Sitting down too much is doing more harm to your body than you can imagine • Hacker News Board

Re: Sitting down too much is doing more harm to your body than you can imagine

#121

Post by BoiledCabbage » Sun, Oct 01, 2017, 2:39 PM UTC

asddddd wrote: post #99

gaius wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

you need to stop what you are doing right then and there and do something about it If you're at home, there's no reason not to just do 10 pressups right there and then (and as you get better, 20, 30 and so on). Or dips with your chair if you can't do pressups yet.

I wouldn't recommend focusing on push-ups, they are counterproductive if you have the typical "computer posture" with hunched/forward shoulders. Chin-ups, rows, and similar are likely to be a better idea.

> Chin-ups, rows, and similar are likely to be a better idea.

And in my opinion are entirely missing the point because they take more pre-planning and effort. Even if only a little.

The problem people are trying to solve is "how do I go from nothing to exercising even a little?" The problem you are helping them solve is "how do I get more/ the most out of my workout?"

It's a serious pet-peeve of mine. I know you mention it with good intentions, but people often try to help others by telling them their personal favourite item, vs helping them solve their problem.

People do similar with programming languages. For a one off project or getting started sometimes a shitty language is the best way to help someone for their specific problem.

Re: Sitting down too much is doing more harm to your body than you can imagine

#122

Post by dandermotj » Sun, Oct 01, 2017, 2:44 PM UTC

Clubber wrote: post #112

I'm having a hard time distinguishing whether this is serious, or BS like herbal supplements. People have been sitting at desk jobs for over 100 years now and those people at an old age are living longer than anyone in history based on life expectancy.

And obesity levels are higher than ever too. Dismissing this article's message because we are living longer is missing the point. We are living longer despite our poor physical health.

Re: Sitting down too much is doing more harm to your body than you can imagine

#123

Post by gggdvnkhmbgjvbn » Sun, Oct 01, 2017, 2:49 PM UTC

skinnymuch wrote: post #111

Many people here seem to be talking about how they have improved their commute or go to the gym a couple times a week. The article isn't about exercising once or twice a day though. It's about you sitting around too much during the day. Not regularly being even minorly active, no? Perhaps I'm mistaken but it seems like the people talking about their once or twice a day exercise arent on the same page as the article.

You are right and they are wrong. Sitting for extended periods is correlated with heart disease and other problems regardless of fitness.

I've talked with multiple physical therapists about it and they've been very clear about that distinction. Other commenters here are missing the point.

Re: Sitting down too much is doing more harm to your body than you can imagine

#124

Post by ianai » Sun, Oct 01, 2017, 2:57 PM UTC

dandermotj wrote: post #122

Clubber wrote: post #112

I'm having a hard time distinguishing whether this is serious, or BS like herbal supplements. People have been sitting at desk jobs for over 100 years now and those people at an old age are living longer than anyone in history based on life expectancy.

And obesity levels are higher than ever too. Dismissing this article's message because we are living longer is missing the point. We are living longer despite our poor physical health.

For sure, there’s more than one reason for the obesity problem.

Re: Sitting down too much is doing more harm to your body than you can imagine

#125

Post by daxelrod » Sun, Oct 01, 2017, 2:59 PM UTC

rubber_duck wrote: post #65

DigitalSea wrote: post #50

In our office we started a lunchtime walk. We eat our lunch and whoever wants to participate, we head out for a 30 minute walk. It might not be enough, but it's better than the nothing before.

Walking is not time efficient, you're better off doing 10 mins of HIIT than an hour of walking.

For me, it wasn't about efficiency. Walking turned out to be the one thing I could work into my routine and actually do consistently every day. A big reason was that I enjoyed it.

Threre are a couple health benefits that walking has over HIIT. For my particular case, my doctor told me that the amount of time I sustained an elevated heart rate was more important than how hard I pushed myself (don't try to walk the same distance in a shorter time, instead walk for longer). And there are cognitive benefits unique to walking [1].

I can't speak for anyone else, but waking turned out to be my gateway drug to all kinds of other healthy lifestyle changes.

[1] https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2014/10/walking-f...

