"Stand up if you want to live longer."
That's the message from the University of Sydney's School of Public Health, where over 200,000 people were studied by Dr Hidde van der Ploeg along with David Dunstan of the Baker IDI Heart and Diabetes Institute in Melbourne. Their study found that "adults who sat for more than 11 hours a day had a 40 per cent increased risk of dying in the next three years compared with those who sat for fewer than four hours."
Even the people who "sat for between eight and eleven hours a day had a 15 per cent risk of dying
compared to those seated for fewer than four hours a day." The risk "remained after taking into account physical activity, weight and general health," and both advocated "morning walks" "trips to the gym" but warned that even being active during short periods of the day wouldn't necessarily help counter the effects of prolonged sitting. "For many adults, sitting is the predominant stance."
If this is correct for a large number of "normal" people, how much more relevant is it for writers?(excuse the levity.) How easy is it for us to sit down for a six to eight hours in a day? Remember, this isn't just the time sat at our work tops. It is cumulative and as we'll see later short periods of activity are sometimes insufficient.
So we have to look first at the people who everyone would say fits into this category. The elderly, the sick, the unemployed. What about our children who are ferried to school, sit at a desk, let off games and spend breaks sitting at a computer. They are ferried home and, even if they're conscientious , sit at homework. There are the university students who's day may consist of a five minute walk to lectures, lunch sitting in a cafeteria (or worse) and then a five minute walk home to sit at their computer.
We can move up the age range to adults who work in offices where the work is based entirely around a computer. Again they begin the day with a car journey and a short walk to their desk. It's even possible that the lunch breaks are taken at the workstation and meeting held within a minutes walk. The car journey home is followed by three to four hours relaxing in front of the television, perhaps. I'm reminded of a TV advert over here about a thrusting office type who spends all day in meetings and writing reports until he looks drained and exhausted, and then he drives home in his brand new car. Does that remind you of your day? The problem is that when he's driving, when he's looking relaxed and smiling, the roads are completely empty, not a car in sight. Does that represent your day?
The study included out of work periods of exercise so even the people who believe that their fitness visits make up for their workplace posture can be deluding themselves.
At Balance Health and Fitness the best testimonial we have ever received was from a client who said that " with Ernie we never do any exercise I couldn't do myself. But I wouldn't do it. I pay Ernie to knock on my door and drag me away from my computer." I know through a Facebook Chat I hosted with Suzanne Leiurance of The Working Writer's Club that most of the people on the chat talked of getting outdoors regularly for walks. Lets all follow their lead and "get fit to write." We have a regular programme entitled "Learn How To Stop Work Killing You." Which is taken into offices and homes to make sure clients balance their work with their lives.
No comments:
Post a Comment