This week we discuss our two favourite G's - Grounding & Gratitude!

In this episode, we share the science behind grounding, why we do it, and the reason this has become so challenging (but increasingly important) in modern life. Plus, our personal experiences with gratitude journalling and how it's more powerful than you think..

Don't forget - our weekly challenge and Little Promise to join us in this week!

Tune in to this week's group chat, we'd love to have you!

Love,

Anna & Alex x

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Instagram & TikTok: @biohackgcpodcast

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00:00 Introduction

01:03 Last Week's Challenge & Little Promise

06:04 The Benefits of Grounding

08:43 The Science Behind Grounding

20:50 Practical Tips for Grounding

28:23 Gratitude Journaling: A Powerful Biohack

41:38 This Week's 'Little Promise'

Oh no. But I've been doing Pilates, so. That's good. Yeah. Maybe you should get your feet dirty after this. Post recording dirty feet session. Does that sound like a normal thing to say? Yeah, could do. More dirty feet things. Oh, dirty feet. At least that could be misconstrued. Okay, with that. Welcome to The Biohack Group Chat.

I didn't do it. No, I didn't. So we recorded this episode a little bit sooner than we usually would. So I had less time to do it, which is one excuse. My second excuse is good intentions to do it. I did like a big food shop, got loads of veg, got loads of stuff that I could put in a salad. And then I decided that I prefer to just make it fresh every day.

Like, no, I just cook bigger portions so that I don't, every day, I don't have to do it again, and then clean up. Did you do it? Did you make a salad in the last five days? Didn't, but yesterday So you also didn't commit to your own little promise that we made? But yesterday I made crispy monkfish tacos, and they were really good.

And did you cook a bulk portion of crispy monkfish tacos? No, because they're like eight pounds for two fillets, so yeah, and we ran out. And it wasn't good. So, we both failed that, that little promise then. Yes, we both failed. We did. But that's fine, it happens. But if I can just make a case for cooking bigger portions for one minute.

Order delivery. Yeah, that. Okay, yeah, that's exactly how you're feeling, because you know you've got to go home and you've got to get all the veg out of the fridge, you've got to chop it all up, you've got to cook it again, but, oh wait! You did it all yesterday and there's a portion ready waiting for you in the fridge and all you have to do is is open up the Tupperware and eat it and put it in a nice bowl or whatever you want to do, but it's ready.

It's waiting. It's calling to you in the fridge. Okay, you got me. You sold me on it. Fine. You got my buy in on the on the big salad. I will try and do it. I'm disappointed that I didn't do it. I will try and do it. I'm sorry. No, no, it's all good. We're not about making anyone feel guilty. And I've been posting this on our Instagram, if anyone's seen.

So I completely agree, like I'm not going to beat myself up about not making a salad because we can't all be perfect. No, but so we failed on the promise, but we didn't fail on the challenge. The challenge was epic. That was epic. Yeah. We went to sauna and plunge in, um, in Shoreditch in London. If anyone's been or lives around, it was absolutely amazing.

I don't know if that was just me, I was like psychosomatic or what, but yeah, I just felt really light. I can't even remember. I think I like floated home on a magic carpet. It's like all a bit of a blur. I just felt so good. Yeah, that's exactly what I mean. I felt like I was Stefan Clouds the whole way home.

And since we started our biohacking journey, that was one of like the big things that got us into it. So if anyone's like really unsure where to start, I really recommend this as a good place to start and a little biohack that you can easily implement from day one. Um, so we're going to be clarifying exactly what grounding is, how to do it, and then the overall benefits that it can have on you.

So what is grounding? Grounding is, is the practice of kind of walking barefoot or sitting or laying on the ground with direct contact to the earth's surface. So for example, like you could be sitting on the grass or some soil or like walking on the beach and the sand, as long as you've got that contact.

Oh my god! Collect all of your body with the surface. Yeah, if you just unzip your skin, you'll get out. We don't recommend that. No, I need to just switch on. Still not switched on for some reason. So your feet, I think it's the very base of your foot, like the middle of your foot has the highest conductivity.

It's like the most sensitive to that process. Oh really? The middle of your foot? The middle of the base of your foot, that like really tickly, Yeah. Yeah. The arch. Yeah, the arch. That also describes it. Oh, okay. So you need to like really press down into the ground to like get all of the foot connection. I think just your feet work.

