Making Sitting Less a Habit: Challenge 4
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themedalist
Posts: 3,212 Member
Theme: Exercise and Movement
Challenge: Making Sitting Less a Habit (Part 2)
Fourth Challenge: Up Every 30 Minutes
For our fourth and final challenge in this Sit Less series, let's focus on how long we spend sitting at any one time. Both the total amount of time we spend sitting and the duration we are sitting negatively impacts our health. Our last two challenges focused on this first piece, now let's concentrate on the second:
3. When you sit, make it a point to get up and stretch or move around for a couple of minutes every 30 minutes.
The trickiest part of this action is remembering to do it at first. Using natural breaks such as commercials or the end of a 30 minute TV show can help, as does setting an alarm or using a reminder to move app on your phone. With practice, I think you'll find yourself getting up automatically without any reminder. It will have become a habit.
Today's Challenge: Get up and move around for a few minutes after no more than 30 minutes of sitting. If it's not practical to get up and walk around, just standing up and stretching is a useful alternative.
Feedback Please: I would greatly appreciate hearing your comments and suggestions on this Sit Less series and how we might improve it. Thanks!
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Suggested Resources:
How to Stop Sitting Yourself to Death:
http://theconversation.com/how-to-stop-sitting-yourself-to-death-84425
Move Your App:
http://www.moveyourapp.net
(There are many reminders to move apps, this is the one I'm familiar with)
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Challenge: Making Sitting Less a Habit (Part 2)
Fourth Challenge: Up Every 30 Minutes
For our fourth and final challenge in this Sit Less series, let's focus on how long we spend sitting at any one time. Both the total amount of time we spend sitting and the duration we are sitting negatively impacts our health. Our last two challenges focused on this first piece, now let's concentrate on the second:
3. When you sit, make it a point to get up and stretch or move around for a couple of minutes every 30 minutes.
The trickiest part of this action is remembering to do it at first. Using natural breaks such as commercials or the end of a 30 minute TV show can help, as does setting an alarm or using a reminder to move app on your phone. With practice, I think you'll find yourself getting up automatically without any reminder. It will have become a habit.
To recap, here is a research-based framework for making Sitting Less and Moving More a lifestyle change. Three elements are important:
1. Find and implement changes in your daily routine that will result in you sitting less and moving more. Look for ways to do the things that you want or need to do, but modify them so that you are sitting less.
2. Look for opportunities to increase your step count and add more movement into your day. These opportunities may be sporadic and not part of your daily routine, but they happen with a frequency and regularity that makes them something you can count on and use to your advantage. By making your day a little harder, in the long run, you'll likely be making your life a lot easier.
3. When you sit, make it a point to get up and stretch or move around for a couple of minutes every 30 minutes.
Today's Challenge: Get up and move around for a few minutes after no more than 30 minutes of sitting. If it's not practical to get up and walk around, just standing up and stretching is a useful alternative.
Feedback Please: I would greatly appreciate hearing your comments and suggestions on this Sit Less series and how we might improve it. Thanks!
...............................................................................................
Suggested Resources:
How to Stop Sitting Yourself to Death:
http://theconversation.com/how-to-stop-sitting-yourself-to-death-84425
Move Your App:
http://www.moveyourapp.net
(There are many reminders to move apps, this is the one I'm familiar with)
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For those of you who are interested in other resources that can help continue to sit less, I have a Next Steps page on Quitting the Sitting that I think you'll find it useful:
http://www.quittingthesitting.org/next-steps.html
We also have a Facebook page you may want to join. Think of it as a friendly little twice a week reminder to sit less:
https://www.facebook.com/quittingthesitting
If you are interested in delving into habits further, Charles Duhigg's The Power of Habit is a fascinating read:
http://charlesduhigg.com/the-power-of-habit/
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Getting up every 30 minutes is quite challenging. I'll let you know how it goes.2
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I just joined, so this is my first challenge. As an office manager chained to my desk 8 am to 5 pm with over 2 hours of commuting each day this is truly something I need to be more mindful of. Thank you for the reminder- I'll do my best today to quit the sitting.4
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teepuppylove wrote: »I just joined, so this is my first challenge. As an office manager chained to my desk 8 am to 5 pm with over 2 hours of commuting each day this is truly something I need to be more mindful of. Thank you for the reminder- I'll do my best today to quit the sitting.
Welcome, @teepuppylove! I also spend a lot of time at my desk. One strategy that has helped me break up all the sitting is to stand up (and shift around a bit) when I proofread an email before hitting "send". I send a lot of emails so this has helped me up quite a bit.2 -
I’ve been trying to be more mindful of this lately. I set my Fitbit to vibrate 10 minutes to the hour to remind me to move around a bit. Workin a desk job is definitely a challenge and I’ve raised the question of my office investing in standing desks like other agencies in my state have. They’re always looking for ways to be more healthy so hopefully that suggestion doesn’t go unnoticed.3
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Setting a timer on my laptop, as I spend a lot of time working at home on computer... Great reminder! Getting up and getting a drink of water to increase my water intake at the same time
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jaenders06 wrote: »I’ve been trying to be more mindful of this lately. I set my Fitbit to vibrate 10 minutes to the hour to remind me to move around a bit. Workin a desk job is definitely a challenge and I’ve raised the question of my office investing in standing desks like other agencies in my state have. They’re always looking for ways to be more healthy so hopefully that suggestion doesn’t go unnoticed.
I hope your suggestion is considered, @jaenders06. There are lots of alternatives to the conventional desk and chair. I particularly like sit-stand desks since alternating between sitting, standing, and moving seems to be the best approach.
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Just read this now, I'd better get up and move a little! It's amazing how fast a half an hour flies by.2
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This is so much fun for me. Timers and reminders are helping me a lot.2
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Digital timers to remind me to change activities are my friend
(except for the little one on my desktop browser, that one is way too easy for me to ignore :blushing:).
I have just this past week begun to purposely attempt to become more aware of changing up my activities to give me a mix of sitting, standing/ walking, or activities using more active movement like cleaning, gardening, errands, exercising etc when possible.
In May I was focusing mostly on just the standing vs sitting aspect. But it is helping me more this time around when I began to think about 'standing more and sitting less' in a broader view, and to consider more activities, and how to include them into the equation of how I use my time. This is helping me to begin to think about how I order my day and my to-do lists, errands, paper work, as well as relaxing time like reading, screen time and so forth. I'm also looking at my sitting time as to whether it is sitting where I can put my feet up or feet down like at the table to eat. And what kind of surfaces i am walking or standing on at the time. Walking on a natural trail is easier on my feet/ legs than the concrete sidewalks. My linoleum floors are much harder on me than when I am in the yard or garden. And so on.
I started to think about such things while I was falling into the internet rabbit hole of reading various opposing opinions about sitting vs standing et,c etc, etc while ignoring the timer on my browser :noway:
:flowerforyou:2
