Earthing. The most important discovery in health

Contemporary research shows that the Earth’s subtle and ever‑present surface energy, which we tap into by walking barefoot on natural ground, creates a marked improvement in human physiology. It promotes good health, vitality and deeper sleep; harmonizes and stabilizes the body’s core biological rhythms; eases, and at times eliminates, chronic inflammation; and reduces or resolves pain.

“People long ago grew to love the ground. They sat upon the earth and felt close to a mothering power. Putting skin to Earth felt right, so they would slip off their moccasins and walk barefoot upon the sacred land. The ground calmed them, strengthened them, purified them and healed them.” Ota Kte (Luther Standing Bear), a Lakota Sioux author, educator and tribal leader.

By Martin Zucker

Throughout evolution, humans walked barefoot and slept on the ground, receiving a natural, gentle and restorative electrical energy from the Earth. You have probably felt a touch of it yourself. Perhaps on holiday you strolled barefoot along a sandy beach and noticed a faint tingling or a gentle warmth in your feet. Or you simply felt wonderfully at ease. That feeling arises because surface charge from the Earth moves into your body when your conductive skin makes contact with the Earth’s conductive “skin.” Modern living increasingly cuts us off from this subtle, ever‑present natural current. We wear shoes with rubber or plastic soles that block it. We obviously no longer sleep directly on the ground as people once did. Research now reveals that this energy produces a striking improvement in human physiology. It supports good health, resilience and sound sleep; synchronizes and steadies the body’s basic biological rhythms; eases, and can even resolve, chronic inflammation; and reduces or eliminates pain. Being disconnected from this natural resource right beneath our feet is quite possibly an overlooked, and highly significant, factor behind the alarming rise of chronic conditions in recent decades, particularly disorders rooted in inflammation.

Earthing

These findings are the focus of a new book, Earthing, published by Basic Health Publications, which I had the privilege to write with Stephen Sinatra, MD, a renowned integrative cardiologist, and Clint Ober, an exceptional innovator who uncovered the health benefits of reconnecting with the Earth. Dr. Sinatra calls this discovery the most exciting health breakthrough he has seen in more than thirty years of medical practice. He considers it a remarkably simple, practical, effective and inexpensive way to combat common ailments and pains that makes people healthier. In his field of cardiology, he sees strong potential for improvements in arrhythmias, blood pressure, blood viscosity and flow, and the energy production of blood cells. He recently completed a pilot study of blood electrodynamics, also known as zeta potential, indicating that Earthing improves blood viscosity and circulation. The study was inspired by an informal experiment using darkfield microscopy that showed dramatic changes in the clumping of blood cells after only forty minutes of Earthing. The changes can be seen in the images in figure 2.

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Here are several of the key points from our book:

Earthing refers to the discovery of significant health benefits that arise when we are in contact with the natural electrical energy at the surface of the Earth. The contact is simple. Walk barefoot on the ground, or sit, work and relax with bare skin touching it, or sleep indoors while connected to conductive devices that bring the outside Earth energy inside and deliver it to you.
These devices are intended for indoor use. They connect by a lead to properly grounded electrical outlets in homes, offices and clinics, or outdoors to a grounding rod. They employ a conductive carbon or silver grid that carries the Earth’s energy. Options include special cotton sheets or pads that let you sleep earthed in your own bed, floor or desk mats that let you work or unwind while earthed, plus Velcro straps and standard medical EKG patches with a grounded snap applied to areas of local pain and inflammation. These patches have been used repeatedly in Earthing research and show strong potential in clinical settings.
For more than a decade, thousands of people, adults and children alike, have benefited from these tools. Their experiences, recorded in the book, are nothing short of remarkable. Champion cycling teams sponsored from the United States used Earthing “sleep sacks” during recent Tours de France and recovered from injuries and fierce competition far faster than usual.
We all live and function electrically on an electrical planet. Each of us is a network of dynamic electrical circuits. In the living matrix of our complex bodies, trillions of cells constantly send and receive energy during their programmed biochemical reactions. The movement of nutrients and water into cells is governed by electric fields, and each cell type operates within a frequency range. The heart, brain, nervous system, muscles and immune system are powerful electrical subsystems within our bioelectrical body. In truth, all movement, behavior and action are energized by electricity. Earthing research shows that connection with the Earth initiates immediate electrophysiological changes in the body that point to improved blood properties and better function of the nervous, immune and muscular systems.
In the world of electricity, all electrical systems are grounded, meaning stabilized by the Earth’s surface energy. Without a connection to the ground, electrical equipment and sophisticated medical devices would not function properly. In similar fashion, when the body is connected to the Earth, it receives an electrical signal that normalizes and steadies many biological systems and mechanisms. Evidence indicates that this signal is a source of negatively charged free electrons available in unlimited quantity at the Earth’s surface. The scientists involved in Earthing research propose that electrons flowing into the body restrain or neutralize positively charged, electron‑seeking free radicals that drive chronic inflammatory activity at the root of many well known diseases. We believe the most powerful anti‑inflammatory agent on the planet may be the planet itself. We further suggest that destructive chronic inflammation can stem from a deficiency of electrons, a deficit corrected by direct contact with the Earth’s inexhaustible reservoir of free electrons.
Just as sunlight supplies us with vitamin D, the Earth supplies another essential input. We might call it vitamin G. G as in the word ground. We consider it a missing link in modern illness. Gary Schwartz, PhD, professor of psychology and medicine at the University of Arizona, proposes that Earthing may be as fundamentally important as sunlight, air, water and nutrients.