Um, and we think this is an absolute super biohack because the grounding can support your body's natural detoxification process and this can reduce inflammation. Oxidative stress, so there's loads and loads of benefits which we're going to talk about, but you know, you can experience things like improved energy and reduced fatigue, a sense of calm and reduced anxiety, but also some quite incredible cardiovascular health benefits as well.

Yeah, exactly. So then what happens is the, they kind of travel through like our connective tissue and they neutralize like harmful molecules, protect our cells and organs from that damage that would be caused by oxidative stress and also helps reduce things like injuries. So what if, I keep hearing this thing, free radicals.

And that's what's known as oxidative stress. So if you think of an apple, if you imagine this healthy apple kind of like your body, right, you've got your skin on the outside and you've got the juicy goodness on the inside. If you take a bite of that apple, what you're gonna quickly see is that it's gonna start to go brown.

So when the inside and the good stuff starts getting exposed to the oxygen in the air, it oxidates. That process of oxidation makes it go brown. So it kind of goes unhealthy at that point. The same thing happens inside our bodies. So the free radicals, they do that same process of essentially turning those cells brown.

So like you say, the free electrons, they sort of come up from the earth, transfer into our bodies, and they help reduce those free radicals. So essentially reducing that oxidation and that negative impact inside our bodies. So if they're kind of left to build up, then they can be associated with things like premature, premature aging, um, and chronic disease as well.

So you just really want to be neutralizing these three radicals and then reducing acute and chronic inflammation, helping to like fight disease. And there's just loads and loads of health benefits. But one of the kind of theories is that even though we do produce free radicals as like a natural part of the processes in our body, that actually there was something which was something we did every day that would help reduce those free radicals.

process and those habits because we're now wearing rubber or plastic sold shoes. We sleep on elevated beds. We live in high rise apartments like me on like the fourth floor, barely getting outside, working from home, looking at a screen all day. I'm completely cut off from that essential. natural connection.

Exactly. You know, it makes perfect sense to me. When you think about it, we've been over like eons of time. I knew you were gonna say eons. Yeah, we definitely googled what eons was. It's a nice word and I'm gonna, I'm gonna find a way every day to bring the word eons into conversation. Um, do you know what, I don't even know if I'm saying it right, but it is definitely eons.

But yeah, it's very recent history. Whereas eons and in time before that Yeah, it's like our bodies basically evolved and were optimized based on us having that connection with the ground and now we've lost it. And our evolution of our bodies hasn't caught up with current day habits yet. So it's like we need this process or habit or routine of grounding in order to have our bodies function as they are optimally supposed to.

Think how many things say like oh this is an antioxidant and we buy like supplements to be antioxidants and this is saying that actually the earth could be the best one that we have and our modern lifestyle just completely ruins that. Think about it now, when was the last time, if anyone listening, like when was the last time that you had your skin directly on the surface of the earth and is it something you do frequently?

Obviously we do it, but it's a conscious choice. Yeah, and I still think people think I'm like this freak, like walking around East London, like, where the grass is like, just not nice at all. There's rubbish everywhere and I'm the only person not wearing my shoes. Do you know what? Who's laughing when you're living a healthy, happy life?

In terms of physical health. It's been shown to reduce chronic fatigue, pain, and inflammation, and it can also improve cardiovascular health by reducing blood viscosity and clumping, which leads to better blood flow. I want to talk about that one a little bit more because there was this study that I was reading about, so it was 2013.

So it showed basically that grounding increased what's called the zeta potential of red blood cells. Which doesn't really mean much to me, to be honest with you. But, when I kind of read it a little bit more, essentially just to explain a bit what that means. So, they looked at ten healthy people, and they essentially asked them to ground for two hours.

And after two hours of doing that. Their um, zeta potential increased by an average of 270 percent just from two hours of that. And this relates to the strength of the negative charge on the surface of red blood cells. So, this is the factor which kind of maintains the spacing of blood cells in the bloodstream.

So, the greater the charge the greater the potential of cells to repel each other, so less clumping. Now obviously, clumping blood cells can be terrible for things like forming blood clots or reduced cardiovascular health. So this is literally implying that essentially grounding is like a natural blood thinning effect.

That is exactly, that's a way more fun way to describe the boring study that I just described. That's literally it, yeah. We still haven't done that yet, so maybe we should do that, but we need a microscope. I'm saying we don't have a microscope and we don't have blood slides. I mean, I don't have blood slides knocking around.

