One of the most common questions I encounter when talking with folks who are new to a spiritual path is they have an issue with how to ground and center and would like to know how to do it. As it is the base of so many things, it is likely one of the most crucial skills someone who wants to work with energy (or deal with life) will ever need to learn how to do. This is the base upon which almost all work builds, and learning it can be one of the hardest things, the initial ability to calm and collect yourself. Fortunately, with practice and concentration, it can become the easiest action as well as most automatic to perform.
What exactly is Grounding and Centering you ask? It is the gathering of control of your emotions and thoughts, and finding calm within a storm. It is an understanding and recognition of your role in the Universe/ All and just how hugely important you are, while at the same time giving yourself perspective that you are a small but integral part in life, the universe and everything.
For beginners, I would suggest finding yourself a very quiet comfortable place for your first attempts. There are a lot of things in the physical world that can lead to distraction and in the beginning, you should make as much effort to negate them before they happen. Yes, I realize there is a reality factor with real life, however, the act of grounding and centering can assist in making everything else easier to deal with.
Close your eyes, and stop for a moment. Assess and inventory how you feel and where your mind is. Are you jittery? Expectant? Worried about the bills? Allow the thoughts to complete, but do not allow them to begin again. To help void them doing so, start focusing on your breathing. Counting as you breathe to mark the measure of your breath accomplishes 2 things. One, it allows you to gain control over your focus as well as focusing on breathing and steadying your breathing patterns work together to help the body relax. Each portion of the breath should be of an equal meter. In for 4 counts, hold for 4 counts, release for 4 counts. As time goes on, you will be able to expand your focus as well as deepen the body’s relaxation by enlarging the count. I personally breathe in for a count of 7, hold for 7, and exhale for 7. Time and practice will lead to greater ease of performance of this as well as enhance an automated beginning of this routine to help allow your body to understand that it is time to relax and focus.
As you sit comfortably, envision a root growing into the earth from your body. Feel it carry you down into the warm embrace of the earth. Then visualize a beam of pure light descending from the heavens through the top of your head which flows down through your spine and connects to the root you have feeding into the earth. Feel the push of energy as it cascades down your body, cleansing shadow, stress, and anxiety from you to flow downward and out through the root. Allow this to happen slowly. Feel the positive replace the negative thoughts. Continue this flow until you feel the stress, tension and anxiety and flowed downward and out of you. Slowly envision the root retracting into you, while at the same time slowing the flow from above until both ends stop at the end of your physical form, leaving you relaxed and stress free. This will take time and practice, but there will be an immediate calming effect that will grow with each performance of these steps.
Now you have grounded, you can find your center. Your center is the place of calm and strength within you. It is the place your mind goes when it is still. The feeling you have of peace, contentment and relaxation. This is a search that is different for everyone, but in the end, it’s where you have always drawn strength and calm from. It is a place and feeling that grows within you. It’s arrival for me was spontaneous and gradual. A feeling of complete focus and an awareness of that which was beyond my focus. it is sought, but never looked for, for it will come in the time it will. I know, frustrating platitudes, but, honestly, their the truth. All of this takes time and patience to learn, grown into, and can seem like they will never come. There are many lessons in patience, acceptance and the removal of expectation on the road to growth and understanding as a spiritual being.
Once you have have begun your search for your Center, next undertake “Centering.” Centering is the conscious act and thought process of gaining a perspective of where you fit in the cogs of the universe . One of the methods I use is as follows. While sitting or standing, close your eyes, focus on your Center. Then think about where you are to the items that are in the same room with you. Where your personal physical location is directionally to furniture, walls, and people. Then after you have a good gauge in your “inner eye” of how far everything is, expand the area you are comparing yourself in relation to. Generally to the outer walls of the building or space you are in is a good choice. After you have done this, expand that consideration to the physical limits of the property you are on. Are you north or south? Which is father, the front, back or sides of the yard? Then expand that to the block you are on or the nearest dwellings that surround you. Expand this out using familiar landmarks, growing farther each time.
I will generally go from the house, to the neighborhood, to the city limits/ rivers/ interstates, then continue outward to state lines, mountain ranges, lakes, larger rivers, oceans. Then think about where you sit on this planet. Were are you in relation to China, The poles, Europe, and then move it outward again to the sun, think about where other planets might be in relation to you at that exact moment. Then, allow it to expand beyond what you limit yourself with and think about how/ when/ where you re in compared with everything in existence. Once you’ve reflected on where you are in relation to what is and what is to be done, you have an idea of your role and your place in the cosmos.
Pan's Dance 