Did you know that a small joint you’ve probably never thought much about may be the deciding factor on how well the rest of your body moves?

As a certified athletic therapist, it’s often my job to play detective and search for clues through someone’s body, posture and movement to determine why they are having pain or dysfunction. Often, the area that is at the root of the dysfunction isn’t where the symptoms are presenting. Over the years I’ve learned that starting with the base we move upon, i.e., our feet, is usually the easiest way to avoid a wild goose chase and get people back moving and doing the things they love as quickly as possible.

As I’ve mentioned in earlier articles, the micro-movements that happen in our feet significantly influence how the rest of our body moves. Not only do we have thousands of nerve endings in the feet, making them sensory organs in and of themselves, but we also have multitudes of bones and small joints and endless soft tissues. If any of those things aren’t moving or sensing well, we will feel the effects throughout the body.

Because we are mammals who spend the bulk of our movement time ambulating on two feet, everything that happens in those two feet translates through the whole body. Likewise, because our species has evolved to use supporting footwear, our feet are not being used how they were designed to be used. As a result, we are losing valuable mobility and sensitivity.

Our big toe (or if you’re feeling textbook-y, the “first metatarsophalangeal joint”), is made up of four bones: the first metatarsal (what you would reference as the tip of your big toe), the proximal phalanx of the hallux (the bone between the knuckle of the big toe and the ball of the big toe) and two floating bones that are embedded in the tendon underneath the toe, connecting the toe to the rest of the foot.

This joint is designed primarily for flexion (circling the toe back towards the arch of the foot) and extension (lifting the toe up off the ground or back towards the rest of the body). It has a little bit of side-to-side movement as well as rotation. In a perfect world, the normal range of motion for the big toe is between sixty and ninety degrees of extension and between thirty and forty-five degrees of flexion. When walking, we require at least those sixty degrees of extension for efficient gait mechanics. Unfortunately, stiff footwear, such as workboots or tight-fitting shoes, can limit this extension, causing stiff joints.

The big toe is a synovial joint, meaning it has a fluid-lined membrane surrounded by ligaments holding things securely in place. Synovial joints benefit hugely from regular movement, which helps to hydrate the tissues with that lubricating joint fluid. Those two floating bones I mentioned act as pulleys for the tendon, increasing leverage during the push-off phase of walking (propelling us forward) as well as force absorption.

When there are mobility limitations of this joint, we notice pain local to the foot, development of joint degeneration (arthritis) and changes to how the ankle, knee and hip function. If our big toe can’t load and disperse force, our ankle’s movement begins to stiffen and more force gets stuck in the knee and hip, contributing to pain, stiffness and degenerative change in these joints and potentially contributing to spine issues.

I could write a book on all the issues and treatments we can explore in the big toe, but we don’t have enough space here for that. For now, try this exercise regularly:

Sitting, use your hands to gently massage around the ball of the big toe and spend time on any tender spots you notice. After about five minutes of gentle massage, grab and secure the toe with one hand and the foot with the other hand and gently traction the toe away from the foot. This is sometimes uncomfortable at first, so go slowly and only as much as you can tolerate. If this feels okay, gently and slowly move the toe in all directions, to whatever degree you are able. Then do the same with the other foot. Repeat ten to fifteen times for a few minutes and end with another few moments of gentle massage around the foot.

Repeating this daily (it makes a great bedtime routine) over the long run can help maintain healthy mobility in the forefoot and potentially save some grief elsewhere in the body. This is especially important if bunions are forming (yes, these are preventable and correctable in many cases), you have a history of foot pain (like plantar fasciitis) or you have noticed increased stiffness in the lower body.

As always, if foot pain is getting in the way of your day-to-day life, it’s important to seek an assessment from a qualified health care provider. Well-trained athletic therapists, physiotherapists and orthopaedic specialists can appropriately assess and guide you toward functional movement and happy feet!

We all know that sleep is important to maintain quality of life and overall health. Unfortunately, sleep disruption is one of the most common complaints I hear from my clients.

The power of sleep to improve how we feel on all levels is often under-appreciated. Many people assume that they just aren’t “good sleepers” or that nothing will change their sleep patterns. The thing is sleep — like other biological functions such as digestion — can be improved with practice and awareness.

The quality of sleep has a direct impact on our quality of life. How we sleep affects cognitive function, our perception of the world, pain tolerance and our vulnerability to stress, illness and injury. And since many people report that their sleep is disrupted by pain, stress, tension, rumination and discomfort, there is a vicious cycle between physical wellness and sleep.

