#10 Wear Comfortable Shoes
Apr 19th, 2008 by doing better
Have you ever seen ballet dancers’ feet when they take off their pointe shoes? They’re not a pretty sight. I heard a company choreographer give notes to her dancers after a performance, including the instruction, “No more exploding toes!” Nearby in the dressing room lay a pointe shoe with a dark stain spread across the toe box. It is remarkable how ethereal the dancers look on stage when their foundation is so warped and bloody.
Clearly, there is a correlation between the gracefulness and beauty of the upper form and the grotesque deformity of the root. This opposition represents the balance of all things in the universe. Good and evil, light and dark, beautiful and ugly: these extremes give meaning to our existence.
Ordinary women cannot aspire to be as graceful as ballet dancers, but we do our best to achieve the holy balance. Wedging our feet day after day into high, narrow shoes, we deform them over the years, nurturing bunions, ingrown toenails and pinched nerves, as well as minor complaints such as blisters and sore feet at the end of the day.
These maladies are to be welcomed as a source of spiritual growth. Our upper bodies, rising from the twisted root, expand in beauty and delight, swaying and tottering in the breeze. We may seem off balance, about to float away, yet we are anchored to the earth by our painful lumps.
In our enlightened state, we find community. The sisterhood of creatures with misshapen feet welcomes us into their midst as things of beauty. All men flock to us. (As far as men are concerned, we can never have too many. One or two are not enough.)
It is curious to reflect that men attract us without deforming themselves. We can only pity them for missing the chance to develop their higher natures.