A Barefoot Revolution….???…

Walking is simple. As a matter of fact it’s so simple no one ever taught us how to do it. And so we all think we pretty much have this walking thing down. Well, I hate to say this but most of us are probably walking wrong.

And why is this you ask? It has to do with our shoes. Unfortunately, shoes change the way a person walks and are actually detrimental to our feet.

Research studies that compared 2000 year old skeletons and shoe wearing populations concluded that prior to the invention of shoes, humans had healthier feet. There have also been studies comparing modern populations that go barefoot vs shoe wearing populations. From these studies, researchers concluded that the populations that go barefoot had the healthiest feet.

In a 1999 article in Podiatry Management, Dr William A Rossi stated the following….“Natural gait is biomechanically impossible for any shoe-wearing person. It took 4 million years to develop our unique human foot and our consequent distinctive form of gait, a remarkable feat of bioengineering. Yet, in only a few thousand years, and with one carelessly designed instrument, our shoes, we have warped the pure anatomical form of human gait, obstructing its engineering efficiency, afflicting it with strains and stresses and denying it its natural grace of form and ease of movement head to foot.”

So what is the answer to this..?…

Although none of us are going to stop wearing shoes, we have many opportunities where we can walk barefoot. Around the house is a good place to start. I also like to go outside and walk around in the grass. With all the nerve endings in a person’s feet, it’s a wonderful feeling to connect to the earth in this way!

So take off your shoes and walk around a little bit. Your feet will thank you, as will your knees, hips, and spine!