Update: “Obesity expert says daily workouts can’t undo damage done from sitting all day.”

“Beware your Chair”

If you are sitting when you work, you have an increased risk of obesity, diabetes, heart disease, a variety of cancers + an early death.

Want to keep your metabolism and brain turn on. Sing Stand while you work.

What do Sir Winston Churchill, Bobby Soderstrom, Ernest Hemingway, John Dos Passos, Virginia Woolf, Thomas Jefferson, Donald Rumsfeld, Vladimir Nabakov, Ben Franklin, Leonardo da Vinci and Treehugger founder Graham Hill have in common?

They all worked, standing up. I’ve now joined the ranks, at least half-time—there’s plenty of problems associated with being on your feet, too much, so I split my time between my eco desk and, seriously, standing in my stairwell with my laptop perched, a bit precariously, on top of a bannister.

Via Treehugger:

The Canadian Centre for Occupational Health and Safety suggests that working in a standing position can cause health problems of its own.

“Working in a standing position on a regular basis can cause sore feet, swelling of the legs, varicose veins, general muscular fatigue, low back pain, stiffness in the neck and shoulders, and other health problems. These are common complaints among sales people, machine operators, assembly-line workers and others whose jobs require prolonged standing.”…But most knowledge workers don’t have to stand in one position all day. Jamis at 37 Signals says it gives him greater clarity of thought.

~

Excerpts via the NY Times:

…[even among] healthy people who exercise regularly, those who sit the most during the rest of the day have larger waists and worse profiles of blood pressure and blood sugar than those who sit less…

…sitting is one of the most passive things you can do. You burn more energy by chewing gum or fidgeting than you do sitting still in a chair. Compared to sitting, standing in one place is hard work. To stand, you have to tense your leg muscles, and engage the muscles of your back and shoulders; while standing, you often shift from leg to leg. All of this burns energy…

…when you sit, a crucial part of your metabolism slows down…

And so, that rare article I read, and share on elephant, that changes my own habits. I’m a standing man, from here on out.