I was going through the Make Me Taller Forum recently and I came across a post by a member who is suggesting his own idea on how to renew the growth process using chondrocyte implants. The post is from this thread HERE. It seems that his method is to implant stem cells into the area of the closed growth plates and then get them to differentiate into chondrocytes after they are implanted. He is on the right track, and has been thinking over the science a little which is good and I would suggest that if he ever finds this website to join on board the team and help us and the other researchers in doing more scientific research. I’ve only really been getting into the research in the last 6 months. I don’t intend to make any real breakthroughs until I have gotten the basic science from medical school textbooks down. There is no point in making wild claims and ideas (although I do write posts about them) until we are sure the science is right and agrees with what is being observed in the research labs and medical clinics.

Sometimes I wish that more people who are interested in increasing their height would find this website and read the posts to see what other people are thinking about and coming up with. I personally know and DEFINITELY realize that I am NOT the only person who would like to be taller and probably has done some research at some point on the research and literature out there on what is possible. I am constantly searching all the corners of the internet to find new information and helpful resources and scientific articles which might give us another clue on how to push the endeavor further and make some real breakthroughs.

The guy is willing to think and come up with ideas as an alternative to limb lengthening which is what we are trying to do here. I have found in general that the people on the Make Me Taker Forum to be very one sided and only think that Limb Lengthening will be the only thing that will ever work or be reasonable. They are not that helpful and sort of close minded.

Mordred n00b Credibility 0 Gender:  Posts: 9 Artificial Puberty: A possible alternative to LL « on: January 07, 2013, 02:31:33 AM » Ever since I came across LL (while searching for ways to get taller), I’ve been thinking about alternative ways to boost height without going through this painful, salient process that changes you bodily proportions. So I conjured up a theoretical method for height increase which I call “artificial puberty”: The main obstacle to height increase is the closing of epiphyseal (growth) plates.  Your growth plates close because the cartilage (which is made up of cells called chondrocytes), age, die, and ultimately become replaced by real bone.  Estrogen accelerates this process. My proposal is to implant stem cells at the site of closed growth plates, tweaking them beforehand to differentiate into chondrocytes.  This will create “artificial growth plates,” allowing growth in height once more.  Okay, so now you can grow again, but we have yet another obstacle: human growth hormone secretion diminishes after puberty.  So solve this, just supplement the implants with safe amounts of HGH injections. So basically the two steps to artificial puberty are: 1.  “artificial growth plates” – chondrocyte implants 2.  “artificial growth” – SAFE amounts of HGH injections Assuming that this procedure is possible, it would offer a number of benefits lacking in LL: 1.  Keeps proportions intact – HGH makes every part of your body grow with opened growth plates 2.  Less painful – Pain isn’t a factor in my case, because I would do anything to grow taller, but this procedure definitely would be less painful. 3.  Less overt – You don’t have metal rods sticking out of your legs. 4.  You can (probably) walk/live a “normal” life while undergoing this procedure. With the stem cell technology boom, this type of procedure, or something like this anyways, will probably be feasible in less than 10 years.  Think about it; we’re already implanting stem cells in deaf/blind people so they can hear/see again.  Why can’t we do this?

In response we see posts like these….

Repelsteeltje MMT Member Credibility 1 Gender:  Posts: 119

Re: Artificial Puberty: A possible alternative to LL « Reply #8 on: January 07, 2013, 05:39:58 PM » I’ve seen studies and articles that are saying the same. There is much more possible than we think… However, as optimistic as I am if it comes to alternative treatments for height increase I don’t think we will ever get the change using a treatment like this. Also, lengthening your legs without having pain in the future is one thing and may be possible at some point. But to be in proportion you also need to lengthen your torso. And to be honest I don’t think this is ever going to happen. Of course very much is possible nowadays. But we have to be realistic.

Like the post before, I wanted to look at another idea, urban myth, or old wive’s tale. This one is about the connection between stunted growth and stunted growth.

I remember finding on many Yahoo Questions like Here, Here, Here, Here, and many many other internet boards and forums where one person asks this question and the others often ridicule,  joke, and say something. 

It seems that the general arguement made by anyone who really does believe this idea is that through masturbation, assuming a person is a teenage or adolescent male, it will lead them to ejaculate and lose semen, which contains hormones, specifically testosterone which is something you need to grow taller.

