The other night my wife and I were sitting outside at a restaurant. Next door was a pizza place. I saw two young men (maybe in their 20s) entering the pizza place. One was barefoot but was carrying flip flops. Before he entered, he dropped the flip flops on the ground and put them on.

I found this sad. Clearly this guy likes to be barefoot. I don’t know how far he had walked before he got to the pizza place, but he was walking barefoot outside on city streets. Not filthy streets, but not the beach either. And clearly he could have gone into the pizza place barefoot. Heck, I was next door at a much more formal type restaurant completely barefoot, no footwear with me, and no one cared. He didn’t need to be lugging his flip flops around.

But a lifetime of propaganda has made the kid believe that he can’t go into a pizza place barefoot because he will be kicked out or it’s a health code violation or his friend will think he’s weird or whatever.

I’m not political about barefooting, I just like the way it feels, but if I can influence anyone to realize that they, too, can do it since I am doing it, that makes me feel good.

I've had to wear sandals while walking, Mr. Mason because, all over this neighborhood, all of the oak trees are dropping acorns into the street. And man, you do not want to step on one of those in your bare feet. That is one of the worst ouches ever, because the suckers crush and they leave little shards everywhere that are sharp. So even walking through a pile of them that's been crushed by a car tire or something, ow, very painful. Anybody else deal with acorns?

Long story, apologies in advance...

So... just dropped my truck off at an auto shop, and decided to walk home. The auto shop is just under 2 miles from my apartment. I've walked that distance before, but that was before I was barefooting.

Today, I had my flip flops in my sling, and just took the walk after dropping my truck off. The majority of the trip wasn't too bad. There is not much sidewalk on the route, so I was primarily walking on gravely asphalt/road with occasional grassy pre-ditch side of roadway spots. Some sharp pebbles that I definitely felt, but were not overly painful. Some occasional shiny things I avoided in case it was glass shards, since I couldn't really tell.

Really, nothing terrible, until I got to a stoplight about a block before my apartments. I stepped from a driveway, onto a small grassy/dirt patch just in front of the stoplight, and nearly cried out in pain. Both feet, multiple grass burrs I did not see. I just barely stood on one foot while trying to swat them off the other. They stuck to my hands, they left needle burrs in parts of my foot. I was in agony. It took me probably a good two mintues to get them off, and I was almost limping

By amazing timing, some elderly man had pulled up into the driveway behind me and asked, "you barefooting it?" "Yeah," I replied, trying to look positive. "How far you going?" "Oh, my apartments, are just around the next corner. I've got flip flops with me if I need them." I pat my sling. "Thank you, though." He nodded, and drove away. I cautiously walked back to the light, and still somehow stepped on a few more burrs.

I almost limped the rest of the way home. But as soon as I walked in the door, I went straight to the bathroom and washed my feet with a loofa, then used some scissors (couldn't find my tweezers), and looked for anything sticking out. Didn't find anything. Then put hand sanitizer on my soles - I figured the alcohol would sanitize and help me pinpoint any wounds. Nothing stood out. Rinsed my feet again.

I feel mostly ok now. My feet feel sensitive/sore when I put pressure on, and I have a slight persistent soreness on my ball and heel. I feel like I might end up with another blister set, but I'm going to have to be careful about barefooting until I'm sure there's no long term effects...

Just had my second encounter with somebody telling me that I, due to "existing laws", are prohibited from entering a place without shoes.

I have no problem (to a degree that some purists here deemed me to be a troll only) with people simply denying me entrance, due to me being barefoot. That's called domiciliary right's and is, though one may not like it, just just.

If somebody does that, then I stop arguing and accept it, though maybe grumpily only.

What I cannot stand though, are people who lie into my face and invent laws with multiple side regulations and blah. They do so blatantly and each time they insist on how sorry they are, that they have no other chance, but to follow those rules (as if they were totally on my side, but "the laws, you see!?"). It's so … aaaaahhhhh, I really hate such falsehood.

But,

my question to you lot is:

• How often people are telling you outright lies about non existing laws and the like which, or so they claim, prohibits them, from permitting entrance, service or whatever else to barefooters?

Probably unsurprising for most, but susprising and shocking for me, it wasn't because there were crystals, needles, pee or poop on the floor, it was because of the people.

