Grounding techniques

I came across this pretty extensive list of grounding techniques: https://www.yahoo.com/lifestyle/25-grounding-techniques-help-instantly-003029325.html

I've used a few in the past with good results and have heard of some of the others.

Feel free to provide feedback on any you've tried and add to the list.

I've heard the 5-4-3-2-1 technique mentioned a lot lately. Have tried it more than once when I've been in stressful situations. Didn't help me but others say it's great. Also been hearing EFT tapping praised a lot. Did it for months and did not notice any difference from the practice. I've done mantras or chants. I've done journaling/story writing. Breath work is supposed to do a lot to help with having an immediate effect on mood. I've tried multiple breathing techniques. Box breathing seems very popular of late. I ran across starfish breathing which is interesting. Alternate nostril breathing does seem to have an effect. There are also breathing techniques where you lengthen the outbreath. Exercise of some kind like walking or Tai Chi helps with some of the stress response, but doesn't always counter all of it at least for me. Yoga Nidra seems like an interesting practice especially if you're trying to calm down before going to sleep. I think the article covered quite a lot of the different options. I also use biofeedback such as an EEG device or GSR to help. The feedback really helps you change the brainwave states you're producing.

lm8 wrote:I've heard the 5-4-3-2-1 technique mentioned a lot lately.  Have tried it more than once when I've been in stressful situations.  Didn't help me but others say it's great.  Also been hearing EFT tapping praised a lot.  Did it for months and did not notice any difference from the practice.  I've done mantras or chants.  I've done journaling/story writing.  Breath work is supposed to do a lot to help with having an immediate effect on mood.  I've tried multiple breathing techniques.  Box breathing seems very popular of late.  I ran across starfish breathing which is interesting.  Alternate nostril breathing does seem to have an effect.  There are also breathing techniques where you lengthen the outbreath.  Exercise of some kind like walking or Tai Chi helps with some of the stress response, but doesn't always counter all of it at least for me.  Yoga Nidra seems like an interesting practice especially if you're trying to calm down before going to sleep.  I think the article covered quite a lot of the different options.  I also use biofeedback such as an EEG device or GSR to help.  The feedback really helps you change the brainwave states you're producing.

It sounds like you've explored a lot of different techniques. I'm glad you've found a few that work well for you.

For me just breathing deeply, holding for a few seconds and breathing out very slowly a few times seems to do the trick. Also focusing on relaxing all my muscles, but the deep breathing does that for me automatically.

Nothing works well enough for me when there's a big stressor in life. I try all kinds of things to see if it helps with coping. Am often surprised when people say a technique works really well and I find it does practially nothing for me. It's a nuisance when people keep insisting the technique works, it's scientifically backed and I should keep trying it because it works for them. I'm wondering if the biological brain and processing differences of HSPs and the way they're affected differently by neurotransmitters could be part of the reason some of these techniques work so well for some and not as well for others.

lm8 wrote:Nothing works well enough for me when there's a big stressor in life.  I try all kinds of things to see if it helps with coping.  Am often surprised when people say a technique works really well and I find it does practially nothing for me.  It's a nuisance when people keep insisting the technique works, it's scientifically backed and I should keep trying it because it works for them.  I'm wondering if the biological brain and processing differences of HSPs and the way they're affected differently by neurotransmitters could be part of the reason some of these techniques work so well for some and not as well for others.

The reason there are so many approaches is that no two people are the same so what works will differ person to person. This is true among HSP too.

The amount of stress I've dealt with at times would cause permanent damage to most people HSP or not. No, there is no way to avoid it. But still during those times, I still needed to sleep and my goal was to calm my mind and body enough to do so and that is where grounding really helped. Also when I found I could not focus, it helped there too. They help get through the moment and in crisis situations, sometimes it is literally getting through moment by moment. It also has to be balanced by feeling all the emotions and processing them, making sure there are times to do so. During extraordinarily stressful times, there is no way to be stress free alas. Sometimes too release is needed-- a good cry or rant, often more than once.

Do none of these work in this way for you?

The techniques pretty much don't work in that way for me. The only thing that seems to work is time. After enough time (could be days or months or longer), I usually acclimate to the stressful situation. No matter what I try, if I'm stressed, I'm going to have trouble sleeping and eating.

I hope you do find a way that works for you some day.