Grounding for your Health!

I hope you have heard of grounding.  It is quite crucial to health, and yet almost unknown to most people, even those of the paleo persuasion.  It may sound ‘out there’ to you if you’ve never heard of it, but trust me, it is quite real, and can make a huge difference in your health, both physical and mental!

We are electrical creatures- our various bodily functions happen with electrical connections and stimulus.  Our hearts are functional only through electrical stimulus, as our all of our other circuitry in the body- especially, the brain is complicated memory circuit, and when off-kilter, it can go into dementia, Parkinson’s, and other mood and regulatory problems.  It is as if your brain is ‘shorting out’.

The main wake up call of most of the paleo/ancestral lifestyle is to bring us back to basics!  When we started making plastic and rubber soles to our footwear, we cut ourselves off from the grounding of contacting mother earth.  This, along with the fact that most of us started living unnatural, cut-off from nature kinds of jobs, sitting at climate controlled desks, barely moving throughout our days- well, we are just asking for trouble, evolutionarily speaking.

Just as we need to get vitamin D by getting out in the sun, and exercising daily, along with walking in Nature to keep our sanity and health- we need to be in regular contact with the earth, with the planet, by actually grounding ourselves to the actual soil itself.  Barefoot walking and running, on the earth, grass, or sand accomplishes this very well in Spring, Summer and Fall- but what about here in the north country, when snow and ice cover the ground?

It’s actually easy to fix this problem, even in Winter.  If you wear leather soled shoes, boots, or moccasins, you are grounded every time you are outside.  But such footwear is actually very uncommon nowadays, although you can find it if you look online for grounding or earthing shoes.  It tends to be pricey, though, and you definitely won’t find it at Wal-Mart!  

Here is an easy work around: today, for instance, I hiked around my woods with ski poles on the snow.  Although my shoes were not earthing shoes, every time a planted my ski poles, I was grounded- again and again and again!  And you can also ground yourself easily from time to time, simply by grasping a tree trunk.  Or a pole in the ground, whatever.  Or, if you have a concrete floored basement, walking barefoot on that can accomplish the same thing.  It’s not that hard, but it is super important, whatever anyone else tells you.

Most of humanity today, at least in western countries, are completely cut off from contact with the earth!  They wear plastic-soled shoes constantly, live in totally artificial man-made environments, and also eat grains and sugars almost exclusively, along with grain fed/sick animal products.  Even the nutrients to feed their food are from unnatural sources for these animals!

So first, eat real foods.  Hopefully, you know the drill- grass fed meats, wild caught seafood, and grass fed dairy along with non-GMO vegetables.  Most fruits should be organic, especially berries and apples, which are heavily sprayed and have skins that we consume.  Exclude all vegetable oils, sticking to coconut oil, Ghee, pastured butter and beef tallow and other animal fats from healthy animals.  Eliminate all grains, especially wheat!

Second, ground yourself, daily!  Go out into nature, even in the worst of weather, because just like good nutrition- you need grounding just as much.  And also, whenever you are inside your home- go barefoot!  I cannot express how important this is, for the health of your feet.  Oh, socks are fine, you just need to get the muscular/skeletal structure of the foot to be working on a daily basis.  Our balance, the arch of the foot, and our entire base of the human structure needs to have gentle exercise and stimulation regularly, or it inevitably starts to break down.

So go ahead.  Start to rebuild your health.  It all starts with a bare foot, from the ground up.

PQTD #124 Barefootin'

xero shoe

I know- this seems like a small, inconsequential thing- going barefoot??  What is the big deal with that?

Well, like most things Paleo or ancestral, the big deal is that we just stopped doing basic things!  And have for a long time!

Most non-Paleo folks never, ever make bone broth- taking bones to slow cook in water to make broth, and extract all the nutrients… (and incidentally collagen, and everything else that we haven’t even identified yet that heals our leaky guts, gives us vital, focused nutrition, and, incidentally, doesn’t waste food!)  Bone broth also helps with digestion, helps our skin, hair and nails, and helps to prevent osteoarthritis, among other benefits. 

The point here is that making bone broth used to be just “common sense”.  As was going barefoot- just common sense! Now, if you don’t know it, most podiatrists, or “foot doctors”, recommend never going barefoot.  They say it is damaging, and will lead to foot pain- we need that elevated heel, and ample cushioning, or our feet will fall apart in pain!