As we know from past research, having some relatively high level of testosterone is a good thing since testosterone will eventually aromatize into estrogen, which will be what causes the initial step in the endocrine system process which starts puberty and causes the “growth spurt” so many guys and girls experience around the 10-13 year range.

There is some evidence to show that good testosterone levels may have some positive correlation to being taller than average. If we remember from basic evolution, there are alpha males, and there are beta males. Alpha males are usually bigger, taller, and more aggressive than beta males. Alpha males also tend to have more sexual partners than beta males, and be more dominant and be leaders. They also have higher levels of testosterone.

However we also know that estrogen is also what will cause the eventual depletion of chondrocytes in the resting zone of the growth plate. The reason the growth plates really close is because at the end of puberty, there is a sort of 2nd wave of higher level of estrogen release into the body causing the last remaining chondrocytes to go through apoptosis and get the rest of the hyaline cartilage matrix to calcify and convert to bone matrix. From the PubMed study “Normal bone growth requires optimal estrogen levels: negative effects of both high and low dose estrogen on the number of growth plate chondrocytes.” I had porposed in a previous post “Alpha, Above Average Testosterone Males Are More Likely To Be Taller, An Endocrine Explanation” a hypothesis that the short stature male syndrome commonly called “Napoleon Complex” could be from a male who has too much testosterone in his system, with all the testosterone converting to estrogen and ending the growth process earlier than other men.

From this quick hormonal explanation, we can see that the scientific theory on the idea that masturbation would cause testosterone level to drop would not make any sense. What I am willing to propose, as a hypothetical is that there is a chance that at least occasional masturbation during the adolescent, teenage, still growing years might be actually beneficial for the growth process.

The first reason is that if the ejaculation process did cause any testosterone level, it would actually help a little in delay the eventual process of growth plate process, and increase the amount of time gor growth. Plus, masturbation does cause the release of good endorphins through the brain by the dopamine during orgasm. From source, “Dopamine-synthesising neurons that originate in the lower brainstem (specifically the ventral tegmental area) are activated during ejaculation in men, as measured by PET imaging (Holstege et al., 2003).”

Also…

Abundant evidence points to dopamine as the key neurotransmitter involved in stimulating orgasm in humans. Thus, administration of the dopamine precursor L-dopa, dopaminergic agonists (e.g. apomorphine), dopamine releasers (e.g. amphetamine), or dopamine reuptake inhibitors (e.g. cocaine or bupropion) facilitate the expression of orgasm in men and women. Conversely, administration of antipsychotics impair orgasm, by blocking postsynaptic dopamine receptors (see Komisaruk et al., 2006).

It would seem that L-Dopa is the precursor to Dopamine. We saw from previous like “Increase Height And Grow Taller Eating Mucuna Pruriens Or Velvet Bean“with L-Dopa, which is Levadopa, that it can cause human growth hormone (hGH) release. 

We CAN”T show this process: Masturbation–>Orgasm–>Dopamine–>L-Dopa–>increased hGH released –> increased height

The actual process direction is L-Dopa–>Dopamine.

What we can prove with the research and knowledge we do know that is people who are still growing who go through a lot of stress and anxiety does cause them to develop stunted growth. From PubMed study “Stress response in school-age children who have been growth retarded since early childhood.” there is a weak but positive correlation between stunted growth and psychological issues, although it could be more likely that stunted growth leads to psychological issues, not that psychological issues leads to stunted growth. There are however a few articles that was written in the mid 90s that I’ve found which suggest that extreme stress in the childhood years while still in physical development can lead to development issues not just emotionally and mentally but also physically. There have been quite a times that young adults or teenagers who ask this question of whether their psychological damage from some type of abuse in their childhood can lead to stunted physical growth like HERE. What we know from orginary medical science is that stress does cause the increase in cortisol levels. Cortisol is a steroid hormone, more specifically a glucocorticoid (source is Wikipedia). I have found multiple PubMed studies which show that glucocorticoids in general have been used to even inhibit the growth of exceptionally tall adolescent girls.

From the article “Editorial: Inhibitory Actions of Glucocorticoids on Skeletal Growth. Is Local Insulin-Like Growth Factor I to Blame?“…

Glucocorticoids have profound effects on the skeleton due to their actions on the cells of bone and cartilage. The consequences of these effects have serious clinical implications, and glucocorticoids cause osteoporosis and impaired longitudinal growth.

