Walking Back Into My Body: My Evolution Through Footwork, Minimalist Shoes, and Q-Technology
- Andy Audet
- 16 hours ago
- 5 min read
How listening to my feet reshaped the way I move, work, and meet the world.
I DIDN’T KNOW MY FEET WERE SPEAKING UNTIL I LEARNED HOW TO LISTEN
In kinesiology, we say the feet matter — but mostly in theory.
“Barefoot squats are better.”
“Ground contact improves stability.”
Yes… but no.
If the sensory map of the foot is unclear, barefoot training just gives the body more misinformation.
It wasn’t until I entered posturology that I truly understood this.
For the first time, I wasn’t looking at the foot as a structure.
I was looking at it as an input — a source of orientation, clarity, and systemic organization.
That’s where it began.
Not with pain.
Not with injury.
Just with the realization that my own feet had been whispering to me for years.
THE FIRST LAYER: REDISCOVERY THROUGH POSTUROLOGY
In classical posturology, we worked with:
• postural insoles
• primitive reflex integration
• fundamental developmental movement patterns
Just this alone changed a lot.
My foot became more present.
My balance became more alive.
My whole system started reorganizing from the ground up.
I remember the day my girlfriend put aside her orthopedic insoles after one day of using her postural insoles.
She could feel the difference immediately — not as “relief,” but as clarity.
That moment stayed with me.
Not because it was dramatic, but because it showed how fast the body responds when you give it the right signal.
(No need for knee brace anymore. And with her minimalist shoes 😊 )
THE SECOND LAYER: FUNCTIONAL NEUROLOGY + ENERGY WORK
A few months later, I deepened into:
• functional neurology
• postural neurology
• energetic work
• more refined foot stimulation
• the introduction of Q-Technology
This is when my feet stopped being “feet”
and became orientation instruments.
Sensitivity increased — not pain, but precision.
I could feel tiny differences in texture, pressure, direction.
And as the feet clarified, so did everything above:
• jaw
• shoulders
• ribs
• hips
• breath
• emotional tone
The system was reorganizing itself in real time.
This is where my evolution truly accelerated!
THE MOMENT MY SHOES BECAME IMPOSSIBLE
Then something unexpected happened.
I would put on my regular shoes (puma) — soft, cloud-like, super cushioned “comfortable” shoes —
and my back would hurt within a minute.
My body wasn’t confused.
It was communicating.
Those shoes were preventing my feet from doing their job.
Thick cushioning dulled the sensory map.
My body compensated instantly.
Barefoot felt perfect.
Flatter shoes felt coherent.
But my everyday shoes suddenly felt like a distortion.
So I tested a hypothesis:
• Old shoe A → same specific tension every time
• Old shoe B → a different specific tension, every time
• Barefoot → everything reset
The conclusion was too consistent to ignore:
My shoes were speaking more loudly than my feet.
That day, I threw most of them away.
Not to be extreme —
but because once you feel the truth directly in your body,
you can’t unfeel it.
ENTER MINIMALIST SHOES — THE BEGINNING OF REAL FREEDOM
I bought my first pair of Xero Shoes.
The difference wasn’t subtle.
My feet finally had:
• space
• movement
• flexibility
• sensory access
• direct communication with the ground
A few months later, I tested my old shoes again.
Ten seconds.
That’s all it took.
My system protested immediately.
Each pair created its own pattern of tension — predictable, repeatable, measurable.
That was the confirmation.
Not ideology.
Not trend.
Not aesthetics.
Just the body telling the truth.
❗ Important clarification for readers
I never tell clients to switch to minimalist shoes on day one.
Why?
Because if the feet aren’t ready, minimalist shoes feel terrible.
People think the shoe is “bad,”
but really — it’s their foot finally expressing the load it has been carrying silently.
When the system reorganizes, people naturally shift toward more functional footwear —
not because I tell them to,
but because their body does.
WINTER WAS ITS OWN INITIATION
Summer was easy.
Winter… not so much.
I kept wearing my old winter boots for a year —
and every walk, every snowshoe outing, every trip to the car brought pain.
So I made the switch again:
minimalist winter boots.
Suddenly:
• no pain
• more warmth
• more freedom in the ankle
• more stability on ice
Some soles were too thin for Québec temperatures,
but others struck the perfect balance:
functional, warm, and still minimalist in structure.
Later, my girlfriend experienced the exact same moment of realization —
50 meters into a walk, her body spoke.
We tested it.
It was the boots.
She switched too.
The body always tells the truth.
Q-TECHNOLOGY: THE INVISIBLE AMPLIFIER
Alongside all of this, one tool kept evolving my system every single day:
When I first tried it, it was the same price as a traditional postural insole —
but it did so much more.
It:
• amplified my sensory awareness
• improved orientation
• supported energy flow
• stabilized micro-movements
• reduced compensation
• increased clarity in movement
• enhanced performance in restrictive equipment (skates, boots, etc.)
It felt like having a tiny, quiet, intelligent assistant under my feet —
not manipulating anything,
just restoring coherence.
Today, I use Q-Tech in:
• my minimalist shoes
• my winter boots
• sports equipment
• hiking gear (which is still my minimalist shoes 😉)
It doesn’t replace the body’s intelligence.
But it helps the body work with more clarity, less friction, and more flow.
For people who want to improve their system without weekly sessions,
this tool becomes a daily companion, not a “treatment.”
WHAT THIS JOURNEY TAUGHT ME
I thought I was learning about feet.
But I was learning about:
• listening
• orientation
• coherence
• truth
• capacity
• the intelligence of the system
My feet didn’t just change the way I walk.
They changed the way I practice, the way I perceive,
and the way I accompany others.
This is why footwork appears so simple —
yet transforms so much.
It’s not about techniques.
It’s about returning to how the body naturally orients itself.
If You Feel Something Waking Up in You
If something in your movement, your grounding, or your inner pace feels like it’s shifting…
It may not mean something is wrong.
It may simply mean that your system is waking up.
There are two natural pathways to explore this:
For sensory clarity, orientation, structural coherence.
For whole-system recalibration when the load is deeper than the foot itself.
If you’re curious:
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