Your Guide to Grounding

Your heart starts racing for no clear reason, your chest feels tight, and your mind is racing with thought after thought. You can’t focus on what you were doing: your mind is too busy trying to figure out what’s “wrong.” This can be incredibly overwhelming, and you just want something to make you feel steady again.

Stress, anxiety, panic attacks, trauma triggers, or simply being overwhelmed can cause you to lose your focus or start to have spiralling thoughts. They can make it hard to be “in the moment.” 

The good news is that there are simple techniques you can use to bring you back to the present. They’re quick, free, and portable, making them easily accessible to make you feel grounded again. These techniques empower you, letting you regain control and calmness during intense emotional moments. 

In this article, we will explore what it means to ground yourself, what grounding techniques are and when they could be used, and several techniques you can try. We’ll also cover what research says about how effective grounding techniques are, and how to figure out which ones are right for you.

Grounding Yourself: What is it and When it’s Used

When you ground yourself, you are reconnecting with the present moment. It involves bringing yourself back to reality when you’re feeling overwhelmed. People often use grounding to stabilize themself and find calmness again.

People often ground themselves when they’re feeling:

• Overwhelmed
• Anxious or panicky
• Triggered
• Dissociated or detached
• Disoriented

No matter the circumstance, grounding offers a way to anchor yourself when your mind starts to feel untethered, helping you regain your sense of safety. It’s a practical skill that anyone can learn and apply anytime to improve emotional regulation and reduce distress. 

Exploring Grounding Techniques

Grounding techniques are strategies often used to stabilize yourself and bring you back to the present during intense moments. Below are a few examples of the many types of grounding techniques available (Berberat, 2023):

‍Visualization and Imagery

• Guided visualization: often with the help of a therapist, involves picturing a calming scene or safe space
• Using positive mental images to replace intrusive or distressing thoughts

Relaxation and Mindfulness

• Deep breathing exercises or progressive muscle relaxation
• Acceptance and non-judgement about the present (Schuman-Olivier et al., 2020).

Movement-Based Grounding

• Walking, stretching, yoga, exercise
• Using movement to redirect focus away from stress and reconnect with your body

Sensory-Based Grounding

• Engaging the 5 senses to anchor yourself in the moment
• 54321 technique, to be discussed in detail later on

Cognitive and Mental Grounding

• Shifting your focus to your strengths and resilience
• Playing mental games (e.g., name animals, cities, foods all starting with the same letter)

Orientation to Time and Place

• Reminding yourself of the date, location, and your surroundings
• Using environmental cues to reaffirm your safety and presence

Grounding in Action: the 5-4-3-2-1 Technique

The 5-4-3-2-1 technique is among the most popular methods people use to ground themselves. It involves each of the five senses, and involves purposefully taking in the details of your environment (TherapistAid, 2018).

• 5 things you can see: Look around and name five things you might normally overlook
• 4 things you can feel: Notice four sensations you feel on your body or with your hands
• 3 things you can hear: Listen for three sounds your brain normally tunes out
• 2 things you can smell: Pay attention to scents around you, or try looking for something nearby with a scent
• 1 thing you can taste: Focus on one taste and concentrate on its different flavours (it helps to carry something small to eat for this step.)

This technique encourages awareness of you and your environment and helps break the cycle of racing thoughts by anchoring you to the present. This simple yet powerful exercise can be done anywhere, making it a practical tool to regain calm and control when you need it. 

Do Grounding Techniques Really Work?

Grounding techniques are commonly used for managing stress, anxiety, and trauma-related symptoms, and many studies report their effectiveness. Techniques may involve practices like breathing exercises, which help shift the body into a relaxed state and reduce the intensity of stress or traumatic memories (Seppälä et al., 2014). 

At their core, grounding techniques work by redirecting your attention from internal experiences (thoughts, emotions, physical sensations) to external ones, such as your environment (Dunphy et al., 2014). They have been shown to be helpful in reducing intrusive thoughts, soothe severe anxiety, increase body awareness, re-centre the mind during dissociation, slow down intrusive thoughts, and reduce the impact of distressing memories (Dietrich, 2000; Hammond & Brown, 2025; Welfare-Wilson et al., 2020). 

Finding What Works for You

Finding the grounding techniques that work best for you may require experimentation and trial and error. Effective grounding techniques should help you recenter while also feeling comfortable to do. It’s important to pay attention to which ones calm you the fastest, while also feeling natural.

You can also consider how discreet a technique is, especially if you think you might use it in public or social situations. It may be helpful to adapt and combine different techniques to suit your unique needs. 

Keeping a grounding log may be helpful in finding what works for you. It involves jotting down which techniques work, and when or where. It can be a useful way to develop your own personalized toolkit of grounding techniques for when you want to feel anchored. 

Final Thoughts

Grounding techniques offer valuable ways to create space for yourself to cope with overwhelming feelings, and process your environment. It’s important to remember that no single method works universally: what helps one person might not be as effective for another. 

Grounding is just one tool among many to support your well-being. If you find yourself struggling despite trying different techniques, don’t hesitate to reach out for professional health. Taking care of your mental health and seeking support is a sign of strength. Reaching out can open doors to new strategies and ways of healing that you might not find alone.