Oh, I thought it was, like, spilling all over you or something. I could see you in my peripheral, like I don't know, I was just drinking, and for some reason I started, like, lowering myself. I'm so sorry. No, no, it's all good. It's all good. So after an initial 30 minutes of exposure to grounding, she reported a noticeable decrease in pain.

So it, like, completely healed her. And apparently it's something to do with the inflammatory barricade. So, that's, like, elect electron deficiency. And it's basically Basically, our wounds are healing very different when the body is grounded. Healing's much faster. Basically the profiles of various inflammatory markers over time are very different in people who ground versus people who don't ground.

That's incredible. Well, yeah, it just shows how powerful it is. And I mean, when I first started learning about like these kinds of studies, I like I told all my family and my friends, because I thought this is such a simple thing that could genuinely improve the health of the people you love without costing a thing.

So really, really recommend grounding. So sleep on here also says Study in 2004, subjects who slept grounded for eight weeks experienced improved sleep and reduced pain and stress levels. So I think the only thing on here that we don't actually have a study to cite is, apparently it can help with anti aging as well, and that's because neutralizing the free radicals helps slow down the aging process.

Basically, it's just a wonderful, wonderful thing that we should be doing without even thinking as part of our day. And unfortunately, the life that we live at the moment, we can't do it. It's not as easy for us to be like spending three hours on the ground as part of our normal routine. But factoring this in is a biohack, which I really would recommend to everyone to start as soon as you possibly can.

So it's just going to be more effective essentially. So obviously through the feet is a great way, but if you can have your legs, your arms, your hands, that's really going to help improve that process and make it as quick as possible. And one of the things that I wasn't too sure about is like water like if you were swimming in the sea or like in a body of water like how that works.

I think it has to be like a natural lake or the ocean like something again that's like not cut off from the earth by like pool tiles or like concrete. So basically like if you're swimming in like a man made swimming pool. That's not gonna, it's not gonna do much for you, but if you swim in the ocean, because the water is so conductive, then it's gonna like supercharge that earthing and that grounding.

You just like plug it into the wall. Yeah, exactly. So it basically just connects with every electrical plug. You have that grounding plug which is connected right to the outside, so it's just like a direct line right to the outside, and then the mat must have like the same sort of conductive frequency as what the ground does so that you can have that as like a mat where you put your feet or I think there's also like mattresses, sheets, socks, shoes, bands.

So in every plug socket, that's in there, which basically connects to a grounding wire in the electrical system. And that grounding wire, at some point, goes straight down into the Earth's surface. And that's to prevent things like surcharges and things that could then damage the electrical system. So essentially, it's kind of like the same thing in your body.

You need to have that grounding to prevent that build up of like essentially positive ions or what we like free radicals in our case that could then have a negative effect you want to have that grounding wire to help neutralize that process. I was looking at like what is the ideal amount of time to do it because every I think all studies are like suggesting different things like the sleep one for example I think they were pretty much grounding all day apart from when they were eating.

There's not great outdoor space like nearby me. There's like right outside my apartment There's like the canal, but I'm not convinced that that grass is like actually connected to the ground But you think there might be a sheet or something underneath it like some kind of Barrier like artificial. Yeah, some places do that, you know, they put like if you have like some fancy hotel or something and there's a little random patch of grass, don't trust that that is actually got a good grounding potential because it could be that they've just put like a tiny little thin layer of grass or like fake grass and then put a plastic sheet on underneath it so it might not actually have like the full potential as the actual earth does.

Well, as you were just saying, around 30 minutes is probably a good marker, right? But some of these studies do suggest that longer sessions you will have more pronounced effects. You were saying you struggled to get more than five or ten. I'm challenging us this week to get two hours in one session. Oh my god.

Okay, yeah. And I know it sounds like a lot, but. No, we can do it either at the weekend or maybe in the evening, just, it's like dedicating a whole evening just to that, like I'm going to go outside and I'm going to ground. And I'm going to neutralize my free radicals. And it's like, have you got any plans tonight?

Yeah, I'm neutralizing my free radicals. I'm sorry I can't come to the pub. I'm doing a detox. Oh, how are you doing a detox? I'm just going to stand in the garden for two hours with no shoes on. But it's true though. Um, I believe in us. We can do this. I'm going to struggle with it as well. But we've, I really think that we need a bit of a free radical neutralization.

