Energywork: Grounding

The second in a continuing series of articles covering the basics of energywork.  This article will cover the act of Grounding.

What is Grounding?

Next to centering, grounding is one of the most fundamental acts of energywork.  It’s used to discharge excess or negative energies safely, and also to replenish your energy if you’re feeling a little low.  Staying grounded also helps one to be fully present in their body, and aware of what is going on around them in the present moment.  If your mind is wandering and you’re metaphorically “off in the clouds somewhere” or otherwise off-kilter, that’s a strong sign that you may need to ground. Grounding, in most cases, is exactly what it sounds like: connecting to the Earth, and sending any excess or negative energy down into the ground to be absorbed by the planet, then taking in fresh energy to replenish yourself, repeating the cycle until you feel pleasantly energized but not “bursting” with energy.

How do you Ground?

A Basic Technique for Grounding

As with centering, there are many techniques available for grounding.  One of the simplest, and the most commonly used, is to visualize oneself as a tree.  Even kids can do this one.  Just close your eyes, perhaps take a moment to center yourself, and imagine yourself becoming a tree. Feel your roots extending deep into the earth, connecting and anchoring you to the planet itself.  Feel the strength of the earth, the stability as it supports you, nourishes you.  Feel yourself releasing any negative energy to sink down and be absorbed by the earth, while taking in fresh new energy through your roots.  Continue the visualization for as long as you like, cycling energy back and forth, until you feel stable… energized, but not overflowing with energy, fully present in your body in the here-and-now.  Other visualizations are also possible… you could visualize yourself as a mountain, for instance, rather than a tree.

Physical Grounding

Visualizations aren’t the only way to ground.  There are a whole host of techniques for grounding excess energy that don’t require any conscious manipulation of your mental state.   These range from activities like physical exercise to simply eating something.  I’m a big fan of walking, myself, though make sure to stay hydrated.  Some people also find working with certain minerals aids in grounding,.  Iron is one of the most traditional for this, though it isn’t exactly gentle about it.  Personally, I prefer copper if I’m going with a pure metal, unless I can get my hands on Bog Iron from New Jersey.  I’m also a big fan of a combination of iron pyrite and magnetite known in metaphysical circles as “Healer’s Gold”.  Other good stones for grounding include Moss Agate, Black Obsidian, Smokey Quartz, Staurolite, and Black Tourmaline.

What Comes Next?

Grounding in Other Elements

So far, this article has focused on grounding in the element of Earth.  But it’s equally possible to “ground” in any of the elements.  All of them have a physical component capable of anchoring one in the here-and-now, all of them have the capacity to receive and transform unwanted energies, and all of them have the capacity to help refill one’s energetic reserves.

The basic procedure for doing this is very similar to the exercises for grounding in Earth.  If you care to ground in Fire, you can visualize yourself as the heart of a flame, continually releasing energy and taking in new fuel, at once stable and yet always engaged in the act of transformation.  Equally, you could visualize yourself as a phoenix or a star, whatever imagery speaks to you.  If Water is more your style, you might imagine slowly sinking into the ocean and letting yourself dissolve into the foam, merging with the waters, letting them carry any unwanted energy away while at the same time replenishing you, the boundaries between yourself and the larger ocean murky and unclear until it is time to return again to a more tangible form.  For aficionados of Air, you might imagine simply letting a wind blow “through” you, carrying away what is unwanted and filling you up with its own energy.  All of these are equally valid, as are any other methods of reaching a stable “grounded” energetic state.  Nor are you limited to grounding yourself in classical Western elements… wood and metal from the eastern elemental system are just as valid, as are light and shadow.  If in doubt, experiment.  Try grounding in something and see if it works.  If it does, great.  If it doesn’t, try something else.

Wrapping Up

Grounding may seem fairly basic but without it it’s far too easy for someone working with subtle energies to become disconnected from physical reality, overloaded by more energy than their system can metabolize on its own, be impaired by negative energies, and overall simply become a less effective channel for energy.  I strongly recommend grounding both before and after any act of energywork.  During the working itself, it may be more appropriate to center without grounding.

As always, if you find any more ways to ground yourself, or any more techniques for taking grounding further, please feel free to share them in the comments section.  The next article in this series will be on Attunement.

Energywork: Centering

Many of the articles already on Dreamhart.org, as well as others I’m planning to post here in the future, require a basic understanding of energywork.   Because of this, I’ve decided to start a series covering the fundamentals of the subject in an attempt to make this site more friendly to newcomers.  I’m not sure how long it will take me to write these, nor am I sure if they will be entirely consecutive or if they will be interspersed among writings on other subjects.  This first one, at any rate, will cover the act of Centering.

What is Centering?

Centering is the single most fundamental act of energywork.  Grounding may be a close second, and the two are often talked about and even performed together as a single act, but I thought it might be useful to consider them separately.  There may well be times you will want to center yourself without grounding, though I admittedly can’t think of any times the reverse would be true.

Centering is literally a return to one’s center… a place of calm, balance, and focus within us.  It allows us to set aside stray thoughts and external influences, to still our minds, to marshal our energy and concentration, and to prepare a place to begin our Work.  This is the first step in almost any occult procedure, and one it’s helpful to return to during the course of most workings to keep the subtle energies you are manipulating focused for the task at hand.  If your thoughts get scattered, your energy gets scattered too.

How Do You Center?

A Basic Technique for Centering

Luckily, there are lots of techniques you can use to center yourself.  One of the easiest is simply to visualize yourself surrounded by a giant sphere of energy.  Imagine that energy contracting, pulling in until it is a thin shell around your body.  Then, imagine it contracting further, becoming a dense little ball inside of you at a point just below your belly button.  That’s one place you can center yourself, known as the low Dantian.   Hold it there as long as you want, just breathing in and out slowly, until you feel calm and focused.

