Your Job is the newest public health epidemic
As a physician I find myself sometimes sitting for long periods of time behind my desk working and I know it is bad for me. This seems to be a growing epidemic. Many physicians and even the AMA are taking note that long periods of sitting are bad for your health. As our jobs move more away from manual labor and more towards sitting in front of computers our health is taking a toll for this. A journal article out of Australia even postulated that sitting for an hour watching television takes 22 minutes off your life. That's almost double what they say cigarette smoking takes off your life per cigarette!
This is a huge problem as our society becomes more sedentary due to jobs and just us being plain lazy. As we marvel at our technological wonders and see it as making our lives easier for ourselves we are also hurting ourselves. Granted we no longer have to work long hours in factories or on farms, but we have gained this ease in work life at the cost of our health. I am not saying that if we work longer harder hours we will be healthier I am saying that by moving our jobs to less manual labor and more sedentary labor we have unwittingly done it at the cost of our own health. Even in graduate school we had a professor who helped in a research study with the World Health Organization and they found that sitting for longer than 50 minutes increased the likely hood of having back pain in your life. They also did biomechanincal studies and found out that while sitting you put the most amount of pressure on your spine. I am not suggesting we give up what has helped us advance in
It is very easy to help yourself get movement every day and while getting in this extra movement you will also be doing a little exercise too which will be helpful to your body. Instead of the elevator take the stairs. While sitting at your desk at work get up every hour and walk the perimeter of the office before going back to your seat. Even if you just stand up from your work station and do a few minutes of stretching and bending you will help yourself immensely. Anytime you go to the store, mall, or anywhere with a parking lot go ahead pick the furthermost spot you can find to park in away from the entrance. And start out slowly, if you work on the upper floors of large office building get off one or two floors below yours and then take the stairs. Each month add a flight until you reach a goal of always taking the stairs. Each month increase the distance you park away from store entrances. Not only will you add movement to your life you will inevitably be adding exercise into your daily life. Adding movement to your daily life is easy and will be rewording.
Remember movement is the key to life.
As with Newton's laws of physics a body in motion will stay in motion a body at rest will stay at rest. Your body is the same way if you keep it in motion you will always be in motion(active/healthy). Stay are rest and your body will become unhealthy and keep you at rest(not active/sick).
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