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- - Going barefoot (https://tree-of-souls.net/showthread.php?t=1230)

Gee - I broke a toe once I think. it is a bit skewed now, but that was 20 years ago at least. But I think it was also beeing barefoot ;) - You should really take care of your feet and not do things that can break your toes just because walking barefoot. Its one of the reasons I would not like walking barefoot in the city with all the dirt and all the shoed people who are walking really closeby or even go on busses and trains there

I've broken two toes, but one was by kicking something and the other was dropping something on it, didn't do either barefoot.

Hehe - yesterday I topped myself in barefoot walking. We had a field trip - a nice and rather slow walk along a mountain canyon:
http://www.clasohm.com/photodb/img/13246-lg.jpg
As we were walking across water a lot I decided to drop the shoes. That was something. The rocks are not exactly round there. But I was surprised at myself that I managed quite well. It was about a 4-5h very slow hike (with plenty of breaks looking at plants and rocks). A fun part of it was the disbelief of some people asking if I am not cold, if it does not hurt incredibly. one said "you CANT do that", one asked me if I am a forest scout ;) . So indeed at times it hurt, mostly if I got a pebble in one place of the foot only (esp in the middle part), but as I looked at where I step, it was ok. Missed a bit of the scenery though I guess, that is a bit sad. But we had breaks to look around ;). And I LOLd when I just walked through the creek at almost any point and the others tried to keep on top of some single rocks to not wet their shoes... :D

Still - even though I did a lot of barefoot walking this year, I still had to revert to shoes for the walk back, as I simply could not keep up the speed of walking and my soles were starting to get sore after that 4 hours. I wonder if one can manage to get to a point when this is not so much of an issue anymore within a season. I guess I will loose much of that ability again during winter and have to start by zero next spring :(

Sounds like you had a good time :) I'd love to go hiking or something with a bunch of friends.

Quote:

Originally Posted by auroraglacialis (Post 96719)

I guess I will loose much of that ability again during winter and have to start by zero next spring :(

Yeah that happens every year :/

Sounds amazing...

As for keeping foot toughness up through the winter, I used to live right near the coast - about 200m from the beach. This beach was covered in stones, almost no sand. We used to walk on it a lot and I would often not wear shoes, it wasn't as easy at the start of summer but it wasn't like starting all over again and it soon became easier again to the point that I could run without a problem.
Even if you only do a short walk somewhere occasionally through the winter, then it helps, but the amount you lose isn't really all that bad - your feet will still be tougher than someone who has never done it afterwards.
Ironic how I used to walk barefoot quite a lot when I was young and we lived there, I just stopped as I got older and we moved, but I'm getting it all back now :)

Still get funny looks when people notice me walking down the street barefoot though, and I really don't care :awesome:

Quote:

Originally Posted by Human No More (Post 96782)

Sounds amazing...
Even if you only do a short walk somewhere occasionally through the winter, then it helps, but the amount you lose isn't really all that bad - your feet will still be tougher than someone who has never done it afterwards....
Still get funny looks when people notice me walking down the street barefoot though, and I really don't care :awesome:

Yeah it was fun. I felt a bit like giving up when I had to put the shoes back on for the walk back, but I never walked up a mountain creek valley barefoot before. Really interesting. Quite different textures also. Rocks, pebbles, gravel, sand, soil, grass, clay...

Going barefoot in winter - maybe inside the house yes, but outside - it has usually something between -10 and +5 °C here and the soil is frozen solid or covered with almost 0°C mud. I think that is not really a wise idea. Maybe I'll try, but I doubt I can keep it up long enough to stay "in training"... :(

Going barefoot down the street - actually I dont really like that too much. I dont go barefoot at work (which is prohibited anyways) or in town or supermarket. I dont really like these places as I feel them to be dirty (compared to a muddy path in the woods ;) ). I cant really explain. Maybe it is because the dirt and dust there is not from nature but from cars, tires, machines, packages, trash,...

Quote:

Originally Posted by auroraglacialis (Post 96843)

...Going barefoot in winter...

*bing*

That reminded me of definitely the most freezing thing my legs have ever gone through. :D An old friend of mine used to keep a big trampoline outside even in the winter. Once we went jumping the in the winter in about -8 C. Barefoot ofc.. there was also +30cm snow on the trampoline when we went there. Hah, it was so freaking cold but FUN. I had to stop jumping once in a while to warm my feet a bit with hands. :awesome:

Dec. 13, 2010 - Today's match: My Bare Feet vs. Frost...

...and the score is: My Bare Feet - 2, Frost - 0

The predictions of yesterday's weather forecast were true, since it was a cloudy, partly sunny day, starting with frost around -5°C/23F in the early morning. There hadn't been any snow the night before, so that the ground was cold but dry, which made the frosty conditions bearable enough for my barefeet's taste. "The Look"® was of course present anywhere people spotted my pedal nudity on my way to work, and this time it was totally of the astonished sort, as if to say "how can anyone dare being barefoot in this positively polar weather???". That is no exaggeration, by the way, since the current cold weather is coming directly from the north, referred to by meteorologists as "polar cold airstreams".

