We were in a park in California with a couple and their toddler. This was twenty years ago when we were new immigrants in the US. The toddler was being carried around by her parents for quite a while. When she insisted on being down on the ground her parents complied. She was barefoot and she clearly didn't like the feel of grass. She curled her toes and made distressed faces. It seemed to me that she found it repulsive. Before she started crying she was high up again resting comfortably against her dad's shoulder. Although this incident lasted only a few minutes, it haunted me. Especially because I had always seen children roaming around barefoot in India. I was wondering how unnatural it was for such a small child to dislike something that was absolutely natural, given our evolutionary past.
A few years down the lane, I had conveniently adopted new ways of living in the US. House slippers, walking shoes, running shoes and hiking shoes ensured that I was never barefoot. I insisted that my kids never step out without footwear. I was into running then. I sought relief in new pairs of footwear for the pain that manifested in my legs and feet. I thought that if Nike didn't work, Puma would. And if Puma didn't Keen might. Then came Vibram. Dev started using these when he ran and found the experience very enjoyable. That was when we got introduced to barefoot running. This phase didn't last long though. This was also the time when we were packing our bags to move to India.
During the initial period in India, as the kids were getting used to new ways of living I noticed that they stopped wearing their footwear unless we were traveling. Shoes are impractical in a humid place like ours; we switched to sandals. The kids would never wear them to play on the road or to visit the neighbors or while they were at the farm. Over a period of time their feet developed calluses and they could walk nimbly even on gravelly surfaces. They encouraged me to go barefoot while I was at the farm. I was equally keen to try it out because I was always in pain from wearing footwear - shoes or sandals, all the brands that I have tried, have left me begging for something that would cause less pain. I timed my barefoot experience every day; starting literally from baby steps and slowly ramping it up. Initially it was quite painful. In a few months it was effortless and it brought my pain significantly down. By this time I was deeply interested in evolutionary biology and was making changes in our lifestyle based on this new understanding, to fix our health issues. Thus there was a context that helped me understand the significance of going barefoot. After all each one of us have uniquely shaped feet and how can it be possible for Nike or Reebok to get it right for all of us?
The human foot is a marvelous, complex mechanical structure. According to wikipedia, it has 26 bones, 33 joints and more than a hundred muscles, tendons and ligaments. When we wear shoes, these bones and joints are fused to perform as one unit which they obviously are not. Only when we go barefoot we can observe the nuanced ways of functioning and feedback that have existed for millennia in this region of our body.
We recently started running barefoot. We run for 15-20 minutes, about 1.5 to 2 km. This has helped fix my gait and eliminate the pain in my legs and feet.
Here are some resources for further reading and research:
1. Running Shoes: Why we don't need them - Christopher McDougall
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F90D418SFZI
2. Are we born to run? - Christopher McDougall
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b-iGZPtWXzE
-- Hema
