Shoes for Your Soul || By Beth Hinnen, Certified Mindfulness and Meditation Teacher
Who doesn’t love a new pair of shoes, especially ones that fit right out of the box? I find myself looking forward to the moment I can strap, snap, buckle them on and go for a spin. I have snow boots for inclement weather, dressy sandals for special occasions, shoes for strolling around town, hiking the mountains, wading in rocky rivers, flip flops for hot days, and of course slippers at home. While I love going barefoot on soft mown grass, a champagne sand beach, or wearing “five fingers” for a barefoot feeling on rough terrain, I have to say, most of the time I have something on my feet. There is a sense of can-do-it-ness, climb the highest mountain, forge the widest river, traverse the farthest reaching plain, when I have a great pair of shoes on my feet. Nothing stops me from walking out my front door (right, Bilbo?).
And when that happens, inevitably I come into contact with all manner of ground — pavement, dirt, ice, snow, rocks, gravel, weeds, grass, dog poop, broken glass, trash. You name it, it’s out there lying around. Hence, the shoes.
However, it’s not only that. I could breeze through my day with a good pair of shoes except, I come into contact with something not so easy to deal with. Yep … people. In shops, on the street, my dentist, family and friends, people running, partying, on their phones, young, old, kind, obnoxious, indifferent, smelly, perfumed, dressed, barely dressed (some on purpose, some not), happy, grumpy, sneezy (oh wait, that’s a Disney movie). In any case, going out into the world leads to all sorts of different experiences. I could leave my house happy as a clam and within five minutes be ranting at everything, and everyone, around me about the injustices and degradations, the harms and the (in)humanity (my favorite line from Toy Story).
What I need is a really good pair of shoes for my soul.
The ancient master, Shantideva, offered:
Where would I find enough leather
To cover the entire surface of the earth.
But with leather soles beneath my feet.
It’s as if the whole world has been covered
Or, if you ascribe to a vegan lifestyle:
It’s easier to put on a pair of slippers than carpet the entire world.
(Attributed to Al Franken. Right? I know!)
When we consider what the Buddha taught as the First Noble Truth, that life inherently contains suffering, he wasn’t being a Debbie-downer, he was simply stating a fact that because humans get sick, age and die, we would all at some point live through loss — of health, youth, and eventually life itself, ours or others. Not only that, we would also experience failure, disappointment, breakups, natural disasters, human-made disasters, you name it, we’ve all been touched by sadness and grief at some point in our lives. And this quote recognizes what we all know to be a truth; we can’t make the external world a paradise where none of that happens (i.e. carpeting the world).
Except, it seems like that’s what’s expected. If everyone thought the way I do, acted the way I do, was interested in what I liked, then I could talk with everyone about the same things, make the same jokes, laugh about the same gaffes. I wouldn’t take offense, I could relax, and know that everyone is like me and I’d never get triggered. In essence, the world would not only be carpeted, but it’d be one that I picked out and really, really liked. And yet, not only is that not the way it works, I project we would immediately get bored (as Mr. Smith tells Morpheus in The Matrix — the computers tried to make human life conflict-free but the program kept crashing.)
What we are left with then, is finding a good pair of shoes for our souls, a way to protect and support our very being so that whatever anyone else does or says would be inconsequential to how we view ourselves. It sounds challenging. Someone might ask, “wait a minute, even when a person praises me, or tells me how wonderful I am, I’m supposed to ignore that?” Nope. Rather, if no one tells you that, you still have the inner sense of being praiseworthy and wonderful. Even better is, if someone flips you off while driving, you can wish them a nice day.
This is the true idea of self-worthiness. It is an internal knowing that you are capable, competent, loveable, beautiful and wonderful, no matter the external circumstances, not your body shape, hair color, foot size, career or relationship status, net income, property ownership, or how many friends and family you have. We build our soul shoes by recognizing that what the world thinks of us is nothing compared to what we think of us. Buddhism teaches impermanence, how the world around us constantly changes. To rely on others to reflect our worthiness puts us at the mercy of constantly changing opinions, responses, and moods of everyone else, which social media is on steroids, given our addiction to clicks and “likes.” No wonder the appeal of a carpeted world!
Instead, if we can turn inward and begin to experience an innate sense of wholeness, we can start to build some soul shoes. Mine have taken years to craft (and are still a work in progress!). Mindfulness and meditation help me see situations with clarity and courage; trauma healing has helped me rely on my own capacity to soothe and nourish myself; joining a sangha of like-hearted people has helped me test out my soul shoes and see where I need more padding, or stronger laces. Ultimately, I want to be able to have conversations with people of different ideologies, political leanings, senses of humor, social and economic backgrounds, and feel completely at home, no matter what is said or done. And of course soul shoes can help you walk away from harm, or if yours have spikes like mine, help you stand your ground and ask one more question or point out inelegant behavior in the most nonjudgmental way.
The answer to our heartbreak of feeling like the world is a cruel and uncaring place is not to force the world to change for us, rather, it is to walk in the world fearlessly and show others that malice does not earn the reward of our compliance. After Gandalf said, “Fly, you fools!” he put on his soul shoes, let go of the broken walkway and flew to confront the Balrog. I expect my soul shoes will help me feel and work more like Gandalf, rather than feel and look like the Balrog after Gandalf smote him at the bottom of Middle Earth.
About the Author: Beth Hinnen came to the spiritual path from the corporate world. After experiencing impermanence and greed, she left to study Yoga and has over 1,000 hours in Yoga teacher training, and ended up specializing in the Yoga Sutras of Patanjali, spiritual scripture that closely aligns with Buddhism. From there, she studied Zen Buddhism for over ten years, including in-person, month-long monastic retreats, until she earned certification, in January, 2023, as a Mindfulness and Meditation Teacher with Jack Kornfield and Tara Brach. Currently, Beth is a co-leader of the IMCD Council, and on the Teachers Collective, as administrator. She hosts a Meetup group called Yoga Meets Buddhism, and for the past three years, has held an online Dharma Wednesdays class that discusses the Yoga Sutras while also bringing in Buddhist teachings, along with Sufi poets, Christianity, Judaism and other spiritual paths that reinforce the words of Sri Swami Satchidananda, the founder of Integral Yoga where Beth studied. “The truth is one, the paths are many.” More information about Beth is at www.samayaco.org.
