Tag Archives: Fitness

by

My Barefoot/Minimalist Shoe Journey

Soooo…. about two years ago I realized that one of my big toes was getting virtually immobile– hard to wiggle or move. This is after years of sensible children’s’ shoes with “good support,” ladies’ shoes, high heels, typical shoes of other types; followed by clogs and Doc Marten platforms. The state of my feet was no toe splay, bunions and big toes that were sufficiently off course that my second toes were bearing more of the weight of walking. My balance in doing yoga was not great. Ankles weren’t strong and had trouble holding a one leg pose without struggling. A yoga video class by instructor Guilia Pline on the biomechanics of the foot turned around my thinking completely. I committed to giving my feet the opportunity to move they way they naturally would before I totally lost the use of a toe.

I transitioned gradually, as you are counseled to, to shoes with larger toe boxes and less cushioning. I started with Altra sneakers and a pair of OESH ballet flats. With less padding you learn to walk differently– you don’t smash your heels down first because you can’t or clomp like in the Doc platforms.

I got on Poshmark and sold my shoes and socks and used the proceeds to build a new minimalist shoe wardrobe. I added CorrectToes separators to my daily routine when wearing many of the shoes. I experimented with various brands including Xero, Vivobarefoot, Belenka, Bohempia, Groundies and Peerko. I snagged some of these on discount or thrifted. People make shopping errors in this space and you can get things literally worn once. I basically replicated a shoe wardrobe so, boots, shoes for work, sandals, etc. I became a student of Anya’s Reviews and learned what was out there, what different types of feet are and what works best for mine. I got rid of anything that squeezed my toes including cutting the feet off tights and stockings and transitioning to socks with toes. Had to experiment with brands here, also.

Vibram Five Fingers is new for me. I am still getting to know them after a couple of sizing “missteps” with the brand. I gotta say, the weirdo look of five toe shoes is like a magnet. 

What’s the case two years later? The foot has three arches. I can see all of them. My feet and ankles are substantially stronger. My gait is better and I have little or no discomfort in my knees and hips. The natural strength of my feet and my balance are both better. I have splay in all the toes except the big toe which I know will take longer to get closer to proper alignment.

The rationale for minimalist shoes is that the way the foot is meant to work, it has a spring action when you walk. If you fill up the middle of the arch with “support” it’s like putting your arm in a splint. The foot needs to flex with each step. (This is why neither the clogs nor the Doc platforms were good.) The rest of your body takes its cues from the feet so if you get that settled a lot of other annoyances go away. I miss the extra height of my higher shoes but I am willing to sacrifice it for foot health. I am amazed at over 60 how resilient the body is when given what it needs. Happy walking, everyone.

by

The Frog & The Boiling Water

boling water

The tale is that if you toss a frog into boiling water he’ll jump out but if he’s in a pot which slowly heats up he won’t and will die. It is disgusting to be sure. We used to use it to describe people’s circumstances of living in violent relationships… But I digress.

Lately I have been thinking about motivation. Looking at some of the fitness literature and web information I read I see that the great success stories are often the people who had never touched a weight and then discover weight lifting and proper diet and of course dramatic changes ensue. I think for more of us it’s harder because we are not suddenly discovering a new way of living which we can attack with religious zeal.

Like the frog in the slowly heating water I’ve been lifting weights and doing some type of aerobic exercise for about 35 years. Also I need to shed 10 to 15 pounds of fat. I remember reading somewhere in an article about building muscle how really modest the gains a person who has been training over time can expect to make in a year. So how do I stay motivated to keep doing enough of the right activities? And how do I stay motivated to eat in a way that supports the exercise enough to keep making positive changes?

For me having a variety of activities I can pursue helps some. My preferred forms of exercise are walking in a hilly local park, using the elliptical machine in the new fitness room at my job, lifting weights in my basement and taking the occasional hot yoga class at a local studio. I recently discovered http://www.lauramustloseweight.com which is cool both because of Laura’s personality, and for me, because she is about my height. It’s a good graphic portrayal of both the truth and the possibilities. I guess images and stories help because it’s hard to move from abstraction to action. It would be nice to be motivated more by the positive, e.g. move towards what Rachel Cosgrove calls being a “fit female” than by the negative, e.g. ominous health worries or the image of myself as some sort of lonely Jabba the Hutt. In any case, if I figure out the secret to motivation I promise to share it.

Related articles
by

What Inspires Me to Work Out

English: weight lifting

I am happy to take inspiration anywhere I can get it. Seriously. Years ago my pattern with exercising would sometimes be that things got hectic at work and in the rest of my life and I stopped doing everything physical. Those breaks sometimes lasted as long as six months. Thank goodness a friend and I started walking about 4 miles together in a local park on Sunday mornings. I think we’ve been doing that about ten years. One absolutely crucial effect of this routine is that it keeps me from getting into one of those no-exercise phases. There were times when the weekly walk was the only exercise I did. More recently it’s often icing on the cake. The New Rules of Lifting for Women calls it “active recovery” I believe. That is, something you do that’s not actually strenuous enough to be exercise but is good calorie-burning activity that allows you to be ready for more weight lifting the next day.

The fitness efforts of friends real and virtual also inspire me. From friends that are making great strides with their own levels of fitness and sharing awe-inspiring lifting, running and biking accomplishments to those whom I see looking great as they change their body composition in positive ways. Someone tweets that he’s at the gym or someone posts that she’s hit a new PR, that helps me feel inspired to hit the weights myself.

I also find it helpful to work on a program. I am quite capable of coming up with exercise routines for myself but I find that I do better when I have the guidance, structure and variety of routines put together by experts.  I know people are sometimes surprised to learn that I work out by myself in my basement and that I do keep at it. Ironically, for me the need to tear myself away from home to go to the gym would at this point in my life be a de-motivator and not a motivator.

Probably the biggest motivator of all is seeing results. This is especially motivating at first when one is making initial gains but one needs to be satisfied with more subtle progress as one goes farther on the fitness journey. A friend of mine recently introduced me to stickk.com which uses a combination of things to get one to set goals and stick to them including making donations to charities that one doesn’t like if one fails to meet a goal, having referees and friends to support the effort. This all coming from the results of a Yale study on what helps people stick to goals. I am not using it yet for that but the possibilities seem intriguing.