The Grounding Cube:
Finding Your Place Before You Perform.

By Dr. Gregory Lyons, PsyD, LCPC.
10/7/2025.

Every day, before the first meeting or after the fiftieth email, try to acknowledge a moment that can be identified as a quiet threshold, like a single breath between doing and being, a place where you can decide how you’ll inhabit yourself today.

This reflection can include, but is not limited to, your role, title, or ever-multiplying task list, but focuses on the identifying practice of the space around and within your own presence. In this day of instant gratification and lightning-fast responses, most of us rush past an opportunity for mindfulness that many of us may not realize exists.

The grounding cube represents a moment of awareness that is meant to be more than a pause; it can be a cognitive choice that enacts an act of orientation. It’s where focus, composure, and identity converge before the day decides for you.

Why Orientation Matters at Work.

Workplace stress doesn’t seem to drain focus; it has been shown that it can erode performance, relationships, and even the clarity of who you are.

Over 80% of U.S. workers report experiencing work-related stress (OSHA, 2023). Studies show that higher stress levels are significantly correlated with lower productivity and engagement (Bashir & Ismail, 2021). In a national survey, 56% of employees said stress impairs their performance, and 51% said it harms relationships with coworkers (Anxiety & Depression Association of America [ADAA], 2023). Burnout research from Deloitte found that 83% of respondents said stress negatively impacts personal relationships.

The data could suggest that when we lose our sense of orientation, we can lose clarity of self, and our responses become automatic instead of intentional. The Grounding Cube can help to develop a more decisive, cognitive approach to meeting challenges.        

Preparing the Space.

If possible, before beginning, try to quiet your workspace, place of production, or work environment as much as possible. Close the door, turn off the radio; try to prepare this moment of reflection to be as close as possible to the environment that will be established in accomplishing the task at hand. If your office isn’t private, try to move temporarily to a calmer place — a conference room, break room, library corner, or outdoor bench.

Turn off notifications, dim bright screens, and allow stillness to form naturally around you. The goal isn’t isolation — it’s presence. This moment becomes the prelude to focus: a physical cue that signals your transition into intentional engagement. By creating a more reflective environment, you allow the body and mind to align before entering the next task or project. This simple act of environmental awareness reinforces the same DBT principle that governs mindfulness: participate fully, but with awareness. Even a few minutes in a quieter space can transform reaction into readiness.

The Grounding Cube — Six Sides of Presence.

The Grounding Cube isn’t mystical — it’s a structure for awareness. Six sides. Six simple questions. One small recalibration before the next demand.

This sensory practice reflects principles from Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT) mindfulness skills, which teach individuals to anchor in the present moment through observation, description, and nonjudgmental awareness. By engaging each sense, you transition from automatic reaction to intentional presence — a central DBT concept of mindfulness in action. Even though you may have muted some of the elements involving hearing or seeing, they will most likely become evident through a stronger sense of concentration as the process goes along.

• Sight — Observing Without Judgment.
  What do you see right now? What color or image offers pause? DBT teaches the “Observe” skill — noticing your environment without assigning value or meaning.

• Touch — Participating Through Sensation.
  What can you physically feel? The chair, the desk, your own breath? Touch grounds the body in the “Participate” skill — allowing yourself to be fully engaged in the present sensory experience.

• Sound — Listening Mindfully.
  What surrounds you — noise, voices, or silence? DBT emphasizes “One-Mindfully”: attending to one thing at a time. Sound can become a single, stabilizing point of awareness.

• Smell & Taste — Describing the Subtle.
  What’s in the air? Coffee, paper, nothing at all? Naming sensory details activates the “Describe” skill — putting language to perception without evaluation.

• Internal Presence — Awareness of Inner States.
  Where is your energy centered? Are you forward-leaning, guarded, or calm? This is the internal application of the “Observe” skill — noticing thoughts, sensations, and emotions as they arise without clinging or rejecting them.

• External Influence — Effectiveness in Context.
  What’s pressing against your edges — tasks, expectations, emotional residue from others? DBT calls this “Effectively”: being aware of the environment’s impact and responding based on what works, not what feels automatic.

You don’t need to fix anything — just locate yourself. Knowing where you are, both internally and externally, is the start of being effective, humane, and steady in a changing environment.

Reframing the Workday.

Mindfulness research continues to show that brief moments of awareness improve both emotional regulation and task performance. In workplace studies, even micro-practices of mindfulness before or between tasks have been linked to reduced cortisol levels, improved focus, and better interpersonal communication.

The Grounding Cube offers a quick, evidence-informed structure — not an escape from work, but a method of inhabiting it differently. When stress tightens your breath or the day begins to pull you off center, take one minute to reset through the six sides.

It promotes a moment encoraging for you to cognitively puase, and take a breath. Before sending the email, entering the meeting, or taking on another task, give yourself permission to notice yourself as an independent element in the process of the task. This is not self-analysis — it’s self-location. When you locate yourself, even briefly, you reclaim choice. You decide how to respond, not just what to produce.

In DBT terms, this is the shift from emotion mind to the wise mind: the balanced space where awareness, reason, and compassion intersect.

The most composed professionals aren’t those untouched by stress; they’re those who recognize it early, ground through it, and re-enter the moment aligned. They understand that they don’t merely occupy time — they inhabit space. And in that space, intention becomes action, and awareness becomes stability.

 References.

Anxiety & Depression Association of America. (2023). Workplace stress & anxiety disorders survey. https://adaa.org/workplace-stress-anxiety-disorders-survey

Bashir, M., & Ismail, N. A. (2021). Impact of stress on employee productivity. *Journal of Management Studies*, 58(3), 125–138. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC7889069/

Deloitte. (2022). Workplace burnout survey. https://www2.deloitte.com/us/en/pages/about-deloitte/articles/burnout-survey.html

Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA). (2023). Understanding the problem: Workplace stress. https://www.osha.gov/workplace-stress/understanding-the-problem