Finding Confidence in Your Feet and Ankles: A Journey to Better Mobility Part 2
This is a simple exercise you can do at home to give you more mobility in your feet and ankles. You may notice a difference immediately when you stand up to walk afterwards, or it might take a few times.
In Part 1 of “Finding confidence in your feet and ankles,” we explored the relationship between mobility in our ankles, feet and other leg joints and the functionality we need to be able to confidently navigate uneven terrain. Whether you’re on a walk, hike, walking down a city sidewalk, or on vacation, traversing over cobblestones and bricks, when your joints are all able to bend and flex easily, you subconsciously feel confident in your ability to handle yourself.
Below is a simple Feldenkrais® exercise you can do at home to give you more mobility in your feet and ankles. You may notice a difference immediately when you stand up to walk afterwards, or it might take a few times.
In this lesson, you’ll be working with your brain and nervous system to release unconsciously contracted muscles in order to have freedom and ease in your walking!
Remember this is different from what you may have done in the past — stretching or physical therapy.
Follow these helpful guidelines to get the most improvement. In this method, doing more, bigger, and faster are NOT helpful.
Guidelines for lesson:
Make sure you do the movements very slowly, make the movements very small. Don’t stretch your feet or ankles — do only the movement that feels easy and comfortable.
Mini Lesson for ankles and feet:
Take off your shoes and walk around your room to get a sense of how free your ankles and feet feel. What is the progression of each step you take? Heel to toe, toe to heel, middle of your foot first?
And now stand still and notice where the weight is on your feet? Is it centered, more to the inside, more to the outside?
Now, please lie on your back and bend your knees and stand your feet about hips distance apart.
Very gently lift the front of your right foot away from the floor, just the tiny little bit that’s comfortable. (I guarantee you, you’re lifting it too much. Let it be TINY.)
Then put it down and take a breath. Do this 3-4 times slowly. The more slowly you do this the better the improvement will be.
Then rest for a moment with the sole of your foot on the floor.
And now lift your heel away from the floor several times, resting between each movement.
Again, make it as small and slow movement as you can. Notice if you feel anything in the right side of your pelvis as you do this. Don’t worry if you don’t notice anything!
And now alternate, 3 or 4 times, first lifing the front of your foot away from the floor gently, and lowering it, and then lifting your heel away from the floor and lowering it. Really go slowly.
And now rest again. You can lengthen you leg to rest if you like.
And now, stand your feet again and very gently lift the outside edge of your foot away from the floor.
Do this 3-4 times and rest between each time you do it. Pay attention to whether it’s comfortable to do this and make the movement smaller and slower.
And now lift the inside edge of your foot away from the floor a few times, slowly, resting for a breath after each time you do this.
And now alternate, first lifting the inside and pausing in the middle, then lifting the outside.
And now lengthen your legs and rest.
Before repeating this entire sequence with your left foot, stand up and walk around and see if you notice a difference at all?
When you’ve completed this on both sides, stand up and notice how you’re standing on your feet now. Then, walk slowly around the room and see if anything has changed with the contact or progression that your feet make with the floor as you walk.
Maybe you notice a difference and maybe it will take a few times. Either way, please shoot me an email to tell me what, if anything, you’ve noticed!
If you’re interested in exploring this further with a full length lesson, join our online weekly classes. Here’s a link for more information. If you’re local, you can schedule a private session here.
Finding Confidence in Your Feet and Ankles: A Journey to Better Mobility Part 1
Do you find something is keeping you from hiking in nature or taking long walks this summer? When we lack confidence in our feet or ankles, it’s common to find ourselves avoiding putting ourselves in situations where we might risk tripping or falling.
Do you find something is keeping you from hiking in nature or taking long walks this summer? If you’re lacking confidence in our feet or ankles, it’s common to find yourself avoiding putting yourself in situations where you risk tripping or falling.
Sometimes either a foot or ankle injury or even a simple of lack of mobility in the bones of your feet or ankles can cause you to be fearful about walking on uneven terrain. You might find that you don’t have confidence that you can navigate the stones, tree roots or even bricks and cobblestones of some streets when you travel.
But you may not realize you don’t have mobility because your feet and ankles feel “normal” or familiar to you. You might notice that when you wake up in the morning, during your first steps, your feet, calves or hips feel stiff. But you probably don’t really think about it as being an issue you can do anything about — anything easy, that is.
These signs that you’ve lost some flexibility in your feet or ankles not only affects your ability to walk comfortably and feel safe in certain environments, but it also affects your entire posture and ability of your spine, shoulders and neck to move freely.
What does less mobility in ankles mean for the rest of your body?
When there is less mobility in one joint, like for example, the ankles, it puts more responsibility on the other joints of the legs — the knees and hip joints. If the bones of the feet are not mobile, then it means that the ankles, knees and hips have to make up for their lack of flexibility. In other words, there is a significant relationship between the feet, ankles, knees and hips. And it doesn’t stop there — your whole body is affected.
For example, if your nervous system perceives instability in the feet or lack of mobility in the ankles, then you will automatically keep your eyes on the ground, where your feet are stepping. Your entire body will organize itself around where your eyes are looking (in this case, downward). So this means your spine is rounded, your neck is tense, your jaw juts out. And it follows that your chest and ribcage are compressed, hence your breathing will be shallow, your abdomen will be contracted unnecessarily, and your pelvis will likely be tucked under, causing lower back tension or chronic pain.
The good news is, when the bones in your feet are mobile, and your ankles, knees and hips are all working together, the responsibility for movement is shared. And when the weight is evenly distributed over both legs, then your pelvis can relax, your shoulders are relaxed, and your eyes can look along the horizon as you walk, enjoying the scenery. Your spine will organize around where you’re looking and your posture can be relaxed. As your posture improves, your belly relaxes and your breathing improves.
Simple way to release tension in your feet and ankles!
Rather than stretching or forcing our muscles, there is a way to find mobility and freedom in your joints by working with your brain and nervous system to eliminate these old unconscious muscular patterns of holding tension. One way to change these old muscle tension patterns is with The Feldenkrais Method®.
We’ve been conditioned to think that our problem is that we’re not stretching our achilles tendon or calves enough or we need to get a massage on our feet to fix this issue. I mean, sure, go get a massage because it feels good, but this will not change anything about your tight calves, ankles and inflexible feet long term.
When you work with your brain and nervous system, chronic muscular tension patterns release. It might take a series of sessions to change the chronic tension pattern, especially if you’ve been experiencing this for awhile. The process of replacing unhealthy muscle tension patterns with more efficient, healthier patterns will benefit your entire body.
There’s no need to miss out on enjoying summer hikes, walks, and traveling in the coming months. Your confidence will increase as the stability in your legs, ankles and feet increases.
Check out my foot and ankle mini lesson here and let me know what you think! And those of you who are locals, go here to schedule a session and we’ll have you confidently on the trails in no time!