It's been raining a lot these last few days in my city, which means that depending on where you walk, you had to step into a puddle of water deep enough to cover your whole foot.

I only have two pairs of shoes: sandals and the typical barefoot saguaro green and black shoes almost everybody probably knows. One inconvenient of those shoes is that if they get wet in cold weather you can already forget about wearing them for 1-2 days.

I go to superior vocational training, and I must wear covered shoes. I already knew it would rain a lot when I got out of vocational training, and since I, being 100% honest, didn't want to bring my sandals with me to put on once I got out, I decided that I would take off my shoes and socks and walk barefoot if my path was flooded, taking a tiny towel and placing it inside my backpack for drying my feet once I got on the bus because where I live (30 minutes away from where I study on bus) doesn't get floody.

Like I guessed, most of the path I took for getting on my bus was flooded, so I took off my shoes,socks, and placed them inside my backpack because it was hard to carry them alongside my umbrella due to the wind.

As a person who dislikes having anything on my feet, it felt amazing. Being able to actually feel the different textures of the pavement, road, puddles, etc was making me so happy that I could be compared to a child getting a gift they always wanted during christmas.

Until, people started taking notice of my 'barefoot state':

A couple laughed while passing by me.

I heard a group behind me giggling while waiting at a red pedestrian light, and saw them pointing at me.

One guy, while laughing to his friend, started recording the surrounding area, which I thought, fair, not everyday you see the city flooded. Until I realized that everytime I turned to him, wether to check if the bus was coming, or to look at the flooding, he suddenly moved his phone (which was pointing at me) away to capture the 'surroundings'.

And last, but what felt worse by how little they tried to hide what they were doing, I saw a group of three girls behind the glass of a bus that stopped to let people get off, laughing, pointing, and what I assumed by how they were pointing their three phones directly at me, recording and taking photos. I could have knocked on the glass if I wanted to by taking 5 steps due to how close the bus was, and they probably thought the glass wasn't see-through.

Like I might get how it's 'weird' seeing someone walking barefoot in a city. I'm not in a city with normalized barefooting, but laughing, pointing, taking photos/videos and making someone feel like a piece of 💩 just because they are walking barefoot?? I think that's too far.

I have never felt so degraded and critized publicly in my life before.

Also, this happened in just 20 minutes, which is what it took for me to walk to the bus and wait for it to arrive.

I was thinking to myself recently if there was a way to be barefoot all the time such that it becomes socially normalised .I was scrolling through TikTok and came across “Wanlov The Kubolor” ,a music artist in my country.I already knew he went barefoot, but it was the never the first thing I thought of, when it came to him.He’s known to walk barefoot everywhere,even to interviews and concerts.
It’s so normalised for him now,no one even comments on it anymore. Maybe the other aspects of his personality distract from it. He is somewhat eccentric by our country’s standards

I'm just recounting the most extreme example of being given attitude for lack of shoes in my life so far. So prepare for some rambling.

For most of the year now I've never worn shoes, and throughout this first semester in college, I've followed suit. I haven't had any issues being in class, and have in fact received a lot of friendly support from professors and classmates.

The only places that have a policy against being barefoot are the dining halls. It's an archaic policy from the 60's and 70's that just hasn't been reviewed, and so now it isn't really enforced. Food workers either don't think it's an issue or can't be bothered or don't get paid enough to confront a student and kick them out for it. But every once in a while there'd be a more managerial, corporate person who would kindly bring it up.

However, while I was in line to get dinner, this older lady walked up with an attitude saying that I have to wear shoes or beat it, literally trying to pull me out of line, toss the food I'd served, and send me out after I already paid to eat here. I stood my ground and stated that I already paid and need to eat. She complained to one of the chefs behind the counter, who said that there isn't much he can do.

As I was eating at a table, she picked me out and said she called her boss who confirmed with her that I'm breaking the policy, and I restated that I need to eat the food I've already served and am entitled to by the university; she threatened to call campus police. I know the campus police would take the path of least resistance and kick me out, but I found it kind of insane that she was willing to turn such a mundane, harmless situation into a scene involving the police that would turn everyone's attention toward us.

She said she'd let me finish my meal, but that's it, and walked away. A few minutes later I was done and went to take my dirty dishes to the designated area, and she called out from the corner to leave it at the table. So it turns out she was standing by the door, staring at me while I ate, waiting for me to finish, which is straight up weird and kind of grossed me out.

