detached state so that you can think more clearly and choose how to act. They can help you break free from an anxiety spiral, giving you a greater sense of control and confidence. — Johns Hopkins
Over the last few years, I’ve collected many grounding practices and nervous system regulation techniques. In this ongoing series, I’m going to share the ones that have helped me, with many becoming a part of my daily schedule.
For the end of April, here are ten exercises I use to release stored anxiety in my body:
1. Forehead: raise eyebrows, hold for five seconds, and release.
2. Jaw: open mouth and shift jaw from left to right.
3. Neck: slowly nod yes and no; roll your head clockwise and then counterclockwise.
4. Shoulders: raise and then drop and roll your shoulders away from your ears.
5. Chest: place your hand on the chest and breathe deeply.
6. Stomach: place your hand on your stomach and breathe into the stomach, letting it expand under your hand. Release slow and deep.
7. Hands: close into a fist and then release and spread your fingers wide.
8. Legs: bend and hold your legs up and tight to your chest, hold for a few seconds, and then release.
9. Feet: curl and tighten toes, hold for five seconds, and then release.
10. Full body: stand and bounce up and down while shaking the anxiety out of your body. You can shake your arms, head, wiggle your hips—just shake it all out.
1. It completely escaped me that Yeah Yeah Yeahs released an album, Cool it Down, in 2022. Listening to this album has been a step back into my teenage years. There are few artists, in my opinion, that make perfect albums from start to finish, and they are one of them for me.
2. & 3. April was really a great month of reading for me. Here were my favorites:
My audiobook listen for April has been Baek Se-hee’s therapy memoir, I Want to Die but I Want to Eat Tteokbokki: A Memoir.
"Baek Sehee is a successful young social media director at a publishing house when she begins seeing a psychiatrist about her - what to call it? - depression? She feels persistently low, anxious, endlessly self-doubting, but also highly judgmental of others. She hides her feelings well at work and with friends, performing the calmness her lifestyle demands. The effort is exhausting, overwhelming, and keeps her from forming deep relationships. This can't be normal. But if she's so hopeless, why can she always summon a yen for her favorite street food: the hot, spicy rice cake, tteokbokki? Is this just what life is like?”
“I am someone who is completely unique in this world, someone I need to take care of for the rest of my life, and therefore someone I need to help take each step forwards, warmly and patiently, to allow to rest on some days and to encourage on others - I believe that the more I look into this strange being, myself, the more routes I will find to happiness.”
― Baek Se-hee, I Want to Die But I Want to Eat Tteokpokki
My other favorite read from this past month was The Unworthy by Angustina Bazterrica.
“From her cell in a mysterious convent, a woman writes the story of her life in whatever she can find—discarded ink, dirt, and even her own blood. A lower member of the Sacred Sisterhood, deemed an unworthy, she dreams of ascending to the ranks of the Enlightened at the center of the convent and of pleasing the foreboding Superior Sister. Outside, the world is plagued by catastrophe—cities are submerged underwater, electricity and the internet are nonexistent, and bands of survivors fight and forage in a cruel, barren landscape. Inside, the narrator is controlled, punished, but safe.”
4. Love on the Spectrum has been one of my go-to feel-good shows in the past couple of years. I was so looking forward to season 3, and once again, it just warmed my heart while making me laugh.
“Seven young adults on the autism spectrum dive headfirst into the dating pool, exploring the unpredictable world of love and relationships.” (Available on Netflix)
5. The deeply disturbing podcast Stalked had both my skin crawling and me super invested.
“At 25, Hannah’s life begins falling apart. An anonymous intruder has made her phone her enemy. Aided by the technology we all rely on, this intruder is watching Hannah, threatening her, even pretending to be her. Feeling increasingly unsafe, Hannah goes to the police, but they can’t stop it. Worse, they don’t even recognise it for what it is: stalking. Hannah doesn’t know for sure who is behind it all, but she suspects an older man she met more than two years earlier at London Fashion Week.”
6. The other podcast I dove into this month was Bear Brook (season 1):
“Two Barrels. Four bodies. And a cold case that’s changing how murders will be investigated forever.”
7. On the complete other end of the spectrum of television viewing, I watched Yellowjackets season 3. It always holds up, and how could it not with that cast?
“A wildly talented girls’ high school soccer team become the unlucky survivors of a plane crash deep in the Canadian wilderness.”
8. My lilac bush finally starting to bloom. I wasn’t aware, but apparently it takes a few years for lilacs to bloom after planting the bush. After three years, it finally has!