What Does It Actually Mean to be Grounded, Present and Mindful?
How learning to swim has shown me the path toward this esoteric state and opened up a new way of living
Folks are drowning in anxiety and clamoring for inner peace. There is an endless list of self-help books, meditations and courses to help us find a sense of calmness amidst the smoke billowing from a world on fire.
My personal journey to find inner peace started almost 30 years ago, when I latched onto Transcendental Meditation—and the person who introduced it to me, my ex-husband—to find that illusive inner calm that I had been searching for my whole life. My holy grail was an inner calm that was impossible to attain in the chaotic and suppressive emotional landscape I grew up in.
But almost two decades of meditation practice resulted in a state of dissociation from the reality—of the unsustainable relationships and circumstances of my life, as well as the chronic psychological control, abuse, and emotional pain I suffered from. All I managed to achieve were short, temporary escapes from this reality.
My personal discovery in 2017 of the cultish nature of the organization (which I will write about in the future) behind this seemingly innocuous practice was a rude awakening to many wasted years in my life. What was supposed to be an enlightening experience and a panacea to life’s myriads of problems turned out to be a big, fat lie.
And so the search for true, inner peace continued…. and life continued to throw me up and down in what felt like fire whirls.
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To be Safe, Grounded and Mindful: Easier Said Than Done
When I started my meditation practice, I had to hide it from my family. It was an esoteric practice shrouded with mystery and shame. I couldn’t even utter the word to anyone I knew for fear of being seen as a weirdo. But meditation has since turned mainstream, and so has other spiritual practices and psychotherapy—thanks to their propagation through the Internet, smartphone apps and social media.
Along with these popularized methods to help us survive a world running at a maddening speed and in a self-destructive way, came the concepts of safety, groundedness and mindfulness.
Like many of you, I loved hearing these concepts and aspired to being able to incorporate them in my daily life. Easier said than done, though. Listening to guided meditations that talk about these ideas didn’t cut it. I’ve understood them up there, in my brain, but had a hard time embodying them.
How Swimming Surprisingly Taught Me How to be Safe, Grounded and Mindful
Over the winter break in December, I had a light-bulb moment.
I spent much of my break going to the pool to practice swimming. If you have been reading my newsletter for a while, you would know that I started learning how to swim—from scratch—this past summer, at the ripe age of 52.
During these past six months, I went from being fearful and panicky in water to feeling supported, welcomed and embraced by water. In other words, I’ve started to feel a sense of safety and comfort in the milieu that had felt frightening and threatening to me for most of my life.
What caused that change? Having really good coaches who watched over my safety and would literally catch me if I sank was key. Another agent of transformation came from the concept of staying in the body, as explained in Melon Dash’s book, “Conquer Your Fear of Water.” I mentioned this in my last post, and I want to expand my thoughts around the subject today. She writes:
“2+2=4. You have to be in your body to know what you’re feeling.”
— Melon Dash
The idea of being in the body sank in as I reflected on how I had been out of my body when I was in water. What I mean is that I was in my head the whole time I was trying to swim.
What was in my head then? Flashbacks of my childhood near-drowning experience. Imaginations of drowning again in the pool. These thoughts—which had nothing to do with the present circumstances—convinced me that I could not swim, period.
So when I was swimming in my head, my body tensed up to prepare for drowning, and as a result, it started to drop from the surface, away from its naturally buoyant state. In moments when I sensed a small hint of imbalance, my thoughts went wild and entered the panic mode. Before I knew it, my entire body was bobbing up and down, and my nose or mouth (or both) took in gulps of water, which made me feel out of control because I couldn’t breathe normally.
Out of body = out of control.
The graphic below perfectly illustrates how it’s like when we leave our body.
The circle represents our spirit (or soul, consciousness, or however you prefer to name it), and the stick figure represents our body.
The reflections of my panicky moments in water were perhaps the first time I became acutely aware of myself leaving my body. In hindsight, there were countless moments when I did the same. They included anxious moments and dissociative states when I was trying to remove myself (the circle) from the pain residing in my body (the stick figure), which incorporates both the physical body and the emotional body, where feelings live.
The diagram showing the stick figure completely surrounded by the circle (far left and far right) is the state in which we are fully aware of the presence of the body.
As the 2+2 equation laid out above, being in the body allows us to feel fully. Say if we are feeling uncomfortable or tense about a situation, our tendency may be to run away to some place else instead of leaning into that discomfort or tension. (I’m not talking about a physically threatening situation, which certainly warrants escaping as fast as possible.)
