With this first entry, Dr. Jasper Smits and I would like to introduce our regular blog posts addressing the amazing mood benefits of exercise. Exercise is strongly linked to happier, less stressed, and less anxious moods. Exercise also has important effects on attention and memory, has been used as an effective treatment for depression, and, of course, has tremendous beneficial effects on physical health. In our blogs about these mood and cognitive benefits, we won't just talk about the value of exercise, but about some of motivational, thinking, and behavioral strategies to start a successful program of exercise and stay with it.
However, in starting out this blog series, we are going to attend to one of chief limitations on having a long and happy life - that is, dying early. And dying early is not just linked to exercise, but to the amount of daily sedentary (sitting around) time. All the time at a desk, on the sofa, or in front of the television constitutes a separate challenge to your health. Even if you exercise regularly, spending hours each day sitting without breaks appears to harm your health. In fact, a very recent article from the June 15th issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association took aim at the risks linked to television watching alone. Using a risk marker of every 2 hours of television watched per day, researchers found a link between watching television and diabetes, cardiovascular disease, and death. And it was no small effect - amount television time predicted 104 deaths per year for every 100,000 people.
This study of television time joins over 50 other research papers that, together, create a formidable case that sitting around too much is harmful. To fight against these effects, there is evidence that even taking small breaks from prolonged sitting-a few minutes walking, standing, or other movement every hour-may be important. This is important at home, but this is also important at the office, where increasingly Americans spend hours gazing into computer screens each day. At the office these health giving breaks include standing up from the desk times every hour to stretch and walking around the office. In the future, there may even be the three Cs of office health: walking to the Coffee machine, walking to the Copy machine, and walking to a Coworker. These regular walking trips from the desk break up sitting time and help burn calories during the day; research shows that people who tend to jump up from the desk multiple times at work also tend to weigh less. And during this Coffee, Copy, or Coworker time, don't forget to fidget! Time spent fidgeting, particularly while standing, helps burn calories during your non-exercise time.
To put all of this evidence together, programmed bouts of exercise are important for your mood and overall health, but health requires more than these discrete episodes of exercise. The goal is to develop an active lifestyle that keeps you moving regularly throughout your day. If you exercised in the morning, you still need to stand up, walk around, and take breaks from sitting during the rest of the day. Yes, we said it: "take breaks from sitting." We want you to think of prolonged sitting as a stressor on your body. You need to take movement breaks from this stressor. Be creative. What would it be like to stand while you are on the phone? Should you spend the first 10 minutes of any meeting with everyone standing? Find a way to get up and move several times every hour. Movement matters - so walk, stand, pace, exercise, play, and stroll over to the copy machine for better health.
Copyright Michael Otto
Drs. Michael Otto and Jasper Smits are authors of Exercise for Mood and Anxiety Disorders: Proven Strategies for Overcoming Depression and Enhancing Well Being.