Unfortunately, most of the skeletal effects following chronic exposure to glucocorticoids result in decreased skeletal mass and short stature (2, 3, 4).

This shows a direct connection between constant high levels of stress and stunted growth and short stature.

If we go back to the issue of masturbation again, we understand that masturbation leads to orgasm, which causes a release of dopamine neurotransmitters to the brain. After most orgasms in general and the release of semen, stress levels in men drop dramatically. This shows that in an indirect way, masturbation can at least lead to reduced levels of stress in young, adolescent males who have high levels of hormones in their bodies driving them crazy, causing possible stress and anxiety.

In conclusion, masturbation will NOT lead to stunted growth. Masturbation may not cause height increase, but it may actually HELP PREVENT stunted growth from the excess increased levels of glucocorticoids caused by stress from the increased hormone levels in young males going through puberty. 

I remember getting a message in the website email inbox where a person asked why is it that his friend who has been living a really unhealthy lifestyle like smoking profusely and drinking a lot at his formative growing years still end up being 6′ 4″ where he would be eating right and staying away from drugs only ended up 5′ 9″. He was incredulous over the fact that he felt it was so unfair that his friend would be so much taller for doing the wrong things and still be better off in terms of height.

This got me to wonder whether the claim that “smoking causes stunted growth” to be true or not. So I wanted to spent some energy in this post and do some research to see whether smoking would really cause stunted growth. Before on this website, I had looked at the age old claim and “old mother’s tale” that “drinking milk will help you grow taller” with “The Real Correlation Between Milk, Calcium, Bone Growth, And Height“and whether “drinking coffee stunts your growth” with “Does Coffee And Caffeine Stunt Your Growth?” This post is for the smoking claim.

Analysis: First, we have heard many times over from “studies” that for mothers of the person being analyzed, that the babies of mothers who do smoke are on average less in weight than babies of mother’s who don’t smoke. If we rememberr our conjecture that often the height of a person can be determined by their initial birth size. Most people in general go through a similar growing pattern and growing rate. It just so happens that many giants who were genetically predisposed to being tall were born from bigger, taller mothers who had wider hips (The wider hips to taller eventually babies theory is proposed by me) would be able to hold a bigger baby in their womb/ uterus before they give birth giving the person a greater initial amount of mass, volume, and number of cells to proliferate than other people. This was the case with Yao Ming and Karan Singh who both were born at tremendous sizes. They went through a similar growth rate pattern in their developing years like everyone else, except that their initial size at birth was much bigger than other people. So by converse logic, we can say that at least for the case for smoking effecting a person’s size and height before they are born, there is a high correlation and chance that smoking will cause them to be stunted in overal eventual height. From the website HealthGuidance.com, the theory is this…

Smoking will not affect the pituitary glands which produce the hormones necessary for growth, but however it does result in an increase in carbon monoxide in the blood. This then in turn means that the blood has a lower concentration of oxygen and of the other things that it needs to build and repair tissue such as minerals and vitamins. What this then means is that when an area needs protein or other nutrients to grow, it will not be supplied with them as quickly or in such high quantities and quality. This may then mean that that function of the body is not carried out at all, or just that it is not carried out well.

At the same time smoking may result in lower amounts of testosterone – the hormone involved in building muscle, growing hair, and burning fat. This hormone is also involved in growth as it is an anabolic hormone that tells the body when to build tissue.

I would continue to find form other websites liks LiveStrong.com that smoking does cause some stunting by around 1 inch of height. They state…

In a previous post “Review On Supplement Double Action V Growth Enhancer Supplement, Gain Height and Taller” I had reviewed a product I had found being sold on Ebay as a dietary supplement which can supposedly help people increase their height but on average around 10 cm even in their 20-30s. I did a slightly lengthy review on it, but it seems that the seller, a hi-hawaii is selling also another height increasing dietary supplement product, this one called “Catwalk Growth Enhancer Supplement, 300 mg x 60 Tablets/Bottle, Gain Height & Taller”

What I will do for this post is similar but I will focus more on looking at the active ingredients listed so see if there is any potential. These are the ingredients the sellers claim are in the pill, something called “Cat Walk“. The name makes me think that its intended purpose is to make the legs longer for females who are probably trying to be or are models.

