Too Shy to Go Barefoot

I had the same shyness when i was younger. My parents couldn't always afford the types of gym shoes that were required for the gym floor. As a result, some terms and years i had to take my shoes and socks off for gym class. More often than not there was only two or three of us in the same predicament and sometimes only myself. I think it was not only the shyness of having to be barefoot but being different and feeling disadvantaged compared to the other kids.

 

When i was at school it was standard practice to do gym lessons barefoot, as this was thought (correctly!) to be good for the feet and legs.
It is still the norm today, which could be one reason that going barefot in the UK doesn't attract much attention.

 

When i was at school it was standard practice to do gym lessons barefoot, as this was thought (correctly!) to be good for the feet and legs.
It is still the norm today, which could be one reason that going barefot in the UK doesn't attract much attention.

 

I'd love to talk! About going barefoot.

 

I was shy about going barefoot in front of others until I was around 16. I became friends with a guy the same age from school and he invited me to spend the weekend at his house. That entire weekend, my buddy and his brother who was a year younger than us, were both barefoot all the time. At first, I really felt uncomfortable as my friend kept asking me to kick off my shoes and socks and be comfortable. I finally gave in and then realized they were right, that hanging out in bare feet was cool and nothing to be ashamed of.

 

Me too

 

Unfortunately my parents had always been against my walking barefoot at home, although I always wanted. But they would scold me each time I tried to kick my shoes and socks off. But wearing shoes all day long was not a pleasure for my feet and when I was alone at home I would take off socks and slippers and walk Barefoot even in winter until they returned. Only when I was about 13 I managed to reassure them

 

Overbearing parents are the worst, aren't they? I experienced something of a reversal of your situation. My foot shyness ran deep years ago, and my family made it worse by trying to force the issue. They just wanted me to obey and "take them off" on demand, completely ignoring my own wishes and phobias in the matter, and not realizing that maybe I'm not OK with being controlled like this. So I closed up for a number of years, and withdrew my feets in to their sweaty confines in the shoes.

It wasn't until in my later 20's that I realized I had indeed made a mistake. My toenails were hit with a fungal infection from years of being wrapped in socks. Brittle and thick, with a foul odor to match. It was time for some tough love. This one winter I took them off, and jumped straight into the snowy end in my front yard. 6 months of daily barefoot time and snowy foot baths to fix the issue, and my nails are allright now. But the tragedy here is that for all their stupid, overbearing behavior, my parents would've been right, and I missed out on a barefoot childhood, a point of regret for me now, as that time cannot be gotten back now.

So carpe diem, kid. Seize those opportunities and don't listen to others. You're not getting any younger, and many missed opportunities don't repeat themselves later. Barefoot in hiding, if you have to, but do it anyway. Regretting things years later is the worst.

 

BTW, you do realize that the threads that you bumped up are several years old, and many of the posters are gone and extremely unlikely to respond to you?

 

Tell me about it. I had some golden opportunities to go barefoot at school as I was way too shy about baring my feet. I get depressed when I think about it, so I press on and stay in the present tense. This topic comes up here from time to time and it's so reassuring to me knowing I wasn't the only kid with these thoughts and I wasn't crazy. It's amazing to know how common it is and it's interesting to see that it mostly comes from males yet rarely females. I've only read one case involving a girl, the rest, boys. At least my parents were not against going barefoot.

Antony 14 ,it saddens me to know your parents are so against barefooting. You have my sympathy.

 

and what were the opportunities? Its a common story you know when parents are shoddies

 

I had the perfect opportunity to go barefoot in Phys ed class such as forgetting your tennis shoes, also a few other games we were allowed to go barefoot in order to run faster. In elementary school I was in a small specialized class in which the room was newly carpeted. Our teacher suggested that we remove our shoes and pad around in socks to keep the carpet clean. I never dared to yank off my socks even though that also would have been acceptable. In the room we had this wooden circular stool with a rounded bottom, it worked as a balancing device to learn coordination and such. Our teacher said that we could do it in our bare feet to keep from sliding off it. Did I? oh no never! One year in middle school my gym class was on the last period of the day. I always thought it would have been neat to sneak out the back door of the locker room and board my bus barefooted. Again, I wimped out. Sadly I would have been too embarrassed to perform any school activities in bare feet other than showing after gym class.

 

But fortunately you could be barefoot at home, me, I had to be shod all the time from morning till night, this made me search for opportunities to remove shoes free my feet and give them rest, while my parents couldn't see me

 

Perhaps its the culture difference but I was barefoot in school loads of times. We had to do PE in bare feet for all indoor lessons and sometimes outdoors I remember running cross country in the mud which was great! Then there was drama lessons and in middle school we couldn't wear our outdoors shoes so it was indoor shoes or socked feet, if your socks weren't the uniform colour off they came and you just spent the day barefoot.

Probably all these experiences combined are what made me a barefooter today.

 

that's sad.

 

90% of shy to go barefoot is caused by constantly wearing shoes and feeling awkward without them cause everything feels all super sensitive.

How to Start Barefoot Hiking: 8 Steps (with Pictures) - wikiHow

Even you got to do it on your own build up that natural ability a billion people worldwide have to go about barefoot over all kinds of terrain it takes a few weeks at most.

Regular bare-footers arent even aware they are barefoot for the most part just like most people dont notice they dont have gloves on their hands.

10% I guess is mental "people are looking at my feet" that BS disapears fast. Its cause of that initial frailness YOU are more aware you barefoot no one else gives a shit.

It doesnt take much traingat all. A few long walks outside your comfort zone some sore feet that padding builds up that natural ability to navigate without shoes comes right back. Even if you never had it its in us.

Its really kind of neat I live 10 blocks from the beach I used to walk one block in the beginning and my feet would hurt, shit now I can go all day no problem for miles.

Its a sport like weight training build up to it.

 

I am going to double post on this.

Once you build up your ability to go barefoot the foot shyness is gone.

I can work a construction site barefoot. I have done it.

That awkwardness is a direct result of shoes taking away your natural abilities and making you feel unable to do things without shoes. Therefor shy awkward about it.

Push through the first 2 weeks. Take some long walks. Put a good hurting on. Soon as the soreness wears off do it again. 2 weeks that paved road made from the coarser gravel that seemed impassable is easy.

 

I have no issue being barefoot around people It can be hard to remove the shoes and socks around people but once they are off The nerves are gone