Did you know the energy from the Earth can help improve your health? This concept, known as earthing or grounding, is as simple as walking barefoot. In the documentary short “Down to Earth,” which received the IndieFEST Award of Excellence in January 2017, I join other experts to discuss this overlooked method for protecting and enhancing human health.
Cardiologist Dr. Stephen Sinatra, author of “Earthing: The Most Important Health Discovery Ever?,” explains in the film that grounding involves putting your bare feet on the ground, allowing your body to absorb electrons from the Earth. This process is similar to getting antioxidants through your feet.
Research indicates that a lack of grounding, also known as “electron deficiency syndrome,” is linked to the rise of modern diseases. Spending entire days without grounding has become the norm, but it is unnatural and became prevalent with the use of shoes with artificial soles that prevent grounding.
When you are grounded, free electrons from the Earth enter your body and act as powerful antioxidants. These electrons neutralize positively charged free radicals in your tissues, reducing chronic inflammation.
Grounding also helps support your body as a whole, as well as individual organ systems, tissues, and cellular functions. It is important to remember that your body is an electrical being, and grounding allows you to harness the Earth’s electrical charge.
Moreover, grounding can reduce the electric field induction on your body from the surrounding environment. Studies have shown that grounding your body immediately decreases ambient voltage induced by alternating current on average. This grounding effect equalizes your body’s electrical potential with that of the Earth, preventing electric potential perturbations and disturbances.
Walking barefoot, a form of grounding, offers numerous health benefits. It can improve the quality of sleep, reduce muscle stiffness and soreness, alleviate chronic pain, normalize cortisol secretion, reduce stress and balance the autonomic nervous system, decrease inflammatory response after intense workouts, increase heart rate variability, speed up wound healing, uplift mood and reduce inflammation. Grounding can also thin your blood, improve water structure in cells, and support efficient tissue healing.