Sensory Grounding - A Simple Way to Help with Anxiety

Have you ever had a flashback, panic attack, or just felt really, really stressed out? Sensory grounding is a simple technique to help bring yourself back into the present moment, which is usually safer than your flashback or anxious future.

In this video, I’ll guide you through a short sensory grounding exercise to help you learn which senses are more (or less) helpful for you. I learned this technique from Thomas Zimmerman and have found it very helpful for me and many of my clients. Remember, there’s no “right” or “wrong” answer here.

If you’re more of a reader, here are the basic steps:

• Sight - take a few moments to look around your environment. Notice a few items. What color are they? What texture are they?

• Sound - take a few moments to listen to the sounds around you, starting with the loudest and going down to the quietest.

• Touch - feel something in your environment. Notice the temperature, texture. How about when you move your fingers around on the item?

• Smell - smell something fragrant, like a candle, essential oil, coffee, or your pet 😊

• Taste - taste something, like coffee, tea, a mint, chocolate, water, etc. How does it taste? What is its texture and temperature?

How did that go? Which senses were more or less helpful for you, to bring yourself into the present moment?

You might practice checking in with the most helpful senses throughout your day.

If this was helpful for you and you’d like to explore therapy with me, you can schedule a consultation with me to see if we’d be a good fit.