Our feet are so epic. They keep us mobile, upright, balanced and able to keep us doing what we love the most every day. Our evolution as humans have had us walking around on these well designed ground stompers for ages and the introduction of shoes has come to haunt us. Don't get me wrong there is a time and place for shoes but overall going shoeless is the winner.
Our feet have an arch in them and this is like in built suspension. When our body loads weight on to the foot, the arch 'collapses' and the muscles, tendons and ligaments give the best recoil ever. In fact when humans run we put twice the amount of body weight force through our joints every step. The arch of our foot takes up about 52 % of this weight when running barefoot. If, however, we were to run with shoes that have padding in the heels then our feet are hitting the ground with the heel. This means our legs are straight and that impact is smashing our hips and knees causing gnarly joint and bone damage over periods of time.
Going barefoot also helps with all of our little stabilising muscles throughout our feet. With so many directionally moving parts of our feet, these little muscles, ligaments and tendons are always getting activated and ready to perform. This get dulled down with with shoes as the randomness of terrain is taken away from our raw foot feels.
Aligning and strengthening the rest of the body is another thing going for barefoot living. With out shortening of muscles or changing the way our feet react with the ground, like when we wear shoes, our core and back muscles are getting used optimally causing better posture.
So any chance you get to feel like connecting with your ancestors way of walking, kick those shoes off and dig those toes into the dirt. You'll love it!!!
Thanks for the read!!