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HomeHealthy LivingIs Mendacity on the Flooring Good for Your Well being?

Is Mendacity on the Flooring Good for Your Well being?


As a toddler, Josh Patner grew to become accustomed to stepping over his mother, who used to lie down within the kitchen each time her mother-in-law would name.

“My grandmother would speak her ear off,” Mr. Patner, 61, recalled. To manage, his mom would “lie on the ground and maintain the cellphone away from her head.” Mr. Patner’s father, additionally a fan of the ground, took a 20-minute nap beneath the household’s piano every night time after work.

So it’s unsurprising, maybe, that Mr. Patner enjoys flooring time at his dwelling in Brooklyn and even at his good friend’s locations — partly to stretch and soothe his again (he has scoliosis), but additionally, he says, as a result of it feels calming.

“If I do know you properly sufficient to take a seat in your sofa, I do know you properly sufficient to lie in your flooring,” he mentioned.

Whereas that is nothing new to Mr. Patner, others are simply now catching on to the apply: Posts with the hashtag #floortime have garnered thousands and thousands of views on TikTok.

Lily Bishop, a graduate scholar in Chicago, made a video exhibiting herself supine on her beige carpet, silently staring on the ceiling, arms unfold vast. “I’m a flooring individual to my core,” learn the phrases emblazoned over the clip. “Assembly simply ended? Flooring. Residence from the fitness center? Flooring. Need to take a nap? Flooring.”

“I discover it makes me extra relaxed and current, and sort of, like, slows down the anxious ideas,” Ms. Bishop, 27, mentioned when reached by cellphone.

For her, the feeling feels just like watching ocean waves wash ashore — however with out the journey to the seashore.

“You don’t must have a serene, pure setting,” Ms. Bishop mentioned. “You simply want the ground.”

Though there isn’t a physique of analysis that extols the advantages of mendacity on the bottom, psychologists say spending time on the ground is unlikely to harm, and may even assist us really feel grounded.

Once you lie flat in your again, your posture is open and relaxed, which can have a relaxing impact, mentioned Ellen Hendriksen, a scientific psychologist in Boston.

“Your physique and temper wish to align,” she mentioned. This is the reason it’s troublesome to really feel hopeful and optimistic in case you’re slumped in your chair, head hanging down, she added. Or why our shoulders shoot up or our jaws clench once we’re anxious.

Mendacity on the bottom may additionally assist us keep away from ruminating, defined Alan Fogel, a professor emeritus of psychology on the College of Utah and the writer of “Restorative Embodiment and Resilience.”

“In our Western tradition, we don’t have a whole lot of areas for restoration,” Dr. Fogel mentioned. “There’s no timeouts. There’s no recess.”

Chances are you’ll assume {that a} comfy mattress can be extra conducive to rest. “However usually what occurs, particularly in acquainted locations like our mattress, is our thoughts retains working,” Dr. Fogel mentioned. “We take into consideration what occurred through the day. We take into consideration what we might have finished or ought to have finished.”

When mendacity on a tougher floor like the ground, nevertheless, you might develop into extra attuned to what your physique is feeling and fewer targeted in your ideas.

To get comfy, it turns into essential to sink into the ground and soften your muscular tissues, Dr. Fogel added. The deal with letting go makes it simpler to assist the physique and thoughts decompress — to “simply be,” he mentioned.

Kara Lennon, 34, an account govt and an indoor biking teacher in Boston, has been a fan of flooring time for a couple of decade.

“It’s like going outdoors and sitting within the solar” for a couple of minutes, she mentioned. You’re feeling higher, “after which you will get again to no matter you’re doing.”

Folks have been gravitating to the bottom for hundreds of years. Examples embrace the yoga pose savasana, which helps folks slowly chill out every a part of the physique whereas mendacity on their backs; Zen meditation or tea ceremonies that always happen on the ground; and the radiant flooring heating system in Korean houses, which makes the bottom much more attractive for sleeping, finding out or consuming.

Not everybody will discover aid on the ground. Some could have bodily challenges, for example, that make it uncomfortable or painful to decrease themselves to the bottom.

If you’ll be able to attempt it and wish to give flooring time a go, “focus in your breath, actually flip inward,” mentioned Rachel Goldman, a psychologist and scientific assistant professor of psychiatry on the NYU Grossman College of Medication. Do you’re feeling extra relaxed, extra grounded or extra in management? In that case, she mentioned, “it’s one extra technique that you should use while you really feel like it’s good to.”

Ms. Lennon acknowledged that “it may appear foolish,” however in her case, taking a flooring break for even only a few minutes every day permits her to be extra productive whereas working from dwelling.

“It’s urgent the reset button for a second,” she mentioned.



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