'The foot is like water. Be water my friend'

The way we walk is very personal.

We all have our own.

So much so that you are able to identify your friends and family just by looking at the way they walk.

It was raining last Monday.

And meanwhile I was watching the morning, a little boy was walking with his mother on his way to school.

The little boy was doing it with short, but quick steps. Very fluid, without any effort at all.

Further ahead, a thin man had a very different walk.

Each step was a eternity.

He looked like an overweight elephant.

He nailed the heel of his shoes on the ground, locked his knee and landed the rest of his foot on the ground.

Like in slow motion.

Over and over again.

10,000 steps a day if he follows the official recommendations.

'That way of walking with the knee totally locked, transferring the impact of his foot to his waist, can only cause him problems'.

'He will probably will hurt his back.'

'He will soon have to sit down. Every step is a brake on his walking.'
With this in my head I was, when Angel appeared.

It is still raining and the water starts to run down the street.

As we finish our coffee he tells me something curious about Bruce Lee.

His teachings about the nature of water, have a lot of similarities with the foot.
Bruce says:

'At sea, while sailing, I thought about the mistakes of my training and angry with myself I hit the water.
At that moment, I had a revelation.

Wasn't water the essence of Kung-Fu?'

The foot is like water.

Lightweight.

'I tried to grab it, but it was impossible.
Water, the softest substance I knew, could fit into any container.'

The foot weighs only 1 kilogram, even though it has a third of the bones in the body.
If you add weight to the foot you become slow, clumsy and heavy.

Very strong.

'I hit it, but it was unharmed.
Although it looked weak, it could break the hardest rocks.'

As you run, your foot supports three times your weight.
210 kilos per foot!, in my case.
And this at every step, for tens or hundreds of kilometres.

It adapts.

'Put water in a cup and it will be the cup,  
put it in a bottle and it's the bottle.'

If you put your foot in a narrow shoe it takes on the shape of the shoe, and if you leave it free it expands and takes on its natural shape.

'Then I lay down in the boat and I felt I had found the balance.
I wanted to be like the nature of water.
Be water, my friend.'

Bruce Lee was much more than a martial arts master and left us many lessons.

Passionate about training, he learned boxing, fencing, judo, tangsudo... and it was always clear to him that we must follow our instinct and respect our nature.

On our feet, it is easy to follow his advice and respect what we are.

Or barefoot,
or with minimalist shoes.

Like the Vivobarefoot Primus Lite III for Him, or for Her,

which perfectly follow Bruce Lee's philosophy.

'Be water, my friend.'

Health starts with your feet.