Ingredients: Maltose, dextrin, dolomite, shark cartilage extract, at the end Sansounin, olive leaf extract, Nokogiriyashiekisu, L-ornithine, L-citrulline, black pepper extract, cellulose, sucrose fatty acid ester, silicon dioxide, particulate, V. C, glycine, niacin, L-leucine, V. E, calcium pantothenate, L-valine, L-isoleucine, V. B2, V. B1, V. B6, V. A, folate, V. D, V. B12

Analysis: This analysis is only on the ingredients. In the previous post I sort of went over the issues I had with the seller of this product. The bottle is $65 for 1 bottle and $180 for 3 bottles. Some of the ingredients I have never seen before and some I have. The L-ornithine, L-Leucine, and glycine I remember are amino acids which are just basic building blocks of proteins. Others like silison dioxide I had seen before from my research into whether Silicea and Baryta Carbonica have any potential to increase height long ago. Niacin is Vitamin B3 and there has been a lot of controversy over this compound due to other people’s research before me. It seems however that a lot of the other ingredients are just different types of vitamins which can be found from a multivitamin like a Centrum Silver. I know that maltose is a type of basic sugar and that dolomite is a type of stone, made of Calcium Magnesium Carbonate, apparently (Wikipedia). It has no claimed medicinal or cosmetic applications. The shark cartilage extract is interesting since shark cartilage has been reported to help cure cancer and may increased the collagen level in a person’s body very little. black pepper extract is something that can be good for either reducing or causing inflammation. Other compounds like Nokogirihashiekisu is really hard to find any english based resources to see what it is, but a quick search on google suggest that it is some type of extract from a plant. This is also the case with Sansounin. These two I have no idea what they do. From just doing a very short outline guess at the applications and properties of the ingredients, I would say the supplement being sold is little more than a multivitamin combined with a few extracts from japanese plant extracts. I extremely doubt it would even help young children who are still growing increase their growth rate or ultimate height. There is even a chance that making a human swallow dolomite could cause them to develop pathologies and medical conditions, like kidney stones. Just stay away from this Ebay product since there is almost zero chance it will do anything.

Here is a picture at the bottom of the sales page which supposedly shows a Japanese man who grew upwards of 20 cms (almost 8 inches) from taking this supplement.

My Opinion: I want to say that this picture is one of the worst ways to prove that the supplement is effective. It is a sideways view shot of an asian looking man who on the right appears to be taller. There is so many ways for the seller or graphic artist to digitally edit the photo that this one picture is never enough to prove that such a thing does work. It could be that the two people in the two pictures are two different people, who happen to have close or similar side pictures. Or the picture was photoshopped, edited. or the angle of the picture was changed and moved closer to the person, to make the same person on the left look bigger in the right picture. If I was to guess, I’d say that the two pictures are of two different men.

I have NEVER heard of any supplement ever claim that they can make a 28 year old man grow taller, especially by 20 cms. The Japanese or whoever is selling this supplement are very outrageous and arrogant to claim that such a product even exist.

Further on, we would see pictures of another female who supposed grew taller by over 10 cms in 1 month, but of course the two pictures are of the back of a woman’s head. Really???

There is one picture at the bottom of the page in Japanese which might try at least to explain why the supplement has a chance of working but I personally can’t read Japanese so I am not sure.

From the page on Ebay selling this product, in the Description section…

Catwalk Growth Enhancer Supplement, Gain Height and Taller

18g/Bottle (300mgx60 Tablets)

Expiry Date: 2014

Suitable for someone who are serious about wanting to gain your height, it is special for long legs.

Ingredients:

Maltose, dextrin, dolomite, shark cartilage extract, at the end Sansounin, olive leaf extract, Nokogiriyashiekisu, L-ornithine, L-citrulline,black pepper extract, cellulose, sucrose fatty acid ester, silicon dioxide, particulate, V. C, glycine, niacin, L-leucine, V. E, calcium pantothenate, L-valine, L-isoleucine, V. B2, V. B1, V. B6, V. A, folate, V. D, V. B12

How to use :Take 2-6 tables a day before bed time. (with warm water). Should start with small quantity at first and increase it.

Quantity to see result :

10-19 years old = 1-2 bottles
20-29 years old = 2-3 bottles
30-39 years old = 3-4 bottles
40-49 years old = 4-5 bottles
50-59 years old = 5-6 bottles

Recommend: Sleep before 11p.m.