Standing at the Crossroads

Another technique is to visualize two roads crossing in front of you.  At the center of the crossroads there is a large tree.  Imagine yourself going to sit at the base of the tree, your back against its trunk, the roads stretched out around you.  Cast your mind down each of the roads… one before you, one behind you, one to your left and one to your right.  Imagine what might be down each of them, then slowly allow your mind to return to the crossroads, to the center.  As time passes, allow yourself to become aware of a fourth road… the road formed by the tree… and allow your mind to follow its branches up into the sky, and its roots down into the earth.  Each time, slowly allow your mind to return to the crossroads, to the center.  Finally, become aware of the final road… the road within you.  Follow it to the heart of the crossroads.  Follow it to your center.

Centering with Breath

Still another technique relies on the breath.  Breathe in and out through the nose.  On each exhalation, exhale all the way out to completely clear the lungs.  Then slowly inhale, allowing your stomach to expand as you breath in and the air to settle in the deepest parts of your lungs. Hold it there for a few moments, then continue… breathing out completely, then slowly breathing in deeply so it feels almost like you’re inflating your belly.  Try to keep your chest relaxed while you’re doing this, it doesn’t need to expand along with your stomach.  When you have the hang of this, try visualizing a golden ball of energy growing in your lower Dantian, just below your belly button.  The ball is like a miniature sun inside you, and with each breath you take it grows brighter and brighter.

What comes next?

Obviously, you can mix and match any of the preceding exercises to create a method of centering which works for you.  You can also learn other methods of centering, whether through a google search for centering techniques or just experimenting and following your own intuition.  As long as you end up in a calm, centered state there really is no wrong way to get there.  But what if you want to take things a little further?  Centering may be basic, but there are some more advanced techniques associated with it.

Centering on Something

So far, we’ve taken a look at finding your center. Now, we’ll consider a method of working with that center, by focusing it on something specific.  One of the more common things to center oneself on is the divine, and this practice is often used to facilitate a direct connection with divinity.  To do this, follow the same steps as before to arrive at your center.  Once there, hold an image of the divine in your mind… even if that image is just a clear, pure light.  If other thoughts arise, acknowledge them and then set them aside if they are not relevant, and return your attention to the image.  If it helps, you can also mentally repeat a specific word over and over… perhaps simply “<insert your deity’s name here>”.  Do this as long as you like, and just listen and see what happens.

Centering on the Go

Centering oneself when you’re all by yourself and still and seated and comfortable is fairly easy.  But what about when you’re on the go?  Think you can center yourself while walking around, or in the middle of a traumatic situation?  You may not think you can, yet, but this is generally when you most need to.  Here’s a technique to get you started.  Whenever you become aware of not feeling centered in your daily life, it may be useful to take a few minutes to consciously do this, to create a habit of bringing oneself back to center that will then carry over even into extraordinary or traumatic situations.

Begin walking, at whatever speed is comfortable with you.  As you walk, slowly breath in and out, taking two or three steps as you inhale and then two or three steps as you exhale.  Allow the breath to go all the way down to your belly and push it out, just like the last exercise.  Then exhale completely, emptying your lungs, before starting the process over again.  Become aware of the sphere of light brightening in your Dantian as you walk and breathe.  Each step, each breath, makes it brighter.  Now, center your thoughts on an image of calm and peace held within that sphere of light.  Perhaps a simple scene from nature, perhaps the image you use to connect with divinity, perhaps just the word Peace and the feeling that goes with it.  Feel that image suffusing your center, till the combined energy overflows and runs down your body to your feet, still growing with each step, each breath, an endless inner fountain.  Imagine yourself leaving little puddles of this energy behind you with each step, little seeds of peace planted in the world.

Wrapping Up

Obviously there are many more ways to center, and many more things one can do with centering.  I strongly encourage anyone interested to look into it further.  Sources dealing with meditation may be a great deal of help, as centering lies as the heart of most forms of meditative practice.  If you find any more ways to center yourself, or any more techniques for working with your center, please feel free to share them in the comments section.

That’s about it for centering, and I hope you’ve found it useful.  The next article planned for this series will deal with Grounding.

IT LIVES! New Otherkin Directory!

Edit: Yes, for real this time. 😉

After a great deal of struggling, I’m pleased to announce that Dreamhart.org now has a searchable directory listing for otherkin up and running. To add your information to it, first you have to register for the website. Then, edit your profile: you’ll find all of the Directory information in its own section, so you can choose exactly what you want to display. You’ll also find a radio box that lets you decide whether or not you want to display your information in the directory. I’ve made very very certain that if you check “Do Not Display”, your information will never show up in the directory by any means; not as part of regular display, not as part of search results, and not even if you type the user-id in by hand in the url for individual profiles.

I believe I’ve tested everything fairly thoroughly in the course of implementing this new system, but as always if you run into any bugs please let me know. Also, if you think any fields should be included that aren’t, let me know. I can’t guarantee that everything people want will be included (I don’t actually know how to program in PHP, I know just enough to be able to read and edit someone else’s code), but I may be able to work something out.

Edit: One other small thing, I’ve now added another option for people who want to be slightly more private about their data.  You can now set it to display only to logged-in users of this website.  I will warn that registration is open, and anyone can register, though.  It should prevent indexing by google and other search engines/bots, however.

Please note as well, privacy settings for the directory do not affect visibility of your profile on the forums.