B.S.  Our bodies have functioned very well indeed for millennia before foot doctors tread the earth in their Birkenstocks, and our feet are highly evolved “tension bridges” of elaborate tendons, bones and ligaments that are very sophisticated, and can adapt very well to what our bodies need on their own.  They didn’t evolve to need, or want shoes!

Strangely enough, cushioned running shoes did not become available until the 1970’s!  This is when the “running boom” started; also the low-fat high carb and sugar diet was recommended. 

All of these are unmitigated DISASTERS, and have left us with people of my age (50’s and 60’s), with permanently damaged joints, from their feet to their hips and back, and a leaky gut from all the wheat and carbs and sugar they were encouraged to consume!

NOW, we all KNOW to eat a high fat, low carb, wheatless diet with minimal sugars and maximum nutrition, or nutrient density. 

But, have you learned to “walk like a man” and go barefoot?  Even just standing barefoot, on the earth or grass, gives you earthing benefits, which means you are grounded with the earth (as we were all throughout history), and it equalizes your electrical energy with the earth.  (You are finally GROUNDED to Mother Earth!) 

This is not a small thing.  Just by being periodically grounded, inflammation in your body is lowered dramatically, leading to vastly improved sleep, less or eliminated snoring, and relief of muscle tension and headache, among many other benefits. 

And so, just standing barefoot for brief periods is hugely beneficial.  What about walking and running?

I do virtually ALL of my running barefoot, as I do my walking, at least in the warmer months.  When you walk barefoot, or with minimalist footwear, the multi-faceted suspension bridge that is your foot, legs, knees, hips and back works in synergy, like a fine-tuned machine.  Nothing gets out of “tune”, or stresses the alignment of your body- it all works together, strengthening what is weak, and adding flexibility to what is stiff. 

Add in cushioned, squishy, high-heeled shoes?  Everything is instantly out of sync, screwed up, you are like a gazelle walking on a thick mattress!  You didn’t evolve for this, and you can hardly stand, much less excel in movement.

You don’t need to jump in feet first and barefoot sprint, do back flips, and go crazy doing handstands… Just start going barefoot, for brief periods.  In the house, for sure- socks are fine, but do NOT wear shoes in the house.  Walk around your back yard, or the park, barefoot!  (What a concept!)

The irony is that walking around in our native state has become “strange”!  It’s not.  It’s as if if your vision is perfect, you really should be wearing glasses!  No, and actually wearing glasses makes your vision weaker over time, just as wearing shoes makes your feet weaker over time- but more on this on a future podcast! 

So, here is the bottom line, PaleoJay prescription for vastly better health, simply by not wearing shoes:

Spend all of your indoor time, either in socks or simply barefoot- (it’s really the same difference)!

Spend at least a few minutes outdoors totally barefoot, at least when it is warm enough.

Walk barefoot around your yard for amazing strengthening, stretching, and conditioning of your body from the feet to the lower back.  Plantar fasciitis will disappear simply from this, as will most knee, hip and lower back pains!

Invest in minimalist footwear.  I use the Xero shoes, which are simply a piece of rubber beneath your foot and the ground to protect your foot from glass, rough surfaces, and other damaging objects.  Otherwise, your foot performs exactly as it would when barefoot, and preserves the proper alignment of your body from the ground up.  And, if you occasionally just grab a tree, or touch the ground with your hand, you will be “grounded”, for that benefit.  ( It doesn’t take long)

In colder weather, I wear moccasins, ones that have no elevated heel, and no cushioning.  They are kind of like socks for the outdoors!  They work wonderfully for walking around, and keep my feet and lower extremities “fit and toned”. 

And in WINTER?  Well, here is Wisconsin, I give in!  I wear Sorel boots, I walk around in my woods with thick pac-boots, or on my cross country skis or snowshoes, and don’t worry about it.  But inside the house?

I pad about in stockinged feet, upstairs.  When I work out in the living room, I am always barefoot, and this is every single day!  And when I do my basement, hard charging, intense workouts, usually once per week, I wear my Xeroshoes!   My basement is rough concrete and dirt, so barefoot is not appropriate, and the Xero’s are wonderful in such an environment.  Even squatting, and pistol-style squatting is so much more natural and beneficial when done in a barefoot style with no raised heel or cushioning underfoot!

So- GO BAREFOOTIN’!!

Check out this episode!