Exercises like basketball, jogging, jumping,swiming, pilates,yoga,pilates, stretching every day.

Keeping Condition : Avoid sun light,away from children and keep in dry area.

Please avoid for who get allergy from ingredients or when you pregnant or during feeding.

This is samples of people who took this supplement but please consider that how height can you grow, it depends on each indiviual person.

When I was writing the previous post confessing that I still am wearing shoes, boots specifically, with multiple insoles inside to make myself feel and look taller, I started to really stop and think about why I am still doing these things.

I had stated before that I was relatively comfortable and accepting of my height before on the site, so why do my actions not reflect that? Maybe the right way of expressing this issue is that I am not as obsessed or extreme in my height increase desire like I was years before. Back then, during a 4-6 month stretch of time, I only wanted to achieve one thing, and that was to grow taller, or at least get to the 6′ 0″ mark, which was only 1/4th of an inch away. Through intense exercise I did reach that goal,

However, I still am searching for such a solution, and willing to dedicate many years of my life to this cause, even if it turns out that there is nothing I can do that would work.

I think back in my life and wonder whether my obsession with height is not the cause, but an effect of something else, a deeper and more painful insecurity or anxiety which I am not willing to admit to myself at this point in my life and development. I know that for me, I never cared about becoming taller until I was in my early 20s, around the age of 22 to be exact. It started out small when I noticed that I was shorter than most of the other men in my swimming class. It slowly over time grew into a full blown obsession with me trying to read everything and research everything I could find.

I have studied some basic psychology and I know that if I was to be my own therapist and try to diagnose myself, I can objectively claim that I have an unhealthy focus or obsession over an area of my life which can’t really be changed. Then again, that is the opinion of a 40 year old medical school trained professional who is rich, successful, stable, and has a bright future.

I wrote in a previous post opening up further about my past, and the pain I felt. I had stated that because of me getting left by the my first love, I would go through several intense tramatic psychopathological breakdowns. Along with the seperation were two other even darker aspects of the breakup which really drove me even crazier than if this was an ordinary breakup/dumping. I have heard many, many stories of men/husbands going crazy and lossing their sanity after their grilfriends/wives suddenly leave them after being with them for many years.  I would feel extreme anger, depression, regret, fear, etc. and in the end, I had decided that I had to do everything that I had ever been secretly desiring to do. One of my goals was always to create this type of resource for everyone else in the world. I would go on to tell a friend who is on the short side that I wanted to dedicate my life to researching and finding to this problem. He was very supportive and happy that someone like me would be willing to put in the effort to do this since he also wanted to be taller. This is my first and only guess, my renewed fervor over height increase is my way of overcompensating for the fact that I am depressed and angry that “love” was taken away from me. At some area in my mind I think that I am a bad person or a person who never deserved to get the type of love I (and almost everyone else) so desperately crave. 

An amazing insight Anthony Robbins said once was that there is two very fundamental fears we have which we would do almost anything to avoid, displace, or repress. They are…

• We are afraid that we would not be loved or accepted by other people – We are afraid that love will be taken away from us. We are afraid of getting rejected, getting hurt, or not being loved back.

• We are afraid that we are not enough – That we are not good enough, good looking enough, smart enough to have the type of love, success, money that one part of us really desire and the other side is trying to resist and reject. We are being torn up inside over conflicting desires and emotional forces.

The problem seems to be more than just me. At home, my family members and relatives are still comparing height with each other, even though everyone has stopped growing. For my entire family, height has always been a sensitive issue, which I has wrote about in previous posts. From what I can see, all of this comparing to others to see who is taller, smarter, better, etc. is a way to make ourselves have a valid or real reason to love ourselves. I don’t think that I can really completely love myself.

If I was asked by another person “Do you love yourself?” I would have to say no. I am not who I wanted to be, not who I hoped I would already be. I feel like I am lacking in soooooo many areas of life.

When I was going through a phase in my life years ago where I was learning about the dynamics of male-female relationships, there was one question that was posed to see whether a person was truly ready to be in a relationship after being so shy and afraid. It it “If you are a girl/boy, would you date yourself?”. At this point, I would say “no”. I don’t really love myself. I feel like I am not good enough, or deserve to gain the success or wealthy I do have. There is an amazing amount of guilt I carry and i am not sure why I can’t seem to let that feeling of guilt go.

