Health – Page 4

Sitting is the New Smoking — Sitting Too Much?

“Sitting is the new smoking…” Dr. Christine Northrup

I caught the tail end (no pun intended) of Dr. Northrup’s PBS talk on aging the other day. She told the audience that decline and deterioration doesn’t have to accompany aging.

Middle age spread, in your stomach and your derrière is not de rigueur. Worse, those two things age us and are detrimental to our health.

Most of us sit too long. Okay, I sit way too long. So when I heard “Sitting is the new smoking,” I paid attention. It was time for some self-care.

I also looked at my backside in the mirror, for more than a second. Yikes, winter and writing equals more than Kim K has behind her (pun intended).

Writers, in particular, type away for hours, research, scan social media, check out blogs, all while sitting.

We embrace the BICHOK

Butts In Chair Hands On Keys

Well, not anymore. Here are five ways to prevent writer’s butt:

1. Every 55 minutes stand and stretch for five.

Stretch your arms over your head, to the right, to the left. Here’s the standing side stretch and one for the back. Do a chair squat or arm circles.

2. Dr. Northrup’s 20 second move.

I really like this one, but recommend that you stretch your legs and arms for a couple of minutes first or you could pull a muscle. Run in place, fast, for 20 seconds while moving your arms. Think of that old Charleston dance. If you’re really serious, do this for one minute.

3. Use a standing desk.

You don’t have to go out and buy a $500 IKEA desk or a standing treadmill. This guy has a DIY version for less than $22.

4-Just walk.

Push away from the desk and go for a walk. It doesn’t matter if it’s down the hall, around your office, to the kitchen, to your backyard, up and down the stairs. Just do it for three to five minutes.

5-Two minute yoga stretch.

If you’re a beginner, take this slow and build up.

And now for the bonus tip:

From Ploughshares Journal:

Hook up your laptop to a pedaling system. If you stop pedaling, you lose the document. If you hit your optimal heart rate, you win thirty seconds of Facebook time. Reaching your calorie goal will unlock spell-check.

These tips can take you through five hours of writing and sitting. If you’re doing any more than that amount in a day, I suggest you perform all of the exercises in Ploughshare’s Calisthenics for Writers.

Feel free to share any of your tips.

Feeling a little dry today?

Burnt out, used up?

I am. It’s been a full week.

Maybe you feel like this, too.

This morning I woke up too early, barely four o’clock. I fumbled for a book from the eight on my nightstand. I didn’t particularly care which one, I just wanted to fall asleep again.

My fingers chose Julia Cameron’s book “The Right Way to Write.” I hadn’t read this book for a few days. I had used the book cover as a marker, so I opened it to the last place I had read.

The title of the chapter was “The Well.”

“As writers (insert your word choice: mom, dad, student…)we draw on an inner fund of images that I call ‘the well’…an inner pond, one that must be kept both stocked and free flowing. We have simply overfished our inner reservoir…”

“YES,” I blurted out, there in my bed, and waited for a second wondering if I had awakened my son in the next bedroom.

“Yes, I’ve overfished,” my words now in a murmur.

There is no more fish, and the water has evaporated much like that in my beautiful terracotta fountain in the patio, neglected during this cold season.

Imagine your mind, body or soul emptied. Not a healthy picture.

To restock the pond, Cameron suggests an “Artist Date.” You can name it a “Mom Date, Me Date, Dad Date,” but whatever you call it, it’s for you alone. It’s a once a week date for one hour. Your AD or MD must be a solitary expedition to some event or place that interests you: a museum, the garden nursery, a movie, etc.

Go alone, that’s the deal.

You are to romance, flirt, court, woo your creative consciousness. Allow yourself to soak up the images, aromas, colors, textures, sounds. This is self-care, nothing to feel guilty about.

You don’t have to document anything on paper. Just BE THERE.

You are there to fill up your well, not fish from it.

Makes sense to me. I fell back asleep for 90 minutes.

In the early morning I peeked into my backyard filled with shadows of slate grey sky and flicked on the patio light. The wet flagstone surrounding my triple fountain brightened up.

After an hour, with hot coffee in a gloved hand, bundled in a bathrobe with my tennis shoes on I visited my fountain. Rainwater filled the smaller bowls up with some in the largest bowl.

I hit the switch, sat down and listened to the water move up the center, over the top spout, trickle to the mid bowl, spill into the last. I sat for half hour, just listening to my well filling up. The air chilly, but it was worth it to be out there. (I’ll go back for another half hour later on today).

Right now I’m reflecting on the sound and image of one of those old-fashioned wooden waterwheels, its baskets dipping into a slow running river, scooping up water on a bright blue skied day. When the basket moves to the top it sprays cool water over me. My dry skin turns moist. My emptiness fills. I feel replenished. So much so that I’m now a mermaid.

Now go find some place to fill up your well and have a delightful weekend.

Category: Health