In a recent interview with NPR, Gretchen Reynolds, New York Times Phys Ed columnist and author of the new book The First 20 Minutes, spoke at length about the negative effects sitting all day can have on your health.
“Sitting for long periods of time — when you don’t stand up, don’t move at all — tends to cause changes physiologically within your muscles,” says Reynolds. “You stop breaking up fat in your bloodstream, you start getting accumulations of fat … in your liver, your heart and your brain. You get sleepy. You gain weight. You basically are much less healthy than if you’re moving.”
To combat this, Reynolds suggests taking a two-minute standing break at least once every twenty minutes, such as standing while the on the phone. “I read standing up,” she says. “I try and walk down the hall once an hour. I walk outside and turn around and walk back in. That’s enough to break up the physiological changes that sitting otherwise causes.”
