What Are Healthy Feet?

This is defined as feet that are able to function naturally without any hinderances. This also means that you would be able to walk perfectly without shoes. The problem is that most of us have feet that are not able to do their jobs properly because they have been in coffins their whole life. Shoes have their place of course, but they can lead to abnormal development of the foot. They will usually squeeze the toes together for extended periods of time, which can be especially problematic when the bones are developing. The muscles and nerves also don’t work as intended because the shoe does their job, leading to weak and diseased feet later on.

How To Select Proper Shoes

You want to look for what’s called minimalist shoes. This entails that the shoe does the minimum amount of work, so your foot structure is able to rebuild itself through proper movement. If you’ve been wearing conventional shoes for a long time, or have foot issues, you want to transition gradually. Some of the characteristics of these shoes includes:

1. 0 drop heal

This means that the heal is the same height as the toes. If the shoe has a heel, it’s like your walking downhill all day.

2. Wide toe box

This is for the purpose of not having our toes smashed together, and for them to move freely.

3. Toe height

You also want the toe heigh to be as flat as possible. You want your feet to hit the ground before the shoe does.

4. Being able to roll the shoe in a ball

Being able to roll the toe to the heel backward is important because this facilitates proper movement of the foot. If the shoe is ridged, the muscles won’t be able to move freely, and you won’t be able to sense the vibration of the ground as easy.

5. Upper

You won’t the upper part of the shoe to be attached to your foot. If it’s not, you have to fight to keep the shoe on your foot, thus effecting your gate.

Foot Alignment

To ensure proper foot alignment, you wan tot make sure your feet are pointing straight ahead, and to to the right, or left. In turn, this will align the rest of the body. Turning the feet out or in will place unneeded stress on the joints. Not to say that you can never do that, but more as a general rule. Also, the toes up our ancestors were not smashed together, and dod not have any deformities This is really a modern phenomenon do to our modern environment. It is not genetics, that way of thinking is akin to idiocy. We have to look at the different loads that are placed on our bodies causing our bodies to adapt, this is called mechanotransduction. Shoes mold our feet from a young age into an abnormal shape. Thankfully, a lot of this can be corrected with corrective exercise, devices, and minimalist shoes. There is a device called correct toes that adds more space between your toes, and can change the tissue structure over time, to have the structure of more of an ancient foot.

Walk On Different Terrain

Walking on a flat surface all the time is not good for our feet or joints. This does not allow for all the working parts of the feet to move correctly. Our bodies expect to have varying terrain, such as a forest, grass, or hills. Walking in a forrest for example will have a lot more twists and turns that would activate stabilizer muscles in the feet.