So my basic question that I was asking myself since yesterday was this “What really caused this obsession to surface? What was the initial trigger that started this entire process?”

The more I think about it the less it makes sense from an objective point of view. I am average height of a US male, maybe even slightly taller. Some people in my family even say that I am “tall” which is a label that I have ben extremely careful never to use to describe myself. This problem with feeling insecure about my height never bothered me when I was younger, and I was comfortable with being average height. What happened? What caused all of this?

Why do I every day when I walk along the street have to be constantly comparing myself to other people in height, and nothing else. It doesn’t matter that if they were dressed in suits and I was dressed in sweats, if I was taller than them I felt good about myself, and if I was shorter than them, I felt bad about my self. Can a person’s self of confidence or self be so much linked to one’s size? Is there no other barometer I can use to measure my worth or value as a human being?

At this point, I realize that I am not perceptive and aware enough about myself to be able to answer this question on what really caused this thing to develop. I do think now that my constant over-emphasize on size and height is most definitely either a distraction or expression of a repressed anxiety or insecurity. I think that ultimately, if I dug deep enough inside of me, the real core of all of my insecurities, the cause for my insecurity of my height, is from something else.

The most common stated answer is that I am acting out of fear. I am afraid of something and my way of dealing with this internal anxiety is to try to control something else, displacement, and not ever being able to be honest with my subconscious mind and deal with what is really giving me internal pain.

When I try to answer this question of the post “Can Our Desire For Height Or Height Dissatisfaction Be A Symptom Of A Deeper Insecurity Or Unresolved Issue From Our Past?” I think that this issue is something that is from my past which is from something deeper, and I can only make a guess but I still don’t know what would be the real original cause for this issue.

At some level, this website/blog has been my way of expressing some of my deepest insecurities on my own height issues for so long. And here is another confession I wanted to reveal to the readers. I am partly ashamed to reveal it but I think it has to be done since I finally feel like I can be more open about these thing.

To this day, I still wear boots with padded height increasing insoles inside because I am still insecure about my height. In the beginning I tried stuffing 2-3 insoles into sneakers 1-2 sizes bigger than what I would wear so my feet would fit. Each insole was only about 1/3 of an inch thick. It doesn’t seem like a lot but for me, even 1 inch felt like a huge difference to me when I would be walking outside in public. I know personally a 5′ 4″ guy who must always wear his New Rocks Boots which gives him also 3 inches of height.

At this point, I feel comfortable with myself enough to actually enjoy wearing  these types of insoles and boots. They give me a comforting feeling when I put them on, and they make me feel safe and secure because of how strong and durable the boots are.

These days I put either 4 or 5 insoles inside to give me maybe around 1.5 extra inches into the shoes. In addition to the around 1 1/2 inches of heel height already in boots, that means that I am standing on 3 inch tall boots, which overall is actually comfortable, and easy to walk in. I have gone down in number to just 4 insoles in recent months because I tried out thicker socks. It turns out that there is actually some brands of really thick socks I have found which seems to make the insoles less important. I have even experimented with using even less insoles numbers with brand named dress shoes for a more classic look. If this talk sounds like the speech of a man obsessed or crazy, I am willing to admit that I am a little crazy about my height and height increase.

On one extreme, years ago I tried hiking boots with really thick heels, about 2 inches thick, and put multiple insoles (around 6-7)  in to see how they felt that was really awkward and dangerous so I reduced the height to something that I could walk and even run in. I would be standing 4 inches taller but I looked so strange when I walked in them so that phase went away.

The shoes that I have been wearing for over 4 years now, which I haven’t changed because they easily and rather comfortably fulfills all of my needs. It is Steel Toe Hiking Boots from Walmart. About 5 years ago they cost only about $27 plus tax but these days due to inflation it has increased  to around $34 plus tax. I like these shoes because of the high outer edges. With some shoes, when you add the thick insoles, it leaves no room for one’s feet or the feet slip out. The shoe sizes I buy is around 3-4 sizes bigger than the ordinary size. However, I really feel great with the extra 1-2 inches of extra height, the strong steel toes, the quality of the boots, and sturdiness of the heel.

Maybe one day I will be completely comfortable with me just wearing shoes (or even sandals) without any type of padding. But not right now, I like the extra height the boots with insoles give me.