Try this simple tip to stay healthier and younger
There has been a lot of research in recent years around the harm of sitting for long periods of time. While exercise is super important for our health, sedentary behaviour (sitting down too much) is actually known to be an independent risk factor for poor health, regardless of how much exercise you do!!
Higher levels of sedentary behaviour (sitting for long periods of time) increases the risk of all-cause mortality, dying from cardiovascular disease and cancer, and the risk of developing cardiovascular disease, cancer and type-2 diabetes.
The dangers seem to be around long continuous periods of sitting still ie at a desk all day, and breaking this up can be an effective way to reduce this risk, in addition to also getting regular exercise for the rest of your health and wellbeing.
Unfortunately, many of us have sedentary (sitting) jobs, especially with the explosion of digital or online work
Fortunately, there are a few simple ways to reduce the effect of this on our health.
These are:
✔️try to limit screen time outside of work (it’s recommended to spend no more than 2 hours per day on recreational screen time)
✔️Try a standing desk if this is an option
✔️Take frequent breaks to move, a useful technique is setting a timer to get up and move every 30 minutes for a minute, then every 2 hours move around for 5 minutes. Every 4 hours try get more movement in ie go for a brief walk
✔️Short bursts of high intensity movement can also be great, ie doing 30 seconds of squats, lunges, star jumps etc in breaks. You can alternate these throughout the day to move different parts of your body
✔️Try get incidental exercise wherever you can, and get creative! Some examples are walking to /from work (or park the car a few blocks away then walk), using stairs rather than elevator, walking to do errands rather than drive, or offering to do the coffee order run. Even moving your dash further away from the photocopier can help get some extra steps - it all adds up!
Step counters or fitness trackers can also be a great tool for this, as they track how much you move during the day, and be a good motivator to boost your movement. Every little bit counts - try it and notice the difference 😉
https://www.who.int/publications/i/item/9789240015128