NEAT Improvement Strategies to Improve Weight Loss
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How are folx increasing they're neat during coronavirus0
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I know several extrovert-type friends who are using the "social down time" to check off things on their "do all the round the house puttering" lists. Turning out closets, switching up photos on the walls (painting rooms if local reno/DIY stores still open or delivering). That kind of thing3
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It was mentioned earlier in the thread (by someone else), but I'm restarting the "set a timer" approach for a while.
It's easy to get dug down into MFP forum, Pinterest, whatever, so I'm setting a timer when I sit down . . . a timer built into my stove, so I have to get up at least to turn it off, or it keeps yeeping at me indefinitely. I do try to make a conscious decision to shift gears and do something more active once I'm up, though; then set the timer before sitting down again.
Pavlov's li'l ol' lady.
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We're allowed out once a day for exercise, so I go for an early morning walk in the timeframe that I'd normally be commuting. But that doesn't even come close to offsetting the time I'd normally spend in the gym.
I've also started clearing paperwork and, once I really get going, will be walking back and forth putting financial statements into one pile on the floor, utility stuff into another pile, pensions papers into another etc. Back and forth between the initial pile on the table and the separated piles on the floor should add up to quite a few steps. Once my filing is up straight (I've got a huge backlog so this may take a while!), I plan to turn my attention to clothes, shoes etc. Trying on clothes that are almost certainly too big for me now will be interesting (and involve moving). I think a lot of charity shops will ultimately benefit from this period.
However, not being in the office means there's no constant supply of cakes, chocolates and other treats so I'm not eating as much, which is a huge help.6 -
@Strudders67, are you eventually going to file the papers or shred them?
(I am doing a lot of pacing around my living room. 😞)4 -
moogie_fit wrote: »How are folx increasing they're neat during coronavirus
I've been putting my laptop on the counter and marching/dancing in place while online. I'm walking around to get in extra steps doing stuff like using the back bathroom, taking one pile of laundry to my room at a time, not procrastinating, cleaning and decluttering, putting on funky music while doing chores and dancing, and gardening. I've been doing a lot of workout videos on YouTube to make up for the gym.
I've only had my Fitbit for a month, I knew I fidgeted a lot but I have a rocking loveseat and tend to rock, my Fitbit logged 10,000 steps while I watched a movie, I do it way more than I thought!4 -
@SaraKim17, probably about 50% will need to be filed and 50% will be shredded/binned/composted. But in the stacks of papers dotted around there are newspapers where I turned down a corner of a page because there was something to do / read / visit that interested me, flyers for events and almost certainly post that hasn't been opened. I'm so far behind that any exhibitions etc will have long passed. I'll be very disappointed if this period of lock-down ends and my filing isn't up straight.2
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at one point on Friday, while waiting for my lunch to finish in the microwave, I held onto the kitchen since and bounced in place. Another time, I did a few jumping jacks, and still another time, I walked loops around the house - the cats thought I was crazy
When the weather is nice, I take at least a 30 minute walk, and lately, I've tried to push it to an hour. If the weather isn't nice, then I shoot for 30-45 minutes on my elliptical at home. Not as efficient as walking since its a cheap elliptical, but it still has me moving, at least.
But I did notice a sharp reduction in my step count during the day. When i'm in the office, I can average around 1500 calories during the work day just walking to the printer, the bathroom, the break room, etc. And thats from working in a smaller building and being sedentary most of the day at my desk! but the first day I worked from home, I barely got 400 steps in before the end of the day. That day required a very long elliptical session......
I'm going to try next week to get up a little earlier and hit the elliptical before I log in for the day, especially as next week is not going to be very nice weatherwise. And I've been looking up beginner aerobic videos on Youtube and beginner body weight routines. I came across one from Nerdfitness - can anyone vouch for their stuff?4 -
I am working from home during the coronavirus pandemic and I turn on my music and while at my desk, I do seated marching and foot movement to the beat of the music. Since my office is in the basement, I walk up the stairs to fill up my water and go to the bathroom even though I have a bathroom and kitchen in the basement.
When I am at the office, whenever I have to leave my office, I walk the long way to and from wherever I need to go and take two 20 minute walks. I usually am able to get around 13,000 steps while at work.8 -
bump - much needed for ideas with people stuck at home ...
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@Strudders67, thanks for responding!
Yard work is helping these days: weeding, picking up sticks and pinecones, pulling ivy, trimming shrubs, etc. The time outside is nice too.
Lots of pacing while talking on the phone.
Taking more trips than necessary up and down two flights of stairs while doing the laundry.4 -
Glad to see folks are still (or again?
) working on NEAT improvements: Doing what we're able, focusing on what we can control and can do, then doing it, is a great strategy in both physical and psychological realms.
