Bring Your Exhausted Feet Back to Life With These 5 Easy-Peasy Exercises
If your feet constantly feel tired and painful, it is, most probably, because they are rigid, flat, or are simply lacking flexibility/mobility; but don’t give up yet, start doing these 5 movements, and your feet will rise from the dead.
Did you know?
Just as you have muscles in your hands that help your fingers spread, you have muscles in your feet that help your toes spread.
But your feet lose those spreading muscles’ strength when your toes are squeezed into tight shoes constantly.
If you have tired, painful feet from running, swimming, exercising casually, moving a lot, or not moving at all, your first step into helping your feet is to start caring for your toes.
Follow the 5 movements below to awaken your brain-feet connection:
Hug your toes by interlacing your fingers with your toes. You might find it difficult at first to squeeze your fingers between your toes. But keep at it, no giving up yet, pulling your fingers in, slowly and patiently. With practice, it will become smoother and more comfortable.
Spread your toes slowly with your hands; start with the 2 little ones, #5 and #4, then #4 and #3, then #3 and #2, then #2 and #1.
Push and pull, back and forth, 2 toes a time, push one while pulling the other. Again, start with the 2 little ones.
Twist slowly, one toe at a time, left and right.
Pull it up slowly while straightening the toe joint.
IMPORTANT: Make sure you do the same movement for all 5 toes before moving to the next one.
To finish, standing tall, cling your toes hard onto the ground. Make sure you feel all 5 toes pressing against the floor.
You will be surprised at how caring for your toes will change your standing posture and overall training.
Your second, and just as important, step to awakening your brain-feet connection is going barefoot or in minimalist shoes whenever you have the chance: exercising, walking around the house, etc. It will improve your feet awareness.
I am personally addicted to my Five Fingers shoes; they are my best companions. I carried a sharp ankle pain through my runs for many years, which only vanished after I started wearing the Vibrams Five Fingers 12 years ago.