When we turn our attention away from our body, whether by distraction or suppression, we can’t really feel our feelings. This is when we leave our body. So whatever causes the feelings to rise up in the first place is left unattended to. Healing becomes a challenge if we don’t lean into this space—the space inhabited by our one and only precious body.
How do we get back into the body? By slowing down, pausing, and taking deep breaths. This way, our mind (circle) will stop for the body (stick figure) to catch up with it and become one again.
Here’s a “trick” I learned from a swimming tutor on YouTube (ha!). It’s a mind-body awareness practice called S.T.O.P.
S = find Safety points that make you feel safe, secure and grounded
T = Take a breath, complete a few rounds of box breathing (breathe in for x counts, hold for x counts, breathe out for x counts, hold for x counts; repeat if necessary).
O = Observe your mind and self check-in: notice if there is any racing heart, shallow fast breathing, tension, shivering, chattering teeth and stiffness in movement.
P = Pause. Take 30 seconds to 2 minutes between repetitions to help recovery.
From “Learn to Swim Effortlessly e-book” by Caribe Swim
These tips may seem simplistic, but they made all the difference in my experience in water. They helped me stay inside my body and thus feel in control of it no matter the circumstances.
I realized there was no need to force myself to do anything in moments when I didn’t feel fully inside my body and in control, i.e. safe. Slowing down and pausing to take breaths helped calm my racing heart and shortness of breath after finishing each lap.
Since then, I’ve started to become aware of my body’s relationship with water, noticed how it held me up when I trusted it (which allowed me to relax tensed-up muscles), and even enjoyed the way my body moved across water in a streamlined way. Joy bubbled up as I felt that my mind and body together in the same place—at one. I believe this was the beginning of my own embodiment of mindfulness.
Space + Time - Rush
Pondering on the diagram of the stick figure inside a circle, I came to realize one of the main causes of the anxiety that became my faithful companion since childhood.
I derived the following equation:
Space + Time - Rush = In the Body = Safety, Presence, Mindfulness
Growing up in a super competitive and fast-paced society, Hong Kong, the feeling of being rushed was a constant. I was never really allowed to go at my own pace. My natural rhythm was lost when I heard the command “Chop, chop! Hurry up!” all the time.
This is the state in which the mind moves ahead of the body. It creates anxiety.
But this is how I want to feel:
When I went for a long and leisurely stroll in a nature reserve over the winter holidays, I felt a strong sense of ease, being “at one” with my body. My nervous system was calm. My internal speed was in sync with my breath and my movements.
Glorious calm and peace.
Yes, I had chosen to spend my holidays alone. This miraculously reset my nervous system. I got to stop rushing. By not setting up a bunch of “special activities” to chase after, I went about my days based on my gut feelings and internal speed. Even though I just repeated all the normal daily routines (sans the desk job), I enjoyed them to the fullest degree.
It was a splendid and spacious feeling when no work was lurking around. I was able to give myself all the time I needed, hence feeling the lengthening of time. I relished in this feeling of groundedness.
Every step of my walk in the park was in sync with my body’s rhythm. No rush. No artificial or self-imposed schedules. Fully embodied, I enjoyed what Nature offered me.
I realized that this awareness and practice of embodiment in my walk could be applied to the way I lived my life, too.
Whenever a feeling of being rushed or out of sync crops up, I would now slow down, pause, listen to that feeling, and ask what my body needs at that particular moment. Feeding my soul and body with what they need in the moment has the effect of calming my whole self down.
When we are out of our body or living out of our head, we lose intimacy with the whole of our selves.
When our spirit is embodied, we have intimacy with our self. Into me I see!
When we are intimately connected with ourselves, then we make every decision and action — big or small — based on our most intimate needs and wishes. That makes it so much easier to draw healthy boundary and live in authenticity.
Isn't it interesting how posts show up that are speaking to you? This spoke to me so thanks for writing it.
I am learning to be in my body. At 55 I think I should know this by now. But I (and many others of my generation) were never taught this.
Being ill and having life reduced to the bodily minimum helps. I am a curious learner and in awe of what I'm discovering 😍
How incredibly wise and beautiful you have shared with us, Louisa. There is so much here for me to carry into my own sense of cultivating calm, peace and mindfulness. I love how swimming became a metaphor for this practice of embodiment and how wise are the swimming authors' words, which apply so uncannily well to life itself. Your equation and the illustrations are brilliant, and I won't soon forget it. I think your equation deserves a post-it note near my writing desk! Keep on swimming toward the most calm and most mindful you, absent of rush. I am working on that, too, as you know, and we are helping each other stay buoyant. Much love to you!