Walking Barefoot

(So this is the "This I Believe" project I ended up doing)

I know that sometimes shoes must cover my feet
There's sometimes someone the world wants me to be.
For example: a party and I must put on heels;
Don't get me wrong I love them, but it’s just not as real
As walking barefoot across the grass or the sand,
And I know that myself is exactly who I am.
No cover, no limit, no facade and no front
No "yes world" and "no world" - no "I'll be who you want."

When I go to the gym, I'm healthy, I wear tennies.
When I go to my job, I wear heels, I save pennies.
When I'm a daughter, I wear what fits the occasion.
When I'm a sister I borrow and lend with patience.
Yet barefoot I am me, I can stretch and let loose,
In that moment no persona or form I must choose.
It is in these moments that I believe
I can open my mind and my heart is set free.

Yes, it's true that walking barefoot through life
I'll cross different paths, some of joy some of strife.
The joy feels like carpet deep and so soft
And the strife feels like sharp gravel or rock.
Yet I yearn and I seek to walk only straight
To not veer from the course God's called me to take.
And walking straight I want to feel all that I may,
Of the hurt and the pain and the joy and the gain,
With no regret in those moments that I've walked my own way.

My bare feet may be dirty they may be scrubbed clean
But they're there to tell part of the story of me;
Of where I've been of what I've been through,
Of all that I've done and have still yet to do.
No shoe will cover that, if I can help it.
If I walk through it I want to have felt it.

I guess what I'm saying, the only way it can be put
Is that “I believe in walking through life barefoot."