Optimal Health Strategy 5: Earthing (electrical contact with the earth)

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Earthing is one of the most significant ‘discoveries’ in recent times in relation to health. Of course, it is not new, humans have been in contact with the earth throughout our evolution. Only recently has the modern lifestyle disconnected us from it. Now we understand the mechanism that fundamentally supports our immune system and well-being, bringing us so many health benefits for free.

in Episode 51 of ‘Living outside the Matrix,’ Martin Zucker talks about this key component of optimal health and writing his book with Dr Stephen Sinatra and Clinton Ober. “Earthing: The most important health discovery ever” is widely touted as being the best book available on the subject.

Watch or listen to the discussion with Martin Zucker in the Youtube video below and read on to understand the mechanism and to get the detail of the many benefits you will enjoy by employing this simple (and free) technique into your lifestyle.

What is Earthing?

Earthing (or grounding) simply means electrically connecting with the earth. It means our bodies are literally put in electrical contact with the earth and therefore enjoy unlimited access to the abundant supply of negative electrical charge from a relatively infinite source of free electrons.

“So what?” you may be well be asking. If this were true my Doctor would know all about it. Well, here is where you would be wrong. This is where you have to independently verify this for your self. Do a little research and try best of all it for your self. The science is sound and the benefits are proven.

It’s free to walk with your bare feet on the ground or to sit in the garden with your bare feet on the grass, and relax. The ‘kidney 1’ point (K1), right in the middle of the ball of your foot, (well known to acupuncture practitioners) is easily contacted with the ground if you do this. Try it and enjoy the benefits.

How does earthing work

Earthing works by making available free additional electrons from the earth to your body. According to Dr Joseph Mercola, these free electrons are probably the most potent anti-oxidants known to man. They flow freely on demand into your body to neutralise the accumulation of positive charge that builds up from oxidative stress due to free radicals produced in the body, breathed in, and ingested in food.

There are clinical effects of earthing that are observable in the body such as the change in heart rate variability, a decrease in skin resistance and a decrease in inflammation. There are many important anti-oxidants required by the body and that can benefit the body. Many must be ingested as food supplements but one is available to everyone in the form of contact with the ground.

The interview below in which Dr Joseph Mercola talks with Dr James Oschman is fantastic for understanding the mechanism and benefits of earthing. I highly recommend it.

The benefits of earthing

• Sleep quality improves – due to the day/night cortisol levels evening out. Stress is reduced and sleep quality improves.
• Pain is reduced. Shown by thermography studies done by Dr James Oschman. Inflammation could be seen to dissipate during grounding in a little as 20 minutes, with the K1 point grounded as well as the point of pain or injury.
• The blood is thinned by the increased negative charge on each blood cell. They consequently repel each other more and are less able to clog. so earthing makes the blood less viscous. Although not a silver bullet, grounding could go a long way to reducing heart disease, the number one cause of death in the world. Dr Stephen Sinatra identified the Zeta potential of the red blood cells increasing as a direct result of earthing. This also has huge implications for stroke prevention and neuro-inflammatory conditions.
• It is very likely that grounding improves the ability of the body to structure water. Experiments show that when a positive electrode is placed in water it de-structures and when a negative electrode is placed in water it structures the water.
• Inflammation is reduced. Inflammation during injury is caused by free radicals leaking out of the injury site and damaging nearby cells. These positively charged Reactive Oxygen Species (ROS) are immediately neutralised by being barefoot on the ground because of the availability of the free electrons. According to Dr James Oschman conditions like Carpal Tunnel Syndrome can be easily prevented by grounding because it is entirely caused by inflammation in the wrists.
• The immune system is supported and effectively made ‘ready’ to deal with inflammation of any kind by having its natural reservoir of electrons (negative charge) topped up. Whereas, in an ungrounded state, we accumulate positive charge and consequently leave our immune system depleted and less able to cope with injury.
• Grounding during exercise has been shown to reduce injury induced inflammation during strength training or any kind of muscular stress when free radicals are produced. Yoga is also best done outside and grounded.

How to earth yourself

Grounding is most easily and simply achieved by sleeping on a grounding sheet. This is a bed sheet interwoven with silver thread that is electrically connected to the earthing terminal of your house wiring via the plug socket in your bedroom. Make sure the house is suitably earthed to make sure it will work. This is also the best time to be grounded because the rejuvenation and repair that occurs during sleep is best supported by the supply of free electrons.

In general damp or wet surfaces are better for grounding/earthing than dry surfaces. This goes for grass, earth and concrete and is due to the increased electrical conductivity.

Best surfaces or mediums for effective earthing include:

1. Seawater
2. Natural pond water – as opposed to a reservoir or swimming pool water.
3. Damp grass – better than dry grass due to increased conductivity
4. The bare earth – even rock.
5. Concrete (unpainted or un-sealed)

Worst surfaces

1. Asphalt
2. wood
3. Plastics
4. Rubber (tyres and soles of shoes)
5. Any non-conductive synthetic materials

Using grounding sheets (illustrated above), grounding mats (illustrated to the right) and grounding patches are a great way to remain grounded when not outside.

The patches used are just like the ones used to contact the skin for an electrocardiogram (ECG). All can be bought in the US or the UK (see below).

Apparently hugging trees is a means of earthing in spite of the fact that wood insulates us from earthing when we walk on wooden floors. This suggests some scientific explanation for that feel-good factor for the tree huggers!

Earthing resources

Visit the website www.earthinginstitute.net for loads of free information and access to all the scientific studies supporting this technology.

• To buy earthing products in the UK go to www.groundology.co.uk
• or BioEnergy products here at www.bioenergyproducts.co.uk
• or Equilibra here at www.equilibrauk.com
• To buy in the USA go to www.earthing .com
• You can get the book “Earthing: the most important health discovery ever” from Amazon in the UK
• The scientific evidence for this phenomenon is documented by Dr James Oschman in his amazing book “Energy medicine: The scientific basis“.

This video is also recommended viewing. It gives you a lot of the background information and the story of Clinton Ober’s discovery.

Do yourself a favour and get grounded today! Earthing truly is a major factor in optimising our health and therefore is number 5 in my personal list of Optimal Health Strategies.

Check out my other Optimal Health Strategies below

1. Optimal Health Strategy 1 – Maintain a Healthy Gut
2. Optimal Health Strategy 2 – Eat Real Food
3. Optimal Health Strategy 3 – Nutritional Ketosis
4. Optimal health Strategy 4 – Fasting

I trust you have got some value from this Blog post and find the information beneficial. Please feel free to join in the conversation and leave a comment below.

Nigel Howitt

Treehouse Farm

July 2018