Here’s what happens when you practice intentional grounding.
You become as mighty as an oak tree.
Oaks start out as tiny acorns, the fruit of the tree. In early spring (May here in Minnesota), the breeze helps pollinate the oaks’ flowers and the acorns grow through gentle rains and wild windstorms. When they’re ripe (mid-August through September), they fall by the thousands on everything under the trees: woodsheds, people, cars, dogs and cats, downed logs, etc.
Most acorns end up in squirrel and mouse caches, or in the belly of a white tailed deer.
A very, very few find their way through duff and loam to the forest floor and send down a taproot. The taproot anchors the new tree to the ground and it has claimed its territory for good. It also sends up a shoot which becomes the trunk as it grows.
Then, winter arrives and the baby oak tree is buried under five feet of snow.
(Is this sounding like an allegory for your life?)
For the oak tree, it takes many summers and winters to become mighty. The taproot branches off underground into many roots. The trunk grows, adding a growth ring every year. Branches create a broad crown of leaves.
The tree grows in close connection with the elements. Wind stresses the tree, making it stronger. Earth feeds the tree, giving it nutrition to grow year after year. Water nurtures it, and it keeps a store of water in its roots and trunk to carry it through droughts. Fire from the sun falls on each leaf, triggering photosynthesis.
Oak species thrive in a variety of environments, from desert cliff faces to swampy bogs. Roots seek water and branches seek light and they can live for 1,000 years or more, right where the original acorn dropped to the ground. Over its lifetime, an oak tree may produce up to 10 million acorns, keeping many generations of squirrels well-fed through the winter.
It’s a pretty good life.
Steady and calm, accepting and generous.
You can borrow the strength and wisdom of the oak tree.
Because you have a great imagination, you can anchor your energetic taproot to the center of the earth, and reach your branches up to the distant stars.
Intentional grounding shows you this.
Each time you practice intentional grounding, you add a “growth ring” to your strength. What takes the tree many decades, you can accomplish in a matter of days.
The wild windstorms of life can make you stronger if you are firmly anchored. Your daily life—eating, sleeping, taking care of yourself—can nourish you. You can store positive feelings in your body to use through droughts in relationships. You can harness the fire of the earth to keep yourself safe.
It’s a beautiful life. Steady and calm, accepting and generous.
Intentional grounding is the core practice that gives you this mightiness.
Jake and I have put our knowledge together and created a short course around our intentional grounding meditation. Learn the why and how of the method, and enjoy the guided meditation Evelyn created, by clicking Tactical Meditation: Grounding to the Center.