Choose your soulmate like you'd choose your shoes. When it comes to your solemate, only one size is going to fit. If you're planning on having a kick ass life, you're going to have to search for some real kick ass shoes.
So there you are la-dee-da on the hunt for that perfect pair of shoes. Not just any shoes. The shoes. The ones that make you feel like yourself again, only elevated. You don’t exactly know what you’re looking for, but you’ll know it when you find it. You’re open to trying on as many pairs as it takes.
Now, don’t get it twisted, I’m not saying sleep with every shoe that smiles at you. I’m saying try them on for a size. Take them for a little coffee run. Feel them out. You’re not settling for anything less than what fits, what honors you, what makes you feel you. And you shouldn’t.
Anyway… WOAH. There they are.
The ones. The kind that stop time for a second. The kind that sparkle like they were handcrafted by angels with perfect taste. You pick them up, $2,260 Manolos, obviously not on sale - and the air shifts. There’s this halo glow around them, like a mist of moon dust. It feels divine.
You already know what this means. These shoes aren’t just expensive, they’ll cost you more than money. They’ll cost you something deeper. Your peace, your sense, your damn sanity. But your brain’s doing the math while your intuition’s already screaming, NO.
Like a full-blown siren between your ears - Step away, girl. STEP. AWAY.
But what do we do best?
We “shoed” it away. We turn down the volume on our instincts and crank up the fantasy. We convince ourselves this is different. That maybe, just maybe, this time the shoes will stretch, the blisters won’t hurt, and the price will somehow come down. Spoiler: it never does.
You slip one on. Oh, she’s tight. Painful, even. But damn, she looks good. You slip the other on and stand up. Instant transformation.
You strut. You catwalk. You feel ten feet tall. You toss your hair and catch your reflection - perfection.
Then you do the thing every woman does when she’s looking for outside validation: you glance around to see if anyone else noticed. That right there? Red flag numero uno. Because when you truly feel good, you don’t need to be seen, you just are. But in that moment, you ignore that too. You tell yourself it’s fine, that all new shoes take some breaking in, that pain is beauty, that maybe this is what love feels like, expensive and dizzying.
Until the seams start to cut, and the sparkle fades, and suddenly you’re bleeding through $2,260 worth of illusion. And that’s when it hits you. It was never about the shoes. It was about the woman who didn’t trust her own feet enough to walk away barefoot.
written by: Rebekah Garfunkel
Tiktok: @SheRoleModels