Seeing the nice and clear winter day unfold, as the sun rose brightly orange in the south-east, a nice sight to watch through the office windows - until someone hit the switch for the electric blinds to keep that bright light from blinding the monitors - I was looking forward to the end of the office day, when it was time to release my feet from their imprisonment in my much-dreaded shoes.
And since a colleague was so nice to offer me to get out a bit earlier than usual, that time was to come around sunset...

http://www.barefoot-spring.net/barefoot/mon131210-1.jpg

And so, I got lucky in a twofold way: I could bare my feet in the remnants of daylight and I witnessed quite spectacular hues of red in the clouds to the west, almost put up there to compete with the bright pink-red glow of my bare toes.
On changing from the bus to the subway/tram at the central station, a group of teenage boys got ouf the train, spotted my bare feet and made their usual "hey, check this out..." comments, quite audible even over my psytrance tunes my MP3 player flooded into my ears. I ignored the snickering group of hip-hop fashion victims, boarded the tram, and went on with my happily barefoot trip home. Other than that, it was just the usual amount of "The Look"® meeting my unshod state - nothing bothersome, really. The only thing, of course, being a little unnerving was the ever-present grit on the sidewalks, as usual in winter. I guess I'll have to bear (and bare, too) with that for the next few months to come. There's always the hope for spring being not too far away... I can wait these three months for that stuff to disappear.

Wiggling bare toes,

~*Txim Asawl*~

I have a foot fetish and a strong desire for female feet. Walking barefoot makes me uncomfortable.

Txim, that is awesome :D

I haven't done anything for a couple of months now because it was getting a bit cold, maybe I will try next time I'm on a way back from a gig as I do notice the cold more when sober :P

I walked barefoot in a nearby lush environment once, it was.... Rejuvenating to say the absolute least! I just can't walk on man made things with my bare feet. (Example: Pavement, Roads, or in worst cases... Glass, OUCH >.<)

It seems that walking barefoot has made its way into other fields as well, as this little column in the Carolina Journal Online shows:

Quote:

Government Should Go Barefoot

By Joseph Coletti

December 10, 2010

This week’s “Daily Journal” guest columnist is Joseph Coletti, Director of Health and Fiscal Policy Studies for the John Locke Foundation.

RALEIGH — Given recent temperatures, this might not be the best time to think about going barefoot, but I finally got around to reading Chris McDougall’s Born to Run nearly a year after a friend gave me his copy. The book has developed a cult-like following among runners and serves as a great advertisement for Vibram FiveFingers shoes. It has a number of memorable portraits of memorable people, but the religious conversion in the book is in its endorsement of barefoot running about midway through.

McDougall cites research and stories from coaches, doctors, patients, and professional runners to make the case that modern running shoes, engineered to correct foot problems and protect against the force of landing, are to blame for many running injuries. The human foot is designed for walking and running. It naturally moves to absorb impact through pronation. Running shoes are designed to block that movement.

“But once you block a natural movement,” Dr. [Gerard] Hartman said, “you adversely affect the others. We’ve done studies, and only two to three percent of the population has real biomechanical problems. … Every time we put someone in a corrective device, we’re creating new problems by treating ones that don’t exist.”

Runner’s World magazine admitted it had been giving bad advice with the best of intentions for years: “Recent research has shown stability shoes are unlikely to relieve plantar fasciitis and may even exacerbate the symptoms.”

In other areas, the overconfidence McDougall chronicles is called hubris. Russ Roberts, who wrote what is assuredly the most entertaining economics rap song ever, “Fear the Boom and Bust,” uses a Friedrich Hayek quote to burst such pretensions: “The curious task of economics is to demonstrate to men how little they really know about what they imagine they can design.”

Government officials have been like the Nike engineers. Trying to cushion the blow of an economic downturn with bailouts has left markets pushing harder for solid ground, and instead of relieving the economic pain, it has left the economy flatfooted and potentially set it up for worse problems.

On the state level, the federal bailout contributed $1.6 billion to North Carolina’s spending overhang. Medicaid alone has $1 billion in spending through June 30 that the state cannot afford after July 1. Unfortunately, the maintenance-of-effort requirements (i.e., handcuffs) attached to this money prevented the state from adjusting policy for less revenue. The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act prohibits the state from reducing Medicaid eligibility and so leaves the state with even less room to fix its policy. As a result, the health care bill leaves North Carolina and other states with the choice of paying for Medicaid or paying for the rest of government.

The good news is that the current crisis means the budget has hit solid ground. With the bailout over, federal cushioning is gone. The state budget is unlikely to be in tighter straits than it will be this coming year as legislators try to squeeze what official estimates (PDF link) see as $21.9 billion in potential spending into $18.2 billion in expected revenue. We can call this barefoot budgeting. But what comes next?

There was once a belief “that four years of podiatric training could trump two million years of natural selection,” McDougall wrote. But there remains a corresponding belief that a small group of government decision makers can trump 9.5 million North Carolinians in deciding what is best. Instead, government should seek the best ways to accomplish its core tasks. More times than has been acknowledged, this will mean getting out of the way so individuals, parents, philanthropists, and entrepreneurs can meet the needs of themselves, their families, their neighbors, and their customers.

Just as the 26 bones, 30 joints, and 20 muscles in the human foot adapt to the ground better and become stronger when not constrained by overengineered shoes, the millions of people and organizations in society are better able to adapt to the changing economic terrain without burdensome laws and regulations.

I look forward to barefoot day at the General Assembly next year.

URL: Government Should Go Barefoot

Wiggling bare toes, looking forward to a more barefoot approach in politics, (and to milder weather, too),

~*Txim Asawl*~

Haha, that is quite a stretch to use barefooting as a metaphor for governments. But an interesting one :D

I think that a barefoot approach on various topics is a good one - after all, walking barefoot is a simple, natural and down-to-earth (literally) way of walking. It's silent, gentle and unobtrusive, too. Especially politics and dealing with other human beings can use a large portion of that, really. Joy and innocence are also images transferred by barefoot people - the latter especially when seeing barefoot kids playing. We all can learn from them. There are times when it's good and wonderful to let our inner barefoot child out and play.

WIggling bare toes, sounding a bit hippie, but liking that, too,

~*Txim Asawl*~
:D