Here is what I learned — there are apparently lots of people interested in feet! I think I got more comments on my last post than any other topic. People seem to have strong opinions about wearing shoes vs going barefoot. The barefoot folks really love being barefoot. So I spent a lot more time barefoot this past week, and here is what I learned — my back and shoulders and neck all feel better –WOW. I received my stretching videos and did some that are on Youtube, and did those all barefoot. My feet have been cold, but I am pretty much ok with that. I went so far as to try Tuesday night going to sleep without socks, but that did not work out very well. I figured that I would practice so that I could make it through the night Wednesday, and then I would have my Shake It Up topic for Thursday, but oh well. I think I will try again tonight, since I do not have to work tomorrow.

So the bottom line (no pun intended) is that shaking it can be something big or small. But for me this is big. Not being barefoot is totally ingrained in who I am — it is like the heart and sole — oh I mean soul– of me. (That is a huge exaggeration, but I could not resist the pun.)

Continue to try to shake things up, and challenge how you generally do things. I think it is good for the mind, and may also benefit the body.

I know that I haven’t posted in the past couple of weeks. I wasn’t sure if anyone would really miss the post, but it seems like there were a few out there who was wondering what happened to me. Anyway, the past 2 weeks I did things to shake it up, but didn’t really find the time to write the blog post. If I remember correctly, those 2 weeks I shook things up by wearing an item of clothing that I had made. I guess I figured that wasn’t all that newsworthy and not necessarily enough of a big deal to post. Anyway, if I keep wearing things that I make, that is no longer shaking things up.

Anyway, yesterday I did do something different. Over the weekend I was watching a video during the PBS fundraising drive on stretching, body pains, etc. etc. I liked it so much that I decided to contribute to PBS again and get the videos.The woman who does the videos is pretty interesting. She talks about stretching and utilizing all of our muscles. Did you know there are 620-ish different muscles in our body? That would be a lot of stretching…… One thing that she talked about is stretching out the muscles in our feet, which you can really do only if you are barefoot.

I don’t know about you, but I am very seldom barefoot. I seem to always be wearing shoes. I wear shower shoes If I am not wearing shoes, then I am at least wearing socks. But since I have been watching her videos online until my PBS videos arrive, I have been making a conscious effort to be barefoot. It definitely takes getting used to — the floor is cold which makes my feet cold.  And boy, the basement floor is REALLY cold.

But what I do know is that it does seem to help keep my whole body stretched out and more balanced. Who knows, maybe I will even get a pair of those crazy toe shoes.

🙂