Sleep depends on our nervous system’s ability to shift into the “rest and digest” mode, but modern life requires us to react to constant demands and stimuli from our environment. This causes our nervous system to become biased towards “fight or flight” mode which means shifting into a gear that promotes restful sleep becomes a challenge.

Many sleep advice resources suggest getting rid of stimuli such as artificial light, screens, social media and TV within a few hours of bedtime to allow this shift to happen. I certainly don’t disagree; however, what’s even more relevant is finding ways to adjust our internal response to stimulus and to find ways that support the nervous system to shift toward restful states.

In my experience, one of the best ways to do this is to involve the body in countering the mind’s narrative. Our nervous system senses its environment largely through the body, while the mind functions as an interpreter to make sense of environmental cues. We can influence the mind’s perspective by using the body to promote a sense of “safe enough to rest.”

What does that look like? For starters, practice slowness, especially in the evenings as you (ideally) wind down from the day. In the winter months when the evenings are longer, see if there are routines that you can do extra slowly, for example, washing dishes, showering, moisturizing, gentle movement practices, sipping tea. Imagine pressing a slow-motion button for these daily tasks, making the movements associated with washing your face, brushing your teeth, etc., as slow as possible.

Neurologically, this slowness creates a perception of safety. Whenever we generate a sense of safety, our nervous system can more easily shift away from reaction/action mode. So, see how slowly you can brush your teeth and really focus on the sensations of slow movement. Do the same when washing your hands or your hair. Intentionally focusing on these routine actions tells the nervous system that less activation is currently required, making rest more attainable.

As you get into bed, slowly inhale to tense the large muscle groups (e.g., glute muscles, shoulder muscles, etc.) and exhale to release the same muscles. Do this for five to ten rounds to help the body settle. From there you can move from easy inhales to practicing longer exhales. Adding length to exhales signals to the nervous system that it’s a good time to settle down. If you find longer exhales challenging, start instead with a balanced breath, that is an equal inhale to an equal exhale at a pace that feels easy and sustainable. Find the easiest length of inhale then match your exhale to that length.

Interrupted sleep is something to take seriously. If implementing practices such as those outlined above is not making a difference, it is important to seek professional support. Likewise, waking up fatigued is also a sign to get a professional assessment.

Simply put, if we aren’t sleeping well, we aren’t living well. Speak to your health care providers to find out what steps you can take for better sleep.

Throughout a decade working in health, fitness and physical rehabilitation, it has become clear to me that long-term physical wellness and maintaining longevity of day-to-day physical functions are dependent on a relatively simple, common truth: use it or lose it.

However, we tend to overcomplicate practicing the “use it” part of the equation. A glance at the exercise world today shows us that it’s easy to become overwhelmed by options, fads and what online influencers tell us is the best or only method to long-term physical health and function.

For most people, maintaining or enhancing overall mobility and strength — the type that helps support daily life — is relatively simple: squatting, hinging, pushing and pulling.

There are endless ways to accomplish those basic movements and engaging in them doesn’t have to be expensive, time-consuming or overwhelming. In this article, I’ll explore the squatting movement as an essential exercise for anyone, at any phase of life.

Of the four key movements mentioned above, squatting is the one I’ve noticed becoming less common in the general population. As our lives get busy and we age, we do more sitting than intentional squatting (sitting down and getting back up again). The ability to get oneself out of a seated position, or off the ground, has even been studied as a measurement for morbidity and longevity. Squatting uses our whole body in a functional way, engaging our legs in both directions, and our balance and body awareness. Even when done with no added weight it affects our abdominal strength, too.

Squatting is considered an essential movement for the human body as it’s a movement we do multiple times a day, whether we are aware of it or not. Many of our daily tasks require some level of squatting. Squatting requires us to have ankle and hip mobility alongside foot, knee and leg strength.

We require the squat motion to get up and down throughout our days: in and out of chairs, in and out of bed, on and off the toilet, in and out of the car, etc. If you’ve ever tried to settle into a chair or onto the toilet while recovering from a knee injury or abdominal surgery, you’ll likely have experienced the dynamic function of all that’s involved internally within the action of sitting down or getting up.

We also use aspects of the same biomechanics when going up or down stairs, bending down to reach into a cupboard, moving bales, working on farm equipment or cleaning the shop.

Here’s a test to try at home to check how good your squat function is. You’ll need a sturdy chair (a dining room chair works well) that places your knees at about ninety degrees when you’re seated on it, with feet flat to the ground and square below the knees. Can you sit down on the chair with control (not falling in the last part of sitting) and without lifting your heels or toes off the ground? Can you stand back up, using no or very minimal support from the hands on the thighs or arm rests? Can you repeat both movements for ten rounds and maintain control both up and down?