Re: Sitting down too much is doing more harm to your body than you can imagine

#126

Post by Clubber » Sun, Oct 01, 2017, 3:37 PM UTC

dandermotj wrote: post #122

Clubber wrote: post #112

I'm having a hard time distinguishing whether this is serious, or BS like herbal supplements. People have been sitting at desk jobs for over 100 years now and those people at an old age are living longer than anyone in history based on life expectancy.

And obesity levels are higher than ever too. Dismissing this article's message because we are living longer is missing the point. We are living longer despite our poor physical health.

To misdiagnose the problem is worse than not diagnosing the problem at all. Remember when our collective consciousness believed that eating fat was what made you fat? All the food manufacturers starting advertising 0 fat but loaded the food with calories and sugar. This went on for about 15 years.

Instead of assessing the problem as "sitting," maybe we should look at what scientific data says. I know food manufacturers put a hell of a lot of sugar in foods, even foods you wouldn't expect, like spaghetti sauce. They use it as a preservative, so it's in damn near everything.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/guides/z8849j6

I know watching food commercials subconsciously compels people to eat, even after the restaurants are closed. Children consume 45% more food when exposed to food commercials.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2743554/

I know certain foods, sugar in particular, have addictive properties similar to cocaine.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23719144

Sitting may very well be a factor, but this article shows no links to any studies. Until I see some data, I'll consider it BS and so should you.

Re: Sitting down too much is doing more harm to your body than you can imagine

#127

Post by JoshMnem » Sun, Oct 01, 2017, 3:46 PM UTC

This program is useful for remembering to stand up regularly: http://www.workrave.org/

I get up and do stretches and exercises every time it tells me to take a break. I set it for every 11 minutes, but it seems like the breaks are further apart than that. There were noticeable improvements within a week.

Re: Sitting down too much is doing more harm to your body than you can imagine

#128

Post by gaius » Sun, Oct 01, 2017, 3:49 PM UTC

centimeter wrote: post #70

gaius wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

you need to stop what you are doing right then and there and do something about it If you're at home, there's no reason not to just do 10 pressups right there and then (and as you get better, 20, 30 and so on). Or dips with your chair if you can't do pressups yet.

I agree, although I’ve found that there are diminishing returns around 25-30 push-ups. At some point you need to use weights or machines that allow you to exceed what you can get from body weight.

There's always the challenge of one-arm push-ups. A person who could do 10 on each arm would be a beast!

Re: Sitting down too much is doing more harm to your body than you can imagine

#129

Post by PascLeRasc » Sun, Oct 01, 2017, 3:55 PM UTC

Is that first graph a parody? How am I supposed to compare two subjective assessments? They should have something like average lifespan instead of "death risk" and time spent exercising per week instead of "least-most fitness level".

Re: Sitting down too much is doing more harm to your body than you can imagine

#130

Post by dahart » Sun, Oct 01, 2017, 3:58 PM UTC

EvanAnderson wrote: post #114

l0b0 wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Can we talk about this later? I need to get done by ." isn't rude (at least by my barbarian standards), and it would be very rude to ignore such a request.

It doesn't seem rude to my standards, either. I'd be interested to hear others' experiences using it, though. My experience has been that, unless delivered in an exceptionally conciliatory manner (exaggeratedly, actually), this kind of request gets interpreted as rude by a lot of people. For me, at least, I think it comes from many people assuming they have a "quick question" or that their "small" request isn't diffi…

When someone walks up to me and opens with "quick question" the hairs on my neck stand up. I had a job where that became an office trend, everyone would start with "quick question".

I started responding to "quick question" with "long answer". That and I also hung a sign on my chair with my official office hours. Neither actually worked, and people thought I was rude, but it did make me feel better to try to push back. ;)

Long term my takeaway is that while too many meetings drain the life out of people, there's also a layer of communication that needs to happen, and when too much interrupting is going on, it's a sign that the right kind of meetings aren't taking place. Now instead of getting annoyed, I start to track the "quick question" categories, and create new channels for the commonalities, ideally Slack or email rather than a meeting, but in person when it gets big enough.