Exercising control, where we sensibly can without obsessing, is a good way to stay a steady course when uncontrollable factors are challenging, IMO.
Thrive on, NEAT-increasers! :flowerforyou:8 -
I have been working from home since the lock down, sitting nearly 10hrs a day, just bought a excercise ball to use as a chair, bouncing up and down majority of the day, has anyone used them, and do they help?5
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I have been working from home since the lock down, sitting nearly 10hrs a day, just bought a excercise ball to use as a chair, bouncing up and down majority of the day, has anyone used them, and do they help?
Help what?
Increase calorie burn? Doubtless will, a bit, but may be hard to figure out by how much (even with a fitness tracker, since who knows whether they'd pick that up sensibly).
Improve core strength? Possibly . . . but attention to posture is important, or it can aggravate back problems. (I was sitting on one for banjo practice for a while, but I couldn't pay attention to both, so it was better for my back to separate them.)
They're great for lots of exercises, not just sitting. If you haven't, check out some YouTube videos. Ball roll-outs are fun, you can use them for some strength exercises (but be careful, start with ultra light weight!) to challenge core/balance while doing the strength moves), and more. Nice for some stretches, too. It should be a good, useful, versatile purchase, whether it works out as a chair-substitute in your individual case or not.
Best wishes!3 -
I have been working from home since the lock down, sitting nearly 10hrs a day, just bought a excercise ball to use as a chair, bouncing up and down majority of the day, has anyone used them, and do they help?
I love bouncing on my ball. It definitely picks up bounces as steps on my fitbit. It also picks up the active minutes if I continue for more than 10 minutes.
I can tell you that it has also really helped improve my core muscles. I am way more steady on the ball now. However, I also started doing a 15 minute pilates workout 3-5 days a week. It makes a huge difference. Plus it is a lot of fun to bounce.3 -
Singing and dancing to any music, do all the kitchen stuff old school, clean / tidy house every morning and evening, ironing a lot, constantly reorganizing things (reorganized my other half’s shoes whilst sleepwalking once), always carry all shopping since we are required to use our own grocery bags - never get a cart, do random calisthenics throughout the day, good old fashioned work - help friends out with their yards, shopping, etc., basically unless I’m sleeping - I’m moving.5
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bump1
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These all seem to be good ideas to me I need to implement them now as I realised I sit most of the day if I’m not doing my morning exercise.3
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Very helpful thread!
Getting my first Fitbit several years ago taught me the benefits of being inefficient with tasks around the house and yard, just trying to get in as many steps as possible.
We had a senior pug that never learned how to "ask" to go out, so I made it a habit of taking her out every two or three hours all day long so she could have plenty of bathroom breaks. We'd usually walk once around the yard each time, which is about 200-250 steps.
After she died, I noticed a sudden big decrease in the amount of steps I was getting, just by no longer doing that little walk around the yard several times a day.4 -
It was mentioned earlier in the thread (by someone else), but I'm restarting the "set a timer" approach for a while.
It's easy to get dug down into MFP forum, Pinterest, whatever, so I'm setting a timer when I sit down . . . a timer built into my stove, so I have to get up at least to turn it off, or it keeps yeeping at me indefinitely. I do try to make a conscious decision to shift gears and do something more active once I'm up, though; then set the timer before sitting down again.
Pavlov's li'l ol' lady.
My timer is my bladder. #worldsmallestbladderspeaksvolumes XD XD
But I'm also pretty twitchy. I'm always moving, jiggling, restless, etc. Sometimes, if I sit still too long, energy builds up and I kind of get the urge to run around the house (which I do, because I'm wfh and no one can see my crazy cat-like zoomies c.c).
At work, I had this little wheel-y tower roller thing that they used to put computer towers on. I'd use that as my "zoomies" time, and move that sucker like it was an under the desk NASCAR foot race. XD
WFH... well. Now the cats get treated to fly by loves and rando play times. XD I actually kind of like this WFH business... >.>5 -
bump = Important at any time, but especially at the beginning of a month ...3
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My cat died in March and I adopted a kitten two weeks back who is 12 weeks old and fast as the Flash. He is a lot of work and playing with him 30 minutes, twice a day has me sweating always.8
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bump - If you have been working from home for a while now - what did you do to compensate for lost "trips to the photocopier on the far side of the floor" and other step-stretching NEATs-at-the-office strategies?2
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bump - If you have been working from home for a while now - what did you do to compensate for lost "trips to the photocopier on the far side of the floor" and other step-stretching NEATs-at-the-office strategies?
I may have posted this before, but pacing and going up and down the stairs while on the phone. One conference call can be a lot of steps! (I'm now retired, but I still do this when talking on the phone.)
