We’ve discussed how you can stay active and get more steps in while working in an office. But what about when you’re working at home? Staying active while working from home is even more difficult than when working in an office. After all, there’s no commute, and if you live in small quarters (like an apartment), you have less room to walk around.
So, if you’re working from home, here are some tips on how you can stay active:
Get up once each hour
Any kind of movement helps, no matter how small. Even if you’re just standing up for a few minutes each hour, that means you’re being more active than sitting at your desk for 8 hours straight. And frankly, you don’t need to do a lot to see benefits. Recent research has shown that simply increasing the number of steps you get (no matter how small that increase is) will bring overall benefits to your health.
Pro Tip: If you have trouble remembering to get up each hour, set a reminder. Some devices even have this automatically built in, like the Apple Watch.
Be creative
If you live in a small space, you’ll need to get creative in how you stay active throughout the day. Here are a few tips:
Stand up while on a phone call
Invest in a standing desk
Get a stationary bike and use it while working
Take a five-minute break and dance along to your favorite music
Working from home allows for a more flexible schedule. As such, you should have some more time to work out each day. You don’t need to work out for an hour each day; as we said, even just a little bit of movement is beneficial. So, find a time during your day that you can commit to some light exercise, be it yoga, Pilates, a walk, or indoor cycling.
If you have trouble motivating yourself, use some of these tips:
Tell yourself you’ll exercise for five minutes. If you’re like most people, you’ll stick around for longer.
Put on your workout clothes when you get up in the morning (after all, you don’t have to dress for the office).
Schedule your workout during the time of day you have the most energy
Set up a reward system
Don’t overdo it—plan to work out only a few times each week instead of every day
At Accredited Rehabilitation Consultants, our ergonomic equipment can help workers stay healthy, even at home. Contact us today to learn more.
Any modern-day student or worker is more than familiar with burnout. It’s that feeling of utter physical, mental, and emotional exhaustion, brought on by a relentless workload and prolonged stress. However, many thought they might get a break from the burnout cycle with everyone working from home. This couldn’t be further from the truth.
Due to a mixed bag of pandemic anxiety, economic woes, and an increasingly blurring line between our work and home lives, more and more Americans are falling prey to work-from-home burnout.
Thankfully, it doesn’t have to be this way. With a few lifestyle adjustments, you can recharge your batteries and find better ways to cope with stress and anxiety.
How to Spot Work-From-Home Burnout
The first step in treating work-from-home burnout is recognizing it in the first place. The critical thing to look out for is the persistence of your exhaustion or anxiety. If you can’t seem to sit down and relax, or if you wake up to each morning with dread, you may be suffering from burnout.
Here are a few more signs to look out for:
Difficulty starting or completing tasks
Losing track of tasks
Lack of motivation and increasing apathy towards work
Mood changes
Poor sleep or insomnia
Other physical symptoms, such as chest pain, gastrointestinal distress, headaches, heart palpitations, etc.
How to Treat It
Work-from-home burnout is different from other kinds of burnout. You don’t have that work-life separation as you did in the office, so it’s easier for your work-life to creep in and disrupt your home-life. This is why you have to create clear set boundaries and stick to them to regain any sense of normalcy again.
Set office hours
Sure, you’re not in an office, but you can trick your mind into thinking that you are by creating office hours. This will provide further boundaries between your work and home life, teaching your brain when to focus on work and when to focus on the home.
Take time off
Taking some time off may seem silly during a pandemic, but it can do wonders for your mental health. It gives you a chance to unplug and step away from your work for a few days. You don’t even have to go out for the weekend to experience the benefits. Put all of your work equipment away, turn off your email notifications, and relax for the next few days.
Create a workspace
A dedicated workspace can also provide a better boundary between your work and home life. Preferably, your workspace should be in a separate room that you can close it off from the rest of the house once you’ve finished working. If you don’t have space, you can create a small workspace with a desk, chair, and more. Once you’ve completed work for the day, turn everything off and don’t touch that area until the next day.
