If the shoe fits

Hello High Heelers,

You know, people often ask me: ‘What’s the deal with your obsession with high heels?’ I suppose it’s a fair question to ask, though if you’ve ever pulled on a pair of heavenly 9 inch black, leather stilettos that elongate your profile, add height to your stride and confidence to your swagger, then there’s no response necessary. However, I recognise that many of you are not designed to don kitten heels, sling backs, stack heels or pumps. To the flat-shoed ones, know that high heels make many of us working ladies look great and feel amazing. Why? Well, allow me to indulge you with the reasons…

Reason #1: Fairy tales. I mean the actual, proper stories of old made up by folks back in the day and creative ‘fictioneers’ like the Grimm Brothers. These stories were, and are, used to teach us morals and values. Dorothy clicks her red shiny shoes together 3 times when she realises that ‘there’s no place like home’. Cinderella fits her elegant foot into the glass slipper to change her destiny and almost every other feminine character we see in our bedtime tales is depicted wearing cute ballet pumps or heels. We were brought up with shoes being a symbol of beauty, innocence, lessons learnt as we’re empowered to write the story of our own destinies. Hmmm – how appropriate!

Reason #2: The always fit. Always. Fat days, thin days, bloated days, happy days, miserable days, my-best-friend-is-unavailable days, my-cat-ran-up-the-tree-in-the-rain-and-got-struck-by-lightening days and all the days in between – the shoe will fit. It just will. Unlike the jeans and the very unreliable leggings. A pair of shoes that always look good, will always look good. Despite popular perception, we need consistency in some areas of our lives. We also need to be people who are consistent in our values and the person we present to the world. We learn this from… shoes!

Reason #3: They’re the first thing we regonise as belonging to our mommies when we are crawling along the floor. Think about it. The minute we gained a sense of freedom – the ability to move in any direction we wanted (albeit very slowly) we learned to recognise our mom by her pretty little shoes. Seeing them gave us a sense of security and belonging. We just learned to love those shoes and the strong, beautiful woman attached to them.

Reason #4: They teach us that, that which is beautiful is not always comfortable. Almost every lady in the Western world, that’s lived, has had a day where she’s squeezed her feet into a pair of delightful, magically figure transformational heels that have felt like hell. We’ve had the blisters, dealt with the burning bunions and the extreme pain. Guess what – we’ve learnt from it. Some have learnt not to ever wear heels again, others have learnt to pick more carefully, and those that are suckers for pain, have learnt to suck it up and stand up for who we want to be in the world. Sometimes taking a stand means dealing with a little discomfort. It’s all about weighing up the benefits!

See why heels are so deeply connected to us? You know, the moral here is that just like one’s man’s trash is another man’s treasure, one (wo)man’s Prada pump is another (wo)man’s life lesson. If the shoe fits – wear it, if the lesson means something to you, take it, embrace it and allow it to fit the shape of your world. If it doesn’t, then perhaps you enjoyed the read anyway. I’m hoping that though sharing stories of life, love, learning and everything else, that we are able to discover treasures that go beyond the step of the shoe, to the beat of our hearts. Will you pull on your proverbial heels with me this week as we recognise that we have a long journey ahead and lots of time to walk tall through it.

Have a wonderful week.

Yours in heels,
Jo

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