Stand Up For Your Health (Or Don’t)

You may have heard the phrase “sitting is the new smoking”, and while the jury’s out on whether that’s accurate or not in terms of exactly how damaging it is, one thing that is universally agreed-upon is that sitting is indeed very bad.

It’s especially bad for your spine (because of being folded in ways it shouldn’t be), your muscles and associated nerves of the lower back and hip area, your abdominal organs (because of being compressed in ways they shouldn’t be), and your heart (because of arteries and veins being squashed up in ways they shouldn’t be), and if you remember how “what’s good for your heart is good for your brain”, the inverse is true, and what’s bad for your heart is also bad for your brain, which won’t get nourished with oxygen and nutrients and which won’t have its detritus removed as efficiently as it should; that’ll be left to build up in the brain instead.

First, elephant in the room: not everybody can stand, and of those who can, not everybody can stand for long. So obviously, work within what’s attainable for you.

Also note that while sitting is the disease-bringer/worsener, standing isn’t the only solution, for example:

• Walking is better than standing. You may be wondering: “who can’t stand but can walk?” and the answer is, a lot of people with certain kinds of chronic pain, for whom walking is less chronic-pain-exacerbating than standing, because the human body is built for movement and inactivity can worsen things even more than movement.
  • See also: Managing Chronic Pain (Realistically)
• Lying down is better than sitting. One of the major problems with sitting is that your organs are all bunched up in ways they shouldn’t be. Lying down is, in this regard, closer to standing than sitting, because your body has a nice straight line to it.
• Sitting can be made less bad! For example:
  • Sitting in a recliner chair in the reclined position is… Not great, if you’re then tilting your skull forwards to compensate, but if you’re just sitting back and relaxing, this is a lot better than sitting in the usual seated position, because again, it’s closer to lying down, which is closer to standing.
  • Sitting in seiza (the traditional Japanese kneeling position) is, provided you do it correctly and with good posture, better than sitting in the traditional Western manner. The reason for this is simple: instead of having your torso and legs at 90°, they are at 120°ish, give or take the size of your thighs and butt (bigger being better in this regard), and even that angle can be made even better if you use a meditation bench like this one ← we’re eyeballing it and didn’t get out a protractor, but if you look at the model’s torso and thighs, that’s about 135° difference, which is huge improvement over the 90° you get while sitting Western-style.

For most of us a lot of the time though, we can stand to sit less. Think about the places you most often sit, and what can be done to reasonably minimize those, for example:

• Car: minimize driving (or being a passenger in a car); walk where reasonably possible. Public transport, if available, may have standing options.
• Office: a standing desk is, of course, the way to go. You can even use a standing desk converter, like this one. Just make sure to set it at the correct height, both in terms of where the keyboard and mouse go (the same height as your elbows are when your arms are dropped to your sides), and where the monitor goes (center of the monitor should be at eye-level).
  • Note: laptops will never be right for this, unless the natural resting distance between your elbows and your eyes is about 4½ inches, which will only be the case if your total height is approximately 1 foot and 2 inches. For anyone taller than that, laptops are still great to have when on the move and as a backup, but not great for ergonomics.
  • Workaround: if for some reason you must use a laptop for your day-to-day work, consider using a bluetooth keyboard so that you can still set them the appropriate height-distance apart and thus not have to hunch over them.
• Dining room: sitting to eat a main meal is reasonable, but consider standing options for lighter bites; a standing-height “brunch bar” is great if you can arrange one.
• Lounge: let it live up to its name, and actually lounge: if you’re not going to stand, then horizontal lounging is an improvement over sitting—as is sitting on the floor, and changing your position frequently. Who knew, kids had it right in that regard!
  • Note: if, like this writer, you do a lot of reading, the same applies regardless of which room you’re doing it in.
• Bedroom: a culprit for many will be sitting while doing a beauty routine and/or possibly make-up. Easily avoided if you set a well-lit mirror at the correct height to use while standing.
  • Note: at the correct height though! While hunching up over a wall-mounted mirror is an improvement over hunching up at a seated vanity, it’s not a great improvement. You want to be able to stand with good posture and do it comfortably.
• Bathroom: leave your phone outside—which is also a good approach for avoiding hemorrhoids! See also: Half Of Americans Over 50 Have Hemorrhoids, But They Can Be Prevented!

Want to know more?

We reviewed this book recently, which goes into all of the above in much more detail than we have room for here, plus also discusses a lot of social reframes that can be used (since a lot of sitting is a matter of social expectations, not actual need). It’s a very useful read:

Death by Sitting: The Hidden Health Risks of a Sedentary Life and How to Stand Up for Your Well-Being – by Carolyne Thompson

Take care!