Work at Home Health
Health is a major aspect to working at home and one that far too many of those who do, tend to ignore, often until its too late. Its easy to see why this is such a big issue. When you work at home, many of the things that you used to do when you worked for a boss or at a company office or whatever, you suddenly stop doing.
These things include maybe walking to the bus stop or train station if you didn’t use your car, running up and down several flights of stairs in your building, or the manual work that would accompany a variety of jobs. They would also include interaction with co-workers which would often result in group gym or swimming sessions at lunch times or after work, playing a sport for your company team, or a myriad other things that got you up and doing things.
The downside to working for a company and especially for office workers with respect to health would be the avoidance of healthy lunches in favor of the ubiquitous liquid lunches at the local pub or bar, meaning a daily diet of alcohol, caffeine, cigarettes and little of no exercise.
So there are two sides of the coin when it comes to health and working at home. On the one side, you miss the opportunities for social interaction and exercise, while on the other you certainly don’t miss the excess alcohol and other stimulants that often accompany working in an office.
So what can you do at home to improve your health, or at least prevent it from sliding down a very slippery chute?
In the mornings, before you head for your home office, take a half hour and go for an early morning walk or better still a run or a swim. This will set you up for the day and you’ll not only feel better, but you’ll be able to feel smug that you can do this at 9.00am and no boss is going to yell at you for turning up late!
At lunch time, again get up out of your home office and do something other than grab a sandwich and either sit back at your desk or in front of the TV. When you finish in the evening, again head outdoors and do something energetic before having your evening meal.
Throughout the day, try to avoid drinking cup after cup of coffee or tea and instead vary it by including herbal teas or green tea instead of black. You don’t want to have too much caffeine in your system, although a little is a good thing for helping to keep your concentration keen. It goes without saying that you really should not smoke,so don’t think that just because you are not under the strict anti-smoking-in-the-office rules that its ok to smoke in your own home office. Bad, bad, bad!
Lastly, and this is another easy bad habit to get into when you work at home, avoid drinking cola or other soda drinks to wash down biscuits, cakes or candy bars while you’re at your desk. Cola (you know the main brands without me having to mention them here) also contains caffeine as well as loads of sugar (or worse, artificial sweeteners) so these will be bad for your waistline.
If you stay sensible about what you eat, drink and the amount of daily exercise you get, you’ll be able to work from home in the peak of fitness and health and not succumb to the weight and health problems so many of your compatriots fall victim to.