It's going to be great. So, yeah, just to kind of summarize then, grounding is a really safe and free way to improve your health, and it's also a very natural way, it means you get to spend time outdoors, you don't have any kind of like, you're not taking anything, you're not doing anything a bit wacky, you're just, you're just enjoying some time in nature and also having a great, great impact internally.

If you do try a bit of grounding and you feel a bit strange, please do, like, talk to a medical professional about that. I will say that I, when I first started, I remember that I did feel a little bit strange. Not, not bad, but yeah, do you remember I called you one day and I was like, you know, I feel really odd.

I get that tingling feeling in my feet, for example, but what was it that I was saying? You said that it can have a Oh, I had headaches. Yeah, so it's like when you first start grounding, you can basically have some side effects. Yeah, like detoxification side effects. So yeah, I had like some headaches and I was just feeling a little bit, honestly, just like I was doing a detox, basically.

And then by the time I started doing it every day, I didn't feel any negative effects. Okay. That's my goal to feel the negative effects and I know I'm doing it enough. Okay. So I want to switch it up for a minute and ask you about something that we talked about on last week's episode. So we were talking about biohacks for beginners, what had really personally helped us, and you mentioned like gratitude journaling.

Yeah. So I've never actually done like a consistent journaling practice. I've only ever done it as like part of a workshop or like just here and there. I've done little bits and I have really liked it, but I've never like said, okay this is gonna be something that I'm gonna incorporate into my daily routine or whatever.

I only got into it, like, you know, maybe six months ago, but I found it so beneficial for my life. I feel like it feeds my soul. It's just on every, from like a holistic point of view, I feel like it's improved so many things for me. I just like start the day overall so much better and it's so good for the mind, it's so good for just like your, like your essence in the day if you kind of start the day and end the day in like a way of gratefulness, of gratitude.

That for me is gratitude. And I think everyone probably experiences it slightly differently, but it's just that general feeling of kind of that light and happy sensation. Yeah, I know, I can definitely relate to the kind of feeling you're talking about, and it actually reminds me of like once, years ago, I was going through like a really stressful time, I hadn't done any yoga for ages, and I just was doing like a super easy yoga with Adrian, like old school like video, this is literally like 2018, and There was just a moment like halfway through or like towards the end and we were doing a child's pose and she was just be Just be grateful that you've taken this time for yourself or like whatever it is She was saying and I literally just burst into tears.

And then it does make you feel like emotional definitely does so from like if you want to know kind of like from the science side of things, it's not just like a random feeling, but like there's actually sort of science behind it. So research has shown that this experience of gratitude is actually shown to influence the hypothalamus.

Like there's, there's so much to it. Yeah. I was just thinking about like the dopamine production, like that could then like set off this whole chain of events. Like if you think about in like couples therapy, they'll ask like the couples to like say the things that they appreciate about each other. And then if they don't, If that was happening just in your like, real world, day to day, you're just in your kitchen, you're grateful for your partner, and then you go over and that then produces dopamine, and then you go over and you give them a hug, and that then produces oxytocin, and it's just like, sets off this [00:33:00] whole chain of positivity and all of the hormones that you need to like, feel happy.

Exactly, like that, it's like that recipe for We were saying like a happy life. It's that's why I do see it as a really good biohack. I just want to say like before we carry on and talk about like how you can practice gratitude for anyone that might be kind of switching off at this point thinking is this some sort of zen thing you do if you know you if you have the time like I don't have time for a gratitude journal you know I get you like if I suggested this to my brother and was like you should write down things every morning that you're grateful for he would just like laugh at me and be like I can't sit there with an incense and listen to Lana Del Rey like you Anna, but I don't have time for that.

Because you will be rewarded for it, and you will see the benefits, just like going to the gym, or exercising, you know, sometimes you might think, oh, I can't be arsed, but when you do it, you always feel better, it's worth it for like, the physical, mental, and spiritual health benefits, and it only takes a few minutes, so it's not like you have to do a whole workout, it's just a few minutes, and once you start doing it, you really get into it, but yeah, I'm happy to talk through kind of some of the mental and like, physical health benefits, um, because there have been quite a few people studies.

So like, for example, there was a review of kind of gratitude interventions that found that gratitude practices such as journaling can enhance psychological well being and also reduce symptoms of depression and anxiety. So people that regularly practice gratitude actually report higher life satisfaction and better There are numerous mental and physical health benefits to gratitude journaling, and it really is a case of like, when you nurture your mind, your body feels the benefit.

