It all starts with grounding.

A few years ago just after finishing my presentation on grounding and career counseling in a conference a woman came to me and said: “Thank you so much! I was always told to ground myself, but for the first time someone told me how to do it!”.

Grounding is literally the foundation of all the success I’ve had in my personal life and working with my clients. Just to mention a few, I use grounding to:
help people plan their future;

empower and develop self-confidence on candidates to become Federal Judges in Brazil;

Build presence and strength on my clients so they can face their challenges and transform their lives.

Grounding is both a concept and an exercise. As a concept it relates to awareness and presence in the present, in the now, of what is happening within and outside. It is about standing your ground no matter what happens:

within you (fear, anger, anxiety, joy, pleasure) and;

outside of you (threatening situation, public speaking, presentations, having an argument, etc).

As an exercises it involves body postures, movement, breathing and self-expression with the purpose to bring awareness and presence to the body, with emphasis on feet and legs.

The logic is pretty simple. Your organism has a self-image that is based on what your body is capable or not. Let’s say you are walking in nature and come to a creek. You want to jump it but you don’t really know how many meters you can actually jump. You look at the creek and in a few seconds you assess whether you will jump it or not. This assessment is highly influenced by how much awareness you have of your body. You might be able to jump it, but due to a poor awareness of your legs’ strength you might not feel confident to make it.

In simple words, grounding exercise connects you with your real body strength and power. Moreover, it builds all the support and confidence needed to move through life and achieve your goals. We see some people who presents a very powerful facade, but are very insecure inside. On the other hand, sometimes we meet with people that look so simple and humble, but have a strong sense of inner value and self-confidence.

I have seen many people failing to achieve a goal, pass an exam, succeed on an interview and stand their ground not because they did not know what they were doing, but because they felt threatened and lost their confidence and ground.

My life, my client’s lives and the lives of so many people I have met improved because of grounding. Not that it solves everything, but it gives a solid foundation for a true and deep change. And that’s why I put together a document with a simple 4-stages grounding exercise. I wish everyone could learn this and apply to their lives.

There could be dozens of those strategies, behaviors and attitudes that you think are your personality (ego syntonic), but that are just a protective strategy you developed at some point to avoid pain and suffering but that actually creates pain in your life. Go after them and start to question them out. Is that who you really are?

Throughout life and specially during early development we are constantly learning how to deal with this world, relationships and ourselves. And we learn the hard way, through making mistakes and trying to avoid pain. Like all other beings in this planet all we want is to be happy and survive.

We all have developed strategies to deal with the challenges of life, from learning to go to the toilet to saving money for the next trip. Some of those strategies are highly effective and some not so much. Some people learned not to ask for what they want so they don’t experience rejection; others learned to use indirect ways to achieve their goals. Some learned to give up even before trying to avoid failure, others decided that they will stop only when they succeed. The fact is that in both cases those strategies are not necessarily reaching the greater goal of being happy and living a meaningful life. Over achieving can be as painful as not achieving anything. Not asking can be as painful as not receiving freely.

We all know those behaviors that insist to exist even though they create more suffering than happiness. The first step to change is mapping them out. If we don’t see them, there is nothing to be done.

Ego Syntonic

This are all kinds of behaviors and attitudes that are in sintony of who I think I am. They are not in conflict with my identity whether they are beneficial or not.

Ego Dystonic

This are all kinds of behaviors and attitudes that I don’t consider to be part of myself. They are in disharmony with my sense of self.

The path to change involves turning ego syntonic unhealthy behaviors into ego dystonic ones. In other words: removing and dis-identifying with all the rubbish that it is not who you really are.

There could be dozens of those strategies, behaviors and attitudes that you think are your personality (ego syntonic), but that are just a protective strategy you developed at some point to avoid pain and suffering but that actually creates pain in your life. Go after them and start to question them out. Is that who you really are?

To help you I put together a document with 10 behaviors and attitudes that are just a protective strategy. I hope you enjoy it!
Click the image below to download it.

Beirut, Paris, Mexico, Japan, Brazil, Syria, Iran... A lot of suffering, we know.

I was deeply touched when I checked my phone in the morning and saw all the increased pain and suffering going on right now in the world. Then I saw posts saying that the world needs more love, which I totally agree with. But, are you ready to bring more love into the world?

I felt compassion for those who lost their loved ones, their houses, their sense of belonging, their safety; and for the dead animals in the Brazilian ecological disaster. I could see that my friends also felt the same and that love and compassion is very much needed. However, I want to know if you really want to change this world. Do you?

I want to know if you are ready to make the radical move to really bring happiness to this planet.

I want to know if you are really willing to express the powerful and transforming love that avoids no one, rejects nobody and embraces all.

Can you love the people who performed the attacks in Paris, Iran, Syria and else? Can you love the guy who shot so many people? Can you love the person who was responsible for the death of some many beings and ecosystems in Brazil?

That is the love this world desperately needs. Love that is not subject to my likes and dislikes, that doesn’t create separation and divides the world in good and bad people and that has no preference.

I’m sure that there is much more suffering and pain in any of those who killed others then in any of us right now. And I’m sure that they are also trying to find a way out of the sufferings of this world, just like you.

I’m sure that the people responsible for the Brazilian disaster are also trying to have a happy life. They are not terrorists, corrupts or evil people; they are people who suffer and who are lost in their own ignorance, just like you.

What good it does in your life to hold negative feelings and thoughts about others no matter what they’ve done? By holding that negativity are you creating more love or hate in this world?

Are you ready to love radically?

Are you ready to love yourself so deeply and completely that you can extend the love to those you call 'bad people'?

Are you ready to change this world?

Fernando Aguiar

15.11.2015