If you struggled to achieve the above, you now have homework! Practice sitting to standing, from a higher chair if needed, daily or at least three times per week. You’ll notice that with some practice you can achieve more depth and control over time, and you’ll be engaging in a simple exercise that might help determine independence and overall physical wellness well into your golden years.

Simply bringing attention and intention to where you’re already squatting up and down throughout your day can also be beneficial. Practice pressing your whole foot into the ground to rise out of squat positions (coming up from a chair, bed, the toilet or getting out of vehicles) and practice control on the way down, connecting the foot into the ground and pressing the hips back towards the surface you’re heading to.

If any pain disrupts your ability to squat, it’s important to seek medical advice and access qualified physical rehabilitation guidance. While injuries and discomfort certainly do happen, appropriate and timely rehabilitation guidance can go a long way towards ensuring you’re still able to “use it” and not “lose it” in the long run.

Not every fall can be prevented, but a little focus and intention on our movement can go a long way toward ensuring our bodies are best prepared for resiliency on slippery, uneven surfaces.

Beyond the obvious suggestions, such as ensuring you have appropriate winter footwear and moving more mindfully than usual, let’s chat about movement practices that can support your balance, agility and body awareness.

I’ve noted some common circumstances when I hear about slips and falls from my clients. Often, there has been a recent transition to winter footwear. Heavier boots, thicker soles and more robust shoes mean good things for warmth and grip but can present a challenge for our internal body awareness, or our proprioception. Proprioception is just a big word for how our body knows where it is in time and space.

Our body is covered with proprioceptive nerve fibres that help us sense our environment, maintain balance and move with co-ordination and agility. Our feet are especially full of these types of nerve fibres. When we wear thick, robust shoes we are dulling our sense of awareness in our feet. This can set the stage for weakened soft tissues, decreased strength and an increased risk of not being able to course correct when things get slippery.

The solution isn’t to go bootless. Instead, engage your feet regularly and keep the connection between brain and body to sense the world around you, even when you’re in your winter gear.

Winter footwear also tends to limit our ankle range of motion, which changes our mobility through the entire lower body. A stiffer gait, with less control, can lead to stepping just wrong enough on ice to cause a slip.

Try these four exercises at home routinely to keep your ankle and foot moving. They take no more than a few minutes a day and can prevent falls from having an impact on your stride. As a bonus, these exercises are also great for preventing and treating things like plantar fasciitis, fallen arches and flat feet.

Slow-motion foot taps

Sit comfortably with your foot fully resting on the ground. Slowly raise your foot off the ground, keeping your heel planted. Ensure that you lift from the middle of your foot, so that your pinky toe and big toe raise levelly. Take about three to four seconds to raise up, and then slowly lower back to the ground. Do one foot and then the other. Repeat for 10 rounds per side, a few times each day. A great warm-up prior to walks or runs!

Toe curls

Sit comfortably with feet resting on the ground. Keeping your foot on the ground, curl your toes into the ground. You could place a towel under your foot (spread out) and curl the toes into the towel to drag it in towards the foot. Curl the toes in and out 10 times. If you use a towel, curl the towel in for 10 curls, then practice pressing it back out again using the toes (uncurling). You may feel the arch muscles are working to do this; this is a good thing. Repeat daily, a few rounds where possible.

Tandem walking

Take a step forward, placing one foot directly in front of the other (heel to toe). Walk forward 10 to 20 steps, stacking your feet as you go. Challenge yourself to look forward (not at your feet) while doing this. As an additional challenge, walk backward in this way to your starting point. Repeat daily, a few rounds where possible.

Tiptoe walking

For 10 to 20 steps, walk as high as you can on your tiptoes. As you walk, work to keep your weight in the centre of the forefoot, not more to the outside or inside edge of your foot. Try to walk in a straight line, sideways and backwards like this. Challenge yourself to keep eyes up and look ahead. Repeat daily, a few rounds where possible.

In addition to keeping the connection alive to your feet and ankles, I strongly recommend that regular balance challenges be added to the routine. This could be done as part of your regular workouts during the warm-up, while you’re waiting for the pot to boil on the stove or as you’re brushing your teeth.

Simply feel your foot on the ground, then shift your weight to one side. Think about pressing the ground away and engaging the same side hip muscles to balance on one leg. Stay here for 10 seconds or more, then repeat on the other side.

Intentionally keep your eyes up and practice balancing on the leg with no assistance from your hands. Regularly working on balance supports healthy joint mobility and keeps our mind and body connected. It also increases your chances of not falling when facing the unpredictable outdoors this time of year.

