One very important measurement that determines whether a pair of heels will be comfortable or not is the pitch of the insole, or the steepness of the ramp inside the high heel shoes. The steepness of the ramp varies with shoe size, even if the height of the heel is held constant and the style of the shoe is exaclty the same. If your model friend has size ten feet and you have size seven feet and you both want to wear the same style and heel height shoe (and both of you have normal feet) you will for sure suffer more pain. And it's not (at least not mostly) because your model friend is used to walking in heels!.
A high heel shoe style with for example a three inch heel that fits properly with at least 1/4 to 1/2 inch of wiggle room in front of the longest toe, will fit a person with a bigger foot such as a size ten much more comfortably – ceteris paribus or all other things being equal – than a person with a size seven foot. This is because the pitch is much steeper the smaller and shorter the shoe, if heel height is held constant.
The pitch of the insole of a high heel shoe is the top side of a triangle formed by the points of the mid ball of the foot , the wearer’s heel, and the spike of the shoe heel. If the distance from the ball of the foot to the spike of the heel is for example 3 1/4 inches in the size 7 shoe, and 4 1/4 inches in the size 10 shoe it is obvious that the slope(from the ball of the foot to the wearers’ heel) in the longer shoe will be less steep.
Thus models, who tend to be close to six feet tall and have correspondingly larger feet will nearly always be able to walk in high heels much more comfortably than ‘ regular gals’ with smaller feet. Models have a huge advantage of more comfort in heels by having a less steep pitch that forces the foot to slide forward in heels. Unfortunately gravity affects everyone - even models, however the force of gravity is greater the steeper the ptich, which is why many women with heels need to wear inserts to stop the foot from sliding forward in heels and counter the effect of gravity.
An Alexander Wang Elise Studded Pump is the high heel shoe illustration