Making Fitness Simple on the Job

Work. Boy, has that word been redefined over the years. What used to require two arms and two legs now requires little more than something to sit on. At the beginning of this century, more than 30 percent of the energy needed to run the
US. economy came from the power of human muscle, but today that figure has dwindled to less than l percent. For all the good technology has done, it also has turned some broad shoulders into bay windows and size 8s to size 12s.

If this rings true you might think about employing the hours between 9 and 5 for physical as well as fiscal ends, for the good of your health, your physique, and your career.

Utterly impossible, you say? You’re desk-bound, phone-bound, and computer-bound to boot?
Not to the degree you think. Besides, even if you can manage to bum only an additional 100 calories at work per day, that’s still two-thirds of the minimum daily requirement of 150 calories needed to satisfy your 1,000-calorie»a-week quota. And it’s enough to burn off seven pounds of fat in a year!

But perhaps best of all — and this is what many people wind up liking most about getting more exercise at work ——— it’s on company time! That’s right, you will be getting paid to get fit, which you should feel free to consider the greatest perk of all in this deal, Our profit-minded companies are the ones that took workplace exercise away from us in the first place, after all: Why shouldn’t they allow us to take some of it back?
Could you be heading toward a pink slip with the sort of workplace workouts I have in mind? Not if you behave yourself. The activities I’ll be suggesting, by making you more energetic and alert, may even help fun in your career. Research shows that exercise is a significantly better energizer than the likes of a pastry or a candy bar, so by pursuing fitness on the job, you just might also be pursuing a raise.

These same energizing effects can also be enjoyed by all of you who work at home, of course, perhaps even more so because you’re limited by fewer “managerial” constraints. By building short periods of exercise into your day, you’ll have more energy, you’ll be more alert, and you’ll also find yourself more resilient to the stress of dealing with children that —— sorry, all you CEOs — can make the workplace seem like a retreat.