As winter progresses, it’s common to move a bit less and rest a bit more.

While we don’t often actively pursue it, hibernation certainly is an appealing idea this time of year. Our bodies naturally slow down during the winter months, but that doesn’t mean that we can’t benefit from intentional movement even in the colder, slower weather.

Less movement and colder temperatures combined can cause our circulatory and lymphatic systems (i.e., our fluid management systems) to slow down. This can cause sensations such as stiffness, puffiness or water retention, sore and tired legs, digestive issues, general inflammation, increased pain and an overall feeling of sluggishness.

While our circulatory system (arteries and veins) has its own built-in pump, our lymphatic system relies on our soft tissues contracting and moving to circulate. The lymphatic system is essentially where the fluids associated with the immune system and cellular waste end up — the plumbing in our bodies that you don’t want just sitting around, not getting flushed out.

Supporting our body in managing circulation and eliminating fluids does not have to be complex or expensive. There are products on the market designed to work on these systems, such as vibration plates, rebounders and compression wear. There is certainly nothing wrong with any of these products, and if you’ve tried them and they’ve helped, that is excellent. However, a few simple and intentional movement practices every day are often all we need to help our bodies navigate the slower, colder season.

Heel raises and drops

Because we spend a lot of our time in upright positions, gravity is a major player when it comes to our lymphatic system and, to some extent, our venous system. We can’t avoid the effects of gravity, but we can engage the relatively large soft tissues in our legs in ways that support circulation flow and move lymph.

Using a wall, sturdy table or couch to maintain balance if needed, press the balls of your feet into the ground and lift your heel as high as possible (standing on tip toes), This contracts the muscles in the back of your calf. (Bonus points if you stretch your legs long and engage your glute muscles [butt cheeks] as well.)

Practice keeping your weight balanced on each foot equally and in the centre of the ball of your foot. If you glance down at your feet, both the ball of your big toe and pinky toe should be equally rooted into the ground and all toes pointing straight forward. Hold up high for a few seconds, and then let your heels fall down to the ground with a bit of impact. Repeat 10-30 times, raising and then dropping the heels. The impact of the heel meeting the ground creates vibration through the bones, supporting bone density and helping micro-circulation.

Flexions, extensions and rotations

Joint movement of any kind — all kinds — helps contract and flush the soft tissues and joint spaces, moving circulation and lymph back upwards toward the heart and kidneys for recirculation and elimination.

You can do this exercise lying on the ground or in bed. Starting at the feet, curl and uncurl your toes, rotate your ankles, bend and straighten your knees. Hug one knee into the chest and slowly kick the leg straight towards the ceiling. Repeat on the other side.

Next, curl and uncurl the hands, rotate the wrists, bend and straighten the elbows. Draw snow angles on the ground, sweeping arms up overhead and back down again. Turn your head side to side. These movements hit all the major joints in the body and create a flush effect in the system through gentle compression and release of tissues.

Another option: stand and press your feet into the ground. Squeeze your glutes to press the hips forward. Reach the arms up overhead and extend the body backward, bending the knees gently. Reach as long as you can and take a big inhale. On exhale, release and fold your body forward, keeping the knees gently bent as you curve forward. Inhale to repeat the reach and extend, exhale to fold forward. Like the segmented version above, this stretch supports circulation and flushing of large tissues through gentle compression.

Tapping and shaking

Vibration is a wonderful way to encourage microcirculation through our tissues and move lymph through the body. We can manually create vibration ourselves by gently tapping the body.

Bring the fingertips of each hand together to create a cupped hand and use your fingers to drum-tap your way up your body starting at the legs, covering the abdomen, chest, as much of the back body that you can reach and the arms.

Volitional shaking is another way to create a vibration effect through the body. This is essentially what vibration plates do for us, but simply jumping, wiggling and shaking the arms and limbs has a similar effect. Set a timer for two to three minutes and begin to shake your arms, wiggle your legs and hips, then let your belly relax and jump around. Playing music can help!

Finding ways to move your body daily in any fashion is an excellent way to keep winter sluggishness out of your body and support the health and wellness of tissues. Taking daily walks outside — even if you have to bundle up — is also a good way to support movement of major joints and tissues, the circulatory system and to keep things moving until spring.

Kathlyn Hossack is an athletic therapist, somatic practitioner and clinical herbalist based in Winnipeg, Man. She owns Evoke Body + Mind and provides consultation in person and online to those seeking guidance in rehabilitation and healthy living practices. For more information, visit evokebodymind.ca.