What Can You Do For Healthier Happier Feet?

You’re healthy, you feel good, you’re strong. So what can you do to optimize your health and performance? Check the arches of your feet.

Feet are the most forgotten part of our bodies, but if our feet aren’t happy, our body isn’t happy. Feet are far from our brains. They grow nails. Toe jam. They stink. Eeeew! They’re yours. Take care of them and they’ll serve you.

Your feet arches take you places, they are vehicles of ambulation. Talk to anyone who suffers serious foot problems. It’s no fun to have them. Each step is a reminder of how important they are. We can scoot on knee scooters, crawl on our knees, maybe even walk on our hands, but there’s nothing like functional feet.

The arches of our feet relate us to the horizontal plane of the earth, while the rest of the body is focused on being vertical. In addition, our feet make walking a smooth roll. Without them we’d poke and prod the earth like horses up and down gait.

Our upper body floats free in space, our feet are tethered to the ground. This connection helps us feel, balance, sense, and drive off of the ground so the rest of our body can fully engage. Furthermore, that groundedness and connection gives us functional abilities that floating doesn’t.

By virtue of connection we can move quickly, adjust, and be responsive. Also, shoe companies have come up with thousands of designs to make us more effective and protect the susceptibility of the arches of our feet and ankles in sports. Still ankle injuries make up for the majority of high school injuries. Shoes provide external protection, but the first layer of defense should be structural balance, and adaptability. Foot imbalances make us susceptible to injuries and pain. Healthy feet can reduce the number of foot injuries or reduce healing time.

Discover Your 3 Arches!

In the next blog we’ll discuss the 3 arches of our feet and the one arch that is the structural foundation of the others. Can you guess which one that is? If you don’t know, look out for the next post to elevate performance or promote healing.

Chris Corrales