Anyone who’s experienced a foot massage will know how great it feels to have “free” feet, but did you realise that a free, flexible foot, filled with your conscious awareness, will help with your balance and encourage your posture to improve?
So, relax your feet, uncurl your toes and gently rotate your foot to make you aware of your ankles.
How does that feel? Mindfully moving our body can bring a new awareness to it and from that point of awareness we have a choice of how we use it.
Now place both feet softly on the ground (this is even better without shoes). Notice the weight of your lower legs and imagine that weight ‘falling’ through your ankles and feet into the ground.
Does the awareness of this weight help your feet to relax and become more open?
For me, one of the joys of summer is walking barefoot on the lawn. Whilst being an altogether very pleasant feeling on the feet, it’s also very good for the rest of the body. I use it as a little meditation. Walking with the awareness of my body within its environment and connecting to the ground, whilst allowing myself to lengthen up to the sky.
If you want to give mindful walking a try, let your feet slowly role through each step, let your back breath (ribs expanding and releasing with each breath) and let your eyes be aware of your peripheral vision, so that you’re not peering at anything – just seeing. It can be helpful to allow the calves to lengthen, imagining them lengthening into the heels and as you do so ask the base of your skull to release and the back of your neck to lengthen. It’s a lot to think about, but if you take it all in small sections, it can really transform your poise and balance.
The ground is there to support you, but our overly tense body gets in the way of this support. Using a little mindful practice on a regular basis, gives us a chance to deepen our awareness of our connection to our environment physically and spiritually. We have a lesser known chakra called the earth star. It’s our connector to the earth, where we ‘plug in’ to an infinite source of love and information, which we can use to realise our authentic self and understand our soul’s purpose. Feeling closed off from this chakra can bring a feeling of instability (physically and emotionally), an inability to create the life that you want and a disconnection to your environment (including the people around you). If this sounds like you, then I recommend that you take a little more care of your feet! Treat them to a soak or a little massage. Stand on the dewy grass and let your energy be drawn down to the centre of the earth (gravity with help!), as you start to feel that connection and support from the ground, think up as if your unfurling up towards the sky. Breathe and connect with the space around you. Be with your Self, be present.
We live in a hectic and crazy world; any number of things in our day can knock us off balance. Give yourself a chance to put the spring back into your step and the poise back into your balance.