A fascinating discovery connected to Earthing

Across the history of civilization, cultures worldwide have honored connection with the Earth and described its energy with different terms. Some may be familiar, such as the Earth energy called Qi in traditional Chinese medicine or prana in Ayurveda. Yet the concrete health benefits of this energy have remained largely uncharted. Thanks to the curiosity and persistence of Clint Ober, a pioneer from the cable television industry, those benefits are now coming to light. For a time Ober ran the largest cable TV installation company in the United States. In 1993, at age forty‑nine and at the height of his success, he became gravely ill from complications of an abscess that nearly destroyed his liver. He recovered, then chose to sell his possessions and seek a higher purpose. He traveled the United States for four years in a motor home, searching for what he called his mission. He found it one day in Sedona, Arizona, while seated on a park bench watching a stream of visitors pass by. He noticed that nearly everyone wore shoes with synthetic soles. He wondered if this kind of footwear, which since the 1960s has steadily replaced leather soles, might affect health.

He realized that he, like almost everyone around him, was insulated from the Earth’s surface charge. His thoughts returned to his years in television and cable. Before cable, TV screens were often marred by snow, speckles and stray lines caused by electromagnetic interference. In the cable industry, the electrical systems in each home are grounded and shielded to prevent external signals and fields from disrupting the transmission carried through the lines. A coaxial line has an inner copper conductor, an insulating layer and an outer shield. That outer shield is electrically tied to the Earth by a grounding rod.

This is the very principle of grounding. Electrical systems in homes, buildings and industry are connected to the Earth’s energy field to provide electrical stability and protect the systems from erratic charges.

Could that same field protect the body from the ever‑present electrical charges in the environment, the electromagnetic fields known as EMFs that many consider a hidden health risk. Could it stabilize the body. Ober asked himself these questions. He knew the body conducts electricity. So he tried a simple experiment on himself. He made a rudimentary conductive grid for his bed.

He clipped a metal alligator clip to the grid, attached it to a wire that ran out the window and connected to a grounding rod outdoors. He then lay on the grid and measured the voltage on his body. When he was earthed he observed that the electromagnetic fields on his body dropped away. His body voltage fell close to zero, the same as the potential at the Earth’s surface.

Next morning came before he knew it. He had fallen asleep and, for the first time in years, slept soundly without sleeping pills. That meant a great deal to him. He had long suffered with persistent back pain and poor sleep. At night he took painkillers to drift off, then took more in the morning to get through the day.

He repeated the experiment every night for a week with the same results. He also noticed his pain had decreased substantially. He shared the idea with friends, who asked him to make a grid for their beds. He obliged. They reported similar results. They slept better and hurt less. Seeking an explanation, Ober contacted university sleep researchers. No one had an answer and no one showed interest, so he set out to find the explanation himself. With tips from helpful graduate students familiar with related research, he embarked, as a layman, on a scientific odyssey. Twelve years later, the research was well underway.

He initiated and ably organized about a dozen studies in which scientific teams fully confirmed his first personal observations of better sleep and reduced pain. The studies clearly show that Earthing strongly influences the delicate balance between health and disease and improves the prospects for a longer, better life. Over that time he continually developed and refined indoor Earthing systems used in the research and made them available to interested individuals. Once people experienced better sleep and less pain with earthed sleep, they invariably wanted the same for their loved ones and friends.