But either way I left and made a remark to her about how she'd rather people leave a mess at their tables than have one student without shoes on in the hall.

I'm just kind of baffled that some dining hall worker like her would make it their entire mission of the night to kick one student out for what they're wearing. The funny thing is, she didn't kick me out, because I ended up refusing to leave when she told me to and left on my own terms; though she still looked all triumphant like she saved the day when I left. It kind of makes me sad how important it makes her feel knowing that she's just another underpaid food service worker making below minimum wage, and enforcing an arbitrary policy like this isn't going to give her a raise.

Either way, shit like this just makes me want to keep doing it more, and I'm in the process of working with the student government to get the policy overturned for discrimination and infringement of students' right to self expression. But until then, I guess I'll keep finding myself in strange encounters like this one.

My neurodivergent brain goes into tilt when using the term barefoot. Thats singular so I typically say bare feet. Thats both feet, not one foot.

Barefoot 100% of the month, except for wearing flip flops two minutes entering a music club and two minutes talking to some plumbers on the side of my house where the gravel was rough.

Barefoot adventures included that music club, many many grocery stores, many restaurants (maybe a dozen or more), Home Depot, a few movie theaters, a few clothing stores, drugstore, a mall.

No comments or weird looks.

I’m extremely shy about being barefoot around other people. This applies everywhere, from swimming pools to beaches, but especially in places where people don’t normally go barefoot.
So I started by wearing flip-flops. Now I’d like to take things a step further and find a situation where I’d actually have no choice but to be barefoot. Something like taking part in a play or attending a judo class…
Does anyone have any ideas? I live in Belgium, and situations where you’re expected to be barefoot aren’t very common here!

Hoy me quité a vergüenza, los zapatos ya me los había quitado antes, pero jamás había paseado por mi ciudad sin ninguna vergüenza! Que sensación! Aún estoy incrédulo de mis acciones 😅

Fui a desayunar, pasear, comprar y todo descalzo! Una señora me dijo que tenía los pies bonitos durante el desayuno. Cruce algunos charcos, moje mis suelas, me las ensucie y recibí miradas que me sorprendieron! De hecho esto me ayudó a superar esa barrera mental de la vergüenza 😳

Ahora solo quiero mejorar mis ampollas para volver a salir descalzo por todas partes! Que increíble sensacion!

So I’ve always been anti shoes as long as I can remember. Always been in flip flops , rain or shine. All my friends , family and whoever I’m dating , when I wear shoes they make sure everyone is aware and shocked . I stay with my family , so around, inside and out of the house I’m always barefoot, not a big deal. It’s just past the gate to my house , it’s tough for me to go barefoot.

I’ll go barefoot at the parks , beaches , driving , the list goes on. Where it’s appropriate or at least assumed one would be . It’s just I have a hard time doing it everywhere else . Being judged , the stares and the questions I’m afraid will be asked. I get uncomfortable, embarrassed and don’t know what to do or say. To me, it genuinely feels good and I just enjoy being barefoot. I’d like to do this on trails , while camping with friends at the campsite or just in General.

Today I went on a walk with my dog at the park. It was super empty and I was hesitant to put on my flip flops from the parking lot or not but I did, as soon we turned the corner and were out of everyone’s site, I took off my flip flops and clipped them to my shorts.

The area is a little under construction so there was a lot of gravel and I didn’t mind but as soon as I saw someone turn the corner , I was so anxious and stumbling to unclip my sandals from my hip and put on my shoes and then once he passed me I took them off and under my armpit and walked around the park where it wasn’t under construction without sandals. But idk I realized how silly I must’ve looked and realizing how ridiculous I sound now while writing this.

I’m still having a hard time going full barefoot and not caring in public. I’m even embarrassed if I have my feet propped up on the or ottoman and someone seeing them dirty .
Advice ? Help? Probably doesn’t help that I have tattoos on both my feet either but maybe I’m just way in my head
I’m on Los Angeles of that matters

So, this summer I began my barefoot journey. I stayed barefoot all the time inside the house and tried to do the same in parks. But now that we're in the middle of autumn and the temperature is starting to drop, my feet are ice-cold even inside the house. I try not to wear socks and just cope with the cold, but it's starting to become really annoying because I have to go to the bathroom non-stop. 😂 How do you cope with cold weather as a barefooter?

going barefoot is something that I've long enjoyed at home, but it'd never really occurred to me that I could do in public -- recently that's changed, and I'm quite excited about it!

