Feet! Does the word feet make you cringe? You’re not alone, feet can be gross! Sometimes it’s just easier and more pleasant for everyone if you just tucked those tootsies up in socks and jam them into shoes and forget all about them, right? WRONG!
Why Our Feet Matter
Our feet and toes are the most used, yet least appreciated and least taken care of part of our bodies. We expect so much from those lower extremities, but give them not much in return. For example, we want them to effortlessly propel us through space every single day, we want them to get us where we need to go pain free, we want them to carry all of us, plus all the added weight of the clothes, bags and accessories we choose to take out with us every day, not to mention do it all in some subpar shoe choices (but it’s for fashun darling, fashun!)
The importance of exercise to maintain good health seems to apply to all our other muscle groups, but somehow our feet get forgotten! When you go to the gym and workout, there are machines to stretch and strengthen all the other muscle groups in the body, but nobody really thinks about doing anything for their feet -unless you walk into a comprehensive Pilates studio, then you’ll meet plenty of kooky feet people and their kooky feet and toe contraptions (me included!).
How Pilates Can Help Your Feet (and thus your whole body)
The problem with all of this is that If the muscles of the feet aren’t working properly to hold the bones of the feet and ankles in correct alignment, you can bet your bottom dollar that nothing stacked above the feet is aligned correctly either. This means the right muscles aren’t working when walking, standing, sitting, or exercising. During everything we do, we are then placing added stress on every joint. Over time, this misalignment and poor muscle use can result in foot, ankle, knee, hip, sacro-illiac joint, lower-mid-upper back, shoulder, and neck pain. Nothing in our body works in isolation, one area of concern/pain/dysfunction has ramifications throughout the body.
When we’re young, our bodies are pretty forgiving. We’re strong, flexible, and can pretty much do what we want pain-free and worry-free. Paying attention to how our feet are affecting the rest of our body probably isn’t high on the priority list for most people. As we get older though, the need to maintain balance and avoid falling becomes much more important than it ever was. We desire to stay pain free, mobile and self-sufficient, while hoping that we won’t have to rely on a cane, walker, or wheelchair. Then suddenly, what’s going on at the bottom of our legs starts to get our attention.
How to Help Your Feet with Pilates
When our feet start hurting – the typical first fix is a brace or arch support inserts for our shoes. If this doesn’t solve the problem, medication and surgery seem to be the next logical step. What people don’t realise is there are a lot of very simple exercises that they could do to get the muscles working more efficiently. If our muscles are strong enough to hold the bones of the feet in their proper place – the feet should feel great! A lot of athletic shoes are now designed to do the work, holding our feet from rolling in and out, and helping to rock the sole of the foot across the ground as we walk and run. While this extra support from our shoes can be a benefit – we may be relying on our shoes to do all the work instead of the foot muscles. The result of this is that the muscles of the feet may continue to get weaker. This means taking time to exercise and strengthen our feet is even more important.
Enter Pilates!
Because Pilates is a WHOLE BODY exercise regime, no part of the human body is neglected, including the feet and toes. There are even apparatuses designed and developed for the specific use of the lower extremities. Joseph Pilates called them the ‘Foot Corrector’ and ‘Toe Corrector’.
The good news is you don’t need special equipment to get your Pilates on with your feet! Try these simple at-home switches:
Elastic Band on Toes
2. Towel Toe Scrunch Up
3. Big Toe Mound Balance
Join me at my upcoming event- focusing on the feet!
If you want to know more about your foundations and how to strengthen and mobilise your lower extremities, then come along to my event on May 28. It’s called ‘From Foundations to Fine Wine: An Afternoon of Pilates and Plonk. You’ll be amazed at what some attention on the feet will do for the rest of your body in terms of strength, alignment, and pain reduction! This event will be an hour and a half workshop and pilates class. Then we will spend the rest of the time sampling lovely wines, enjoying some nibbles and socialising
If you know me, then you know that I truly believe that there is always room for a wine on the way to wellness. That’s why there will be a tasting session after the class is over! So grab a friend and make an afternoon of it. Pilates, Plonk and (great) People- the trifecta for fun!
