In a post for the Harvard Business Review, Nilofer Merchant calls sitting “the smoking of our generation.” She writes:
As we work, we sit more than we do anything else. We’re averaging 9.3 hours a day, compared to 7.7 hours of sleeping. Sitting is so prevalent and so pervasive that we don’t even question how much we’re doing it. And, everyone else is doing it also, so it doesn’t even occur to us that it’s not okay. In that way, I’ve come to see that sitting is the smoking of our generation.
Of course, health studies conclude that people should sit less, and get up and move around. After 1 hour of sitting, the production of enzymes that burn fat declines by as much as 90%. Extended sitting slows the body’s metabolism affecting things like (good cholesterol) HDL levels in our bodies. Research shows that this lack of physical activity is directly tied to 6% of the impact for heart diseases, 7% for type 2 diabetes, and 10% for breast cancer, or colon cancer.
And the Mayo Clinic seconds those health concerns. If you sit a lot at work, here are five simple exercises you can do in the office every day to mitigate some of those dangerous effects.
To support a less sedentary workday, we’re also doing a day challenge: If you stand up at work for one hour a day between today and next Wednesday, Jan. 30, leave a comment on this post and you’ll be entered to win a prize! Pretty outSTANDing, huh?
I try to stand at work as often and as long as i can. when you sit for extended periods of time the muscles in your hips and lower back shorten and thats where you can get tight hips from and that leads to lower back pain. And i also stood For over an hour today!
During the day at work, instead of leaving things on the printer I get up every time I print something. It get me up, even though it’s for a short time it helps with the circulation in my body. It also clears up the amount of documents on the printer, which saves others from sortingthrough. Take the time, it a health a wellness benefit!
I converted my cube to a standing office back in August 2013. It was the best thing I could ever have done. I stand in my cube the entire day. I feel stronger, healthier and I am definitely more productive. I would never go back to sitting all day.
I wish we could have more stand up cubes. I would really like that and do it in a heartbeat because with someone with back problems it is very hard and not good to sit all day. I try to get up as much as possible but sometimes that just can’t be done.
Congrats to Julia Peters – she is the Stand Up winner! Julia wins a Starbucks gift card. Enjoy!