Millions of individuals worldwide have a typical 9-5 desk job. While sitting behind a desk for the most part of the day, the sedentary nature of your employment may leave you feeling lethargic and unmotivated. While it may seem tedious at first to adopt the changes necessary to stay healthy while working a desk job, your efforts will soon pay off. When you feel healthy your productivity will naturally increase allowing you to concentrate for longer periods of time and you will feel happier.
Engaging in a healthy work lifestyle can also be utilized as a team-building exercise as you and your colleagues can take walking lunches together and share healthy recipes and dietary tips.
If your job requires you to sit behind a desk for the larger part of your day, you should take certain measures to ensure that your health isn’t severely compromised. While investing in a good-quality comfortable chair that offers support to vital areas of your spine is a good place to start, various other actions can be taken to keep you healthy at your desk.
Include exercise in your daily routine
Working exercise into your day at the office is a sure-fire way to ensure that you remain healthy while desk-bound. If your office is too far to walk to, consider getting off the train or bus a few stops earlier so that you walk more than you normally would. If you drive to work park a block or two further from your place of work than you usually do. Other ways to incorporate exercise into your working day are to take the stairs instead of the elevator or to do a couple of lunges or squats every time you go to the restroom.
Take walking lunches
Walking lunches are becoming increasingly popular among office-bound employees. Eat at your desk while you work beforehand or make sure you take a lunch that can be eaten ‘on-the-go’ while you walk. 30 minutes of brisk walking is more than enough to increase your heart-rate, giving it an important workout. Walking increases your serotonin and endorphin levels, making you happier and is also known to decrease your cholesterol levels as well as lower your blood pressure. Keep a pair of comfortable walking shoes in a drawer at your desk, pop in a headset if you are walking alone and take full advantage of the time you are allowed to leave your desk. Working and working out can go together!
Adjust your monitor
Staring at a screen for long periods of time every day can have a negative impact on your eyesight as well as cause computer vision syndrome (CVS) which include vision problems directly related to prolonged computer use. If you are forced to look at a screen for long periods of time try to adjust your monitor settings to avoid unnecessary strain on your eyes. The brightness of your screen should ideally match the lighting in your office. If a blank text document glows like a light source your monitor is too bright. Take every measure you can to lower blue light emission as much as possible.
Drink plenty of fluids
It’s easy to become dehydrated when you work behind a desk all day because subconsciously you might only relate liquid intake to physical activity. Regardless of whether you are physically active or sedentary, you need to drink approximately 8 glasses of water every day in order to stay healthy. Drinking enough water will also lead to more bathroom breaks which equates to extra steps being walked. If you have difficulty drinking water, try infusing it with your favorite fruit for added flavor.
You may feel like you are faced with a myriad of health-related obstacles when working predominantly behind a desk but there are plenty of choices you can make and actions you can take to ensure that your health never suffers as a result of your sedentary job. By making small changes to your daily routine you can improve your general health significantly even when sitting down for most of the day.
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