So it kind of suggests that that gratitude journaling can really positively impact your like resilience as well. So it's so much more than just like making you feel well. more grateful and like more happy in life. It can really help you with things. Your adaptability and being able to bounce back quickly in your day, if something kind of throws you off a little bit or you encounter something a bit challenging, you can kind of just quickly adapt to it.

And not just tackle it, but just Do it with a really positive mindset. So just, it helps kind of reframe your thoughts a little bit because it's putting you in this mindset of, I'm going to see the world in a more positive light and I am capable and I am ready to deal with whatever it might present me with today.

So what do you what do you actually do like, are you doing this in the morning, do you say three things like, what's your whole routine. So I would say just trying to do it for about 15 minutes a day, but you know, even less than that. You can even just take five minutes a day. But the main thing I would say is be really consistent with it.

If you can just find a way to kind of appreciate and be grateful for those moments such as like, you know, taking a sip of your favorite coffee or thinking about the love that that barista put into making it for you or like the sound of the rain. I love the sound of the rain. Or the trees blowing in the wind.

That's my favorite. Absolutely beautiful and like that is the fact that you even just said then like that's your favorite, you know You're expressing that appreciation for the sound that it makes when the wind blows in the trees and there are people that might think Oh fuck this like I'm not going outside today.

Like having those positive thoughts rather than focusing on the negative, like actually lowers your cortisol. So you're going to feel less stressed. You're going to feel better able to handle everything in your life, which maybe goes back to that like pain reduction. Like it's actually just like your mental resilience to handle everything.

Yeah, one thing I always say which is a little bit like sad because there is actually people in this situation But it's like one one thing. I always go back to is like, okay Yeah, I'm feeling depressed or I'm feeling shit But I could there's literally people on the streets like I've got so much to be grateful for Definitely especially like and that's a reminder like, you know living in cities as well like living in London Like you you're constantly reminded of how how lucky you are and how to be in the situation that we're in now.

But yeah, write it down. These are all things that you could write in your journal. You know, you could literally write down, I'm really grateful to have a warm bed to sleep in. It doesn't need to be overly complex and it doesn't need to be Or like fully formed sentences or even make sense to anyone else.

My life's great. And then throw, throw it to the side. Unless you sit there and you feel it, you really feel like I am so grateful for how much I fricking love my life. then you're not going to get the benefits of it. So it's really about really sitting in that moment of appreciation and really feeling that gratitude.

Exactly. And if you do, if someone wants to get started and you prefer to have a bit of a structure to follow, then there is a journal that I do recommend that's kind of got daily prompts to help you get started. That's by Intelligent Change. So they've got loads and loads of journals and sort of different like mindfulness and productivity themed journals, but they, yeah, they offer a range so you can find one that suits you.

And yeah, just keep it next to your bed or somewhere accessible and it might be able to help you out just getting started a little bit. I love it. I think that this is going to be a really nice little promise for this week. Nice. I really want to try this, so I'm happy. So just to remind everyone, before we end each episode, we're going to make a small promise to ourselves.

So, what I would like you to do is journal three things that you're grateful for every morning and three things that went well in your day every night before you go to sleep. So that's three in the morning and three in the night. Three in the morning, which is things that you're grateful for, so you wake up in the morning and you write three things.

that you're grateful for and you appreciate in your life, and then before you go to sleep, three things that you're grateful for and that went well in your day. Okay, do I have to do this every day? Every day for five days, yeah. Okay, I'm excited. I got a new little notebook so I'm just gonna leave that by my bed.

And I said, please just start gratitude journaling. It's really, it's life changing for me. I don't want to get too, too sentimental and too emotional. Um, again, referring back to my brother, he'll just like listen to this and message me like, You weirdo. Stop crying about your gratitude journal. Literally, but it's, it's had, it does make me emotional because it has had such a huge impact on my life and I feel like a lot of the things, I'm feeling gratitude.

You're making my eyes water right now. A lot of the stuff which has happened in my life recently I do put down too. Gratitude journaling. I've reframed a lot of my thoughts and wow, I feel like it's helping me align every single day with what I want from that day and the accumulative effect of that. So you might not notice it much over one or two days, but over the accumulation of when you've been doing it for weeks and then months, it's really massive.

If you want to see more of the group chat and join our community or see some clips of us doing the cold plunge challenge that we talked about at the top of the episode, you can find us on Instagram or TikTok @biohackgcpodcast. Thank you for joining the group chat. Lots of love and we'll see you next [00:45:00] week.