I've been enjoying learning new ways to live more ecologically sustainably and spend less of my time working for money if/when I don't want to, and while walking in worn-out conventional shoes on hard surfaces all day has been causing me lots of foot pain, the advice I'd gotten of "buy a fresh pair of shoes every year or two" is very environmentally and financially unappealing to me. so I started looking into alternatives, and I've gotten quite curious about simply Wearing Less Shoes and seeing if that helps with my pain and/or otherwise improves my quality of life

and so in the last week or two I've switched over to wearing mostly slip-on sandals, and in the last day or two I've been subtly slipping them off and going barefoot at work and at a social club I attend, and no one's said anything?? and it's so nice???

I want to give a shoutout to the people in this subreddit, which I just found 30 minutes ago but which is deeply encouraging/inspiring me to continue with this experiment :D (and also to a shoutout to a friend from years ago who always wore socks indoors but who one day saw me in socks and went "why aren't you barefoot?? didn't you say you prefer to be barefoot?" -- that's really stuck with me! it turns out it's okay to do what I prefer for myself)

I’ve been barefoot at the beach and in the woods but never been brave enough for a public place. At a conference there was a costume contest so I got a Flintstones costume, the perfect built-in excuse. I still debated hard whether or not to go barefoot, but I finally just forced myself to do it. I spent all evening in costume and it was amazing - only positive comments too.

My wife and I have a favorite local coffee shop. It’s owned by someone we know well. She’s never once asked me to wear to shoes in her establishment. She knows me and that barefoot is how I roll. She’s a small business and works very hard to keep it going in the shitty business climate we’re in. Someone left an awful review on Google because I was barefoot when I was there at the same time. They went on and on about it. So this morning my wife was in there and the owner very apologetically asked that when I come in to please wear shoes. I have no problem with that and I can always use the drive through if I don’t want to wear shoes. She hated asking and it was very awkward for her because she had no problem with me being me. Anyway just wanted to bitch about assholes to people who would understand 🙂

I showed up at my hotel in Hyde Park, NY barefoot and to my surprise was greeted by a barefoot receptionist! I said “Hey we’ve got the same shoes!” She was amused, thought a second and then said ”But you came from a lot farther away!” Obviously had no issues going barefoot to get some coffee and pastries at their little breakfast nook in the morning.

I also went totally barefoot to a restaurant, no issue. And the biggest things were the Eleanor Roosevelt estate and Olana – went barefoot for both the outdoor and indoor tours at each site with no comments or attention that I noticed.

Does anyone have any experience going barefoot in a DMV? I realize that there are a lot of variables, like location, that would affect this. I'm just curious before I go in to get my renewal.

Hi, I've been lurking around here for a little while, but this is my first post. When I was younger I was very self-conscious (I'm still working on that), especially about my feet. I think a lot of it was social anxiety and difficulty with communication (I'm neurodivergent in multiple ways, which makes stuff like eye contact and reading social cues hard). I tried to go barefoot as little as possible, including around family. No specific reason, though my family is the type to wear shoes in the house, so that probably didn't help. It's not like I didn't enjoy going without shoes, either. I've always liked being able to feel where I'm stepping, it makes me feel more stable, and more aware of my surroundings. As I got older, I started going barefoot whenever my family was out of the house, walking around the backyard, but I never felt confident enough to do it around other people.

Anyway, I met my now-boyfriend the spring before last through college, and after hanging out a few times I noticed that he was always barefoot in his apartment, no matter what. He usually wore sneakers otherwise, but it made the idea of taking my shoes off around him less daunting. Well, one day, I decided to not wear socks when going over, to force myself to go barefoot in front of him. It just so happened that that was the day we admitted our feelings, and from there on I never bothered with socks at his place. Eventually the subject came up, and he told me about how he was a bit of a closet barefooter. To encourage the both of us, we agreed to start going on barefoot walks around his neighborhood (his apartment is in a suburban area, so it's not super grimy, and there's a nice park nearby). He also encouraged me to try to get over my shyness at home, and I finally tried not wearing socks in front of my parents about this time last year. They didn't care, of course, but it was still a pretty big deal for me. Of course, by then it was getting colder, so going barefoot actually didn't make a whole lot of sense, but still.