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Instead of trips to the water cooler, now that I WFH I make excuses to go outside. Has the mailman been by? Walk out to the box to check. Might take a few tries. My container plants get watered every day, sometimes twice. I didn't turn on the in-ground sprinkler system this year so I may have to go out a couple of times to move the rainbird on the lawn. Have to go out to the porch to pick up deliveries (thanks to Amazon Prime and grocery drop-off). We live in a three story house so I'll make excuses to go up and down the stairs. All this movement makes me want to move more.3
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A few things I'm doing lately to increase NEAT:
- Shopping with a hand-basket instead of a cart whenever possible . . . sometimes when barely possible (milk and yogurt are heavy! )
- Doing routine chores as quickly and vigorously as possible, even using unnecessary extra movement ( ) which makes more time for . . .
- Catching up on procrastinated home repair and improvement projects.
- Doing minor, often nearly-invisible exercises during wait times, such as standing
(barely) on one foot while waiting in line, lat contractions against the steering wheel at stoplights, calf raises while chopping veggies, etc. (these burn tiny calories but help me with other objectives, too, like balance and lat recruitment).
Hi Ann
What are lat contractions against the steering wheel? Please and thanks.1 - Shopping with a hand-basket instead of a cart whenever possible . . . sometimes when barely possible (milk and yogurt are heavy!
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A few things I'm doing lately to increase NEAT:
- Shopping with a hand-basket instead of a cart whenever possible . . . sometimes when barely possible (milk and yogurt are heavy! )
- Doing routine chores as quickly and vigorously as possible, even using unnecessary extra movement ( ) which makes more time for . . .
- Catching up on procrastinated home repair and improvement projects.
- Doing minor, often nearly-invisible exercises during wait times, such as standing
(barely) on one foot while waiting in line, lat contractions against the steering wheel at stoplights, calf raises while chopping veggies, etc. (these burn tiny calories but help me with other objectives, too, like balance and lat recruitment).
Hi Ann
What are lat contractions against the steering wheel? Please and thanks.
Your lats (latissimus dorsi) are muscles that run from the front of your body down and around to the mid/low spine.
Put your hands on the steering wheel, separated (in clock terms,10 and 2, or 8 and 4, or 9 and 3 - however you'd normally do it). Keep your shoulders down, don't let them come up toward your ears.** Then just try to contract the lats, holding your arms firm/steady. Try to feel like you're pulling your shoulder blades simultaneously back and down. It will pull your body just that little bit toward the steering wheel - only like half an inch or inch, maybe. (It may also make you feel like you're sitting up just a tiny bit straighter.) That's it.
I started doing that specific movement because lat engagement is really important to my sport, rowing (I won't go into all the details of why, at least not unless someone asks , but trust me, it is). So, since I started rowing years ago with essentially zero body awareness, doing things like this helped me find my lats, feel them move, and be able to engage them in the way I needed to improve my rowing.
** If you raise your shoulders, it doesn't make it not worth a few calories a decade, just like using lats would (although the lats are a bigger muscle, so maybe one more calorie a decade
). It just emphasizes different muscles in the shoulders, rather than the lats. Any isometric-ish thing against the steering wheel would be similar as a potential fidget move, even holding the back/core firm and letting the arm muscle contract to pull against the wheel (rather than hold steady so the back muscles work instead).
Now that I think of it, if body awareness is something a person is working on, it could be useful to see what different muscle groups feel like, when pulling against the steering wheel, if you emphasize and focus on different ones (or hold others steady vs. let them work, such as the shoulder raising difference). 5 - Shopping with a hand-basket instead of a cart whenever possible . . . sometimes when barely possible (milk and yogurt are heavy!
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I have been trying to make daily habits a bit more inconvenient. Storing toothbrush and toothpaste in cabinet instead of on the sink, milk in back of fridge, tea bags in back of cupboard so I have to root around. Knife block further down the counter. It’s really counterintuitive and I suspect also exercises the brain!3
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A few things I'm doing lately to increase NEAT:
- Shopping with a hand-basket instead of a cart whenever possible . . . sometimes when barely possible (milk and yogurt are heavy! )
- Doing routine chores as quickly and vigorously as possible, even using unnecessary extra movement ( ) which makes more time for . . .
- Catching up on procrastinated home repair and improvement projects.
- Doing minor, often nearly-invisible exercises during wait times, such as standing
(barely) on one foot while waiting in line, lat contractions against the steering wheel at stoplights, calf raises while chopping veggies, etc. (these burn tiny calories but help me with other objectives, too, like balance and lat recruitment).
Hi Ann
What are lat contractions against the steering wheel? Please and thanks.
Sorry, there was supposed to be a lat image in there, but I copied the link incorrectly. This is it:
1 - Shopping with a hand-basket instead of a cart whenever possible . . . sometimes when barely possible (milk and yogurt are heavy!
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bump1
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