Earthing encourages physiological normalization

In my view, reconnecting with the Earth has revealed one of Nature’s great healing secrets. When I began sleeping earthed two years ago, my nagging restless legs syndrome vanished straight away. I now sleep earthed whether at home or when traveling. Over time, the bothersome urge to get up at night to use the bathroom, a common issue for people my age, seventy‑two, decreased markedly. Some nights I rise once, and some nights not at all. Several friends have reported the same. Thanks to earthed sleep and the use of grounded EKG patches during the day, my wife has less discomfort from significant musculoskeletal issues. My transcriptionist asked for a conductive throw after typing up several of my interviews with physicians and patients for the book. After she began sleeping earthed she told me she was simply amazed. The pain from her fibromyalgia had become minimal. To experience the benefits yourself, step outside and walk or sit barefoot on grass, sand, pebbles or unsealed concrete, all of which conduct. Wood, asphalt and plastic do not conduct. Stay barefoot for at least thirty minutes. By the end you will likely feel calmer, and if you had pain beforehand it should ease or even disappear.

Biophysicist James Oschman, PhD, a leading authority and author on energy medicine, summarizes Earthing’s effects this way. “The moment your foot touches the Earth, or you connect to it by a wire, your physiology changes. Normalization begins immediately and the body’s anti‑inflammatory response switches on. People struggle with inflammatory conditions because they never connect to the Earth, the source of free electrons that can neutralize free radicals in the body which otherwise contribute to disease and cellular breakdown.”

Benefits of Earthing

More than a decade of Earthing studies, along with feedback from individuals who routinely earth themselves, especially during sleep, point to a wide range of benefits. Here is a concise list:

Improvement or resolution of symptoms in many inflammation‑related disorders
Relief or disappearance of chronic pain
Better sleep quality and faster sleep onset
Increased energy
Reduced stress and a greater sense of calm through favorable effects on
the nervous system and stress hormones
Normalization of the body’s biological rhythms
Improved blood properties, healthier blood pressure and circulation
Less muscle tension and fewer headaches
Milder hormonal and menstrual symptoms
Much faster healing and reduced or prevented bedsores
Reduction or disappearance of jet lag
Protection from potentially harmful environmental electromagnetic fields, EMFs
Accelerated recovery after strenuous sports activity

Research on Earthing

Research to date provides evidence that the Earth’s surface energy confers significant physiological and health benefits.

Among the findings:

Sleeping while earthed normalizes cortisol levels and improves sleep. (Ghaly M, Teplitz D. J Alt Comp Med. 2004;10(5):767‑776.)

Cortisol levels before and after Earthing:

In individuals without high stress, a normal twenty‑four hour profile of cortisol secretion follows a predictable curve. It is lowest around midnight and highest at 8 a.m. (Chart A). The pre‑Earthing chart (Chart B) shows wide variation among the twelve study participants.

Chart C shows the pattern after six weeks of Earthing and indicates notable stabilization of cortisol levels. (Data adapted from the Journal of Alternative and Complementary Medicine, 2004.)

Applewhite R. When the body is earthed, electrons move from the Earth into the body and Earthing markedly reduces the effect of harmful environmental electromagnetic fields on the body. (Euro Biol Bioelectromag. 2005;1:23‑40.)

Chevalier G et al. Earthing produces a unique electrical state in the brain and muscles. (Euro Biol Bioelectromag. 2006;600‑641.)

Chevalier G et al. The electron transfer “highway” from Earth into the body runs through highly conductive water‑regulation meridians, including K‑1 and UB. (Subtle Energy & Energy Med. 2007;18(3):11‑34.)

Chevalier G. Electrophysiological measurements indicate more efficient function of the cardiovascular, respiratory and nervous systems. (J Alt Comp Med. 2010;16(1):81‑87.)

Brown R et al. Less inflammation and faster recovery following delayed onset muscle soreness induced by more intense physical exercise. (J Alt Comp Med. March 2010.)

Preliminary results from ongoing animal research show significant improvement in biochemical factors linked to metabolic syndrome in humans. For a scientific discussion of electron transfer within the body, see Oschman JL. Can electrons act as antioxidants. A review and commentary. (J Alt Comp Med. 2007;13(9):955‑967.)

For more information, see the book Earthing and the website www.earthinginstitute.net

About the author:

Martin Zucker has written or coauthored fifteen books, including Earthing, Move Yourself (Wiley), Reverse Heart Disease Now (Wiley), and Natural Hormone Balance for Women (Atria Pocket Books). He is a former reporter for the Associated Press.