We didn't do much for barefooting outdoors during the winter, but once spring rolled around we got back into our walks eagerly. I also tried out driving barefoot, which is way better than driving with shoes, I don't know how it's not more of a thing. I have a way better sense of the pedals without a shoe in the way, and it's fun to grip the pedals with my toes.

We stayed on the coast for a few days over spring break and spent almost the whole time barefoot, even walking around town (there were one or two other people doing the same, but it was pretty uncommon). We tried going into a few stores, too, and barely anyone even noticed. That was enough for me to try going into a local convenience store when we got back, and an employee looked at me funny, but that was about it.

Since then, I've pretty much stopped wearing shoes outside of school and work (plus a few bigger stores), and my boyfriend has too. We've even explored some of campus, which has been really fun. I'm by no means a full time barefooter, but I'm definitely without shoes more than most people, and very proud of it. I've only had the confidence to get this far because of my boyfriend, of course, it's way easier with a second person, and it's been so fun to experience all sorts of different places and surfaces with him. We like to compare soles after walks (I'm not sure how his are almost always darker than mine), and being able to be that open about a part of myself I used to be so protective of is really freeing. He's a wonderful person and I'm terribly lucky. We're thinking of maybe moving in together sometime soon, and I'm super excited.

Winter's coming around again, but now that we've got more experience we're committed to sticking through it for as long as we can. It doesn't get super cold over here, but we do get plenty of frost and occasional snow. I'm a little nervous, but also excited to experience a bunch of new surfaces. Thanks for reading my rambles, have fun barefooting!

Looking for fellow barefoot people that would like to meet up and possibly go on hikes/walks/lunches/ect. Just want to start a group of likeminded and barefoot folks. Drop me a message or a comment and let’s get this together.

How have any of the above words given you legal reason to be more barefoot in most businesses, schools, medical, or places of worship? Has anyone been denied for either of these reasons ?

As someone with a deep interest in art, I’ve been thinking about the connection between creativity and being barefoot. I’m thinking specifically about artists (painters, sculptors, ceramicists etc.) who choose to work barefoot in their studios.
They often do this very intentionally, as the sense of grounding and the freedom of movement seems to offer them a deeper connection to the creative process.
Are there any artists here who prefer to work without shoes?

Als jemand mit einem großen Interesse an Kunst habe ich über den Zusammenhang zwischen Kreativität und Barfüßigkeit nachgedacht. Ich denke dabei an Künstlerinnen und Künstler (Maler, Bildhauer, Keramiker usw.), die sich dafür entscheiden, barfuß in ihren Ateliers zu arbeiten.
Sie tun dies oft ganz bewusst, denn das Gefühl der Erdung oder die Bewegungsfreiheit bietet ihnen eine engere Verbindung zum kreativen Prozess.
Gibt es hier Kunstschaffende, die lieber ohne Schuhe arbeiten?

We had our roof replaced a month ago, and despite the roofers and me going over the lawn with magnets to find stray nails, they continue to appear. I found three today on a brick walkway by stepping on them. I'm sure I didn't step full on the point of any of them, but I sure as hell got some painful jabs. But nothing punctured my nice, thick calluses! They did their job well. May my luck hold! And just in case, my tetanus shot is current.

Took a quick drive through my hometown of Flagler Beach, Florida.

In that short ten minute drive I saw 17 people barefoot. 11 males (guessing age: 16 to 25). Six barefoot gals (ages around 19 to 24).

I recognized three dudes as local barefooters. Their feet just as tan as their legs and arms.

It’s rather refreshing to be around barefoot people rather than the Croc wearing tourists.

Several times I’ve been on a long walk into the countryside to the beach. I leave my house barefoot and walk up my street and down some others making my way through a couple of back lanes before getting to the seafront. I tend to head out mid-morning and some people are out walking their dogs. Older people tend to give me cheery “Good mornings”. On two separate occasions I’ve had two separate ladies wait patiently with their dogs at the end of one particular lane while I pad carefully through on the rough surface. I smile and say a “Thanks” as I emerge and they just giggle while looking at my feet and say “You’re welcome”. These pleasant interactions are such a high point of my walks.