How to Have a Healthier Workday—Starting Today

For many of us, a good 8.8 hours of our day is spent behind a desk at work. And all that sitting is linked to a number of serious health issues, from heart disease to diabetes and worse. Here are some simple tricks you can put into place that will help you have a healthier workday. Starting now, you can…

1. Break it up with some stretches.

According to Orthopedic Associates, orthopedic doctors in St. Louis, “Every day your hands and wrists are subjected to strain from the endless tasks you perform with them, which means they are highly susceptible to arthritis, injury, or overuse. Wrist injuries and hand disorders can cause pain, stiffness, and limited mobility.”

Take a break at the top of each hour to alleviate strained muscles and release tension in the shoulders and back. Do some simple stretches to get the blood flowing and banish that feeling of stiffness from having been in one position for too long.

2. Get a breath of fresh air.

Air pollution can happen indoors as well as outdoors. When this happens, it can affect your decision-making ability and recall. Go out during your lunch break and soak up some vitamin D and take deep breaths of clean air. You can also ask if your office can invest in an air purifier machine. If that takes too long for them to decide on, buy yourself a plant that is known to remove toxins from the air. Such plants include garden mum, spider plants, dracaena, ficus, snake plants, and aloe vera.

3. Drink more water.

When we don’t drink enough water, we feel fatigue and become prone to headaches. Sound like your average day in the office? Other symptoms of not drinking enough water include feeling grumpy and experiencing a mental decline. Also, dizziness, sunken eyes, shriveled skin, constipation, and aching joints and muscle cramps. Doesn’t sound pleasant, right? Then we all could use this reminder.

Remember how we talked about taking breaks at the top of every hour to stretch? Why not use that time to drink a tall glass of water? If you do that for every hour you are at work, you’ll be done with 8 glasses of water by the time you leave the office.

4. Take a cat nap.

Want to learn a trick that will improve your mood and performance and alertness levels? Try out the cat nap. You will be joining a long list of famous people if you do. Ronald Reagan, Thomas Edison, Lyndon B. Johnson, John F. Kennedy, and Bill Clinton all believed in the power of napping!
Many companies provide napping rooms and encourage their employees to take a midday nap. Google, the Huffington Post, Zappos, Uber, Cisco, and Procter & Gamble head this ever-growing list. After all, companies that encourage napping benefit by having more alert employees. If your place of work has yet to jump on this bandwagon, you can still practice it personally during lunch hour. And if someone catches you at it, send around this article to help educate your coworkers and boss.

5. Listen to soothing music to banish stress and anxiety.

Feeling cranky but you still have 5 hours to go before you can clock out? Want a quick mood booster? Put your headphones on and listen to your favorite song. Listening to music has a relaxing effect on the mind. Doing so will help slow down one’s heart rate and lower blood pressure and stress levels.

While you can listen to music to help calm you down after something has caused you to feel upset, you can also use music to help you focus. Various experiments have shown that music can help individuals concentrate at a higher level. Whatever the reason for doing so, listening to a few tunes while you work might be that key to help you have a better workday.

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