Physical advantages to bare feet?

I was just wondering if there was any physical/health advantages to going bare for long periods of time. I have been posting a lot in the nude forums as I typically don't wear clothes in my apartment and frequently visit nude beaches.

I'm still not bold enough to go bare foot in my public urban high-dense city environment. But when I lived in a semi-rural house I would run around the yard barefoot frequently. At the ocean and river I'm barefoot because I don't like dumping sand outta my shoes. When I was younger I went barefoot a lot more often in public places where I knew people wouldn't care, that is, up until I had a bad experience pulling broken glass out of my feet. I haven't done it much since.

 

I believe that walking barefoot makes you have a better posture

 

^^^Possibly...many people walk 'on thier heels' as in heel comes down first. Because shoes generally give you some heel padding, impact on the heel is reduced.
But if you go walking around barefoot slamming your heels down like that, pain and bruised heels will be the result.
I think most experienced barefooters tend to develop a more carefull way of stepping, usually more of a ball and toes first, one that allows instant lightening up of a step for instance, when you feel threatening objects underfoot (glass, small rocks and pebbles) I rarely get stone bruises, usually only when I run on pavement barefoot, and am not being as careful as normal. ouch!

Anyone agree?

ZW

 

thats funny theres a thread about this because ive just recently started going barefoot when im round the house in the garden etc and i think its great, dont know about the physical benifits but i defo think theres mental benifits to it, i love to feel the grass on my feet etc we never get much chance to be outside barefoot now, my mums keeps saying "why you not wearing socks ?" lol why should I ? lol it definately feel liberating

 

I agree, or rather that is my intuitive way of walking barefoot.
One physical advantage to walking on bare feet is that your shoes are never too small nor too big.
There are surfaces that are not conducive to walking barefoot no matter how careful you are. Shoes do provide the physical advantage of being able to walk where you would other wise be unable to, an obsidian flow or an ice flow for example.

 

Yes, I think it should be intuitive, based on feedback from the body. Awareness is more important than calculation in this matter...

The Rocky Mountain Pine Forests in my area are very challenging barefoot.
It's slow going, but deer trails usually provide a way to avoid most of the 'stickers'


ZW

 

VALIDATION!

HaHa, I'm so fucking smart...


Shoeless running may spare feet


New research, led by Harvard scientists and published today, shows that people who run barefoot or with minimal shoes - as people have done for millions of years - often land on their feet in a way that avoids a jarring impact. That’s very different from most shoe-clad runners, who crash down on their heels with every bound.


“It’s as if every time you land on the ground, someone hits you on the heel with a hammer,’’ said Daniel E. Lieberman, a professor of human evolutionary biology at Harvard University, who studies the bio-mechanics of running in the lab - and himself runs with minimal or no shoes. “It’s an amazing thing. Running barefoot can be less impactful.’’


Instead of striking heel-first, barefoot runners tend to land on the ball or middle of their foot. Researchers need to do followup studies to test whether less impact translates into fewer injuries, but the new finding may become yet another example of the way in which the luxuries of modern life are a bad fit for bodies shaped by millions of years of evolution.

http://www.boston.com/news/health/articles/2010/01/28/shoeless_running_may_spare_feet/

Side note: funny a Harvard professor of human evolutionary biology using a non-word..."impactful"

ZW

 

Check out this website: http://www.thebarefootbook.com/

This site has tons of info extolling the virtues of going barefoot, all written by a Doctor!

 

posture advantage, good for the vertebral column, calves take a tremendous lot of extra exercise and grow, blood circulation issues vanish from feet and legs, fungi lose their dark and damp habitat and die, deformations induced by shoes get a little better, muscles in the foot start to build up, and eventually immune system can grow stronger.

 

Yup. i saw a show on this and they were claiming it reduced injuries. The kid also ran faster barfoot.

I know going barefoot makes you pay attention to where your stepping. Which is good cuz I dont end up standing in fire ants that way.
My feet also feel a lot better after a long barefoot walk then they do with shoes on.

Its also good that it toughens your feet up. That way when something happens to your shoes you dont end up hobbling around in my flip flops cuz your feet are too sensitive, like my bf

 

The human body evolved naked (and therefore barefoot). Clothes are a social invention. Walking and running barefoot is natural. It is also naturally very pleasant. If you can learn to go nude with other people, you can learn to go barefoot where others are fully shod in FLIP-FLOPS and SANDALS. Everybody's showing skin these days....

 

Don't be ridiculous.
Humans don't have fur to keep warm. Unless you live in the tropics, protecting the body from the elements is necessary for survival. jeez

ZW

 

My point still stands: clothes are a social invention---society covers any number of needs, including protection. Many barefooters indeed take advantage of warm clothing to walk in the snow. Jeez.

 

No, your point does not stand. Ultramaroon...

 

Yes. It does. Unless you were born with an outift and shoes on, you are the "ultramaroon"

 

Tell that to the Inuit, the Patagonians, the Lapps, etc,etc.etc.....

Some of you dipshits never cease to come down do you?

ZW

 

Clothes helping you to keep warm doesn't contradict the fact that at some point they were invented.
The point is that while clothes/shoes protect/keep warm/whatever parts of the body, if that protection is not necessary, you can go without it.
In the case of feet, extra protection often isn't necessary (or wouldn't be, if you'd gotten used to using them).
If the conditions require it, you can just put some shoes on (as in the Inuit, etc).

 

Wow you are not the brightest crayon in the crayon box.

 

Well said.

 

Lol. Well I COULD be wrong, but I don't think they came out of their mothers with clothes and shoes on either.