Sitting at a desk and staring at a computer is a common activity for so many of us these days. Your work station set up is so critical to your comfort and health.
The position we place ourselves in for many hours each day has a significant impact on our bodies and one hour of yoga or stretching or working out doesn't magically reverse the damage we do to our spines during 8 hours of slumping and rounding and rolling backward on our pelvic bones.
Here are some tips for ensuring an ergonomically sound set up for your workday:
1. Start with your eyes. Your entire musculoskeletal system will organize around where you are looking, so set up your computer screen directly in front of where you will be looking the majority of the time. In other words, as you sit slouched on your sofa with your laptop on your lap (as I'm doing as I write this now), or at the dining table, notice that you have to look downwards. Just notice what you do with your eyes, neck and spine.
Essentially what’s happening is that your heavy head pulls your spine along behind it. One or two hours, here and there, is okay. But 8+ hours each day, 5 days/week will have an effect on your overall well-being.
2. Find a chair with a firm flat seat that allows you to sit with your thighs parallel to the floor and your feet flat on the floor directly under your knees. The firm seat will allow you to sense and feel your contact with your pelvic bones. Try rolling your pelvis a little bit backwards and feel how you round your spine—and notice how this affects your neck. When you roll your pelvis backwards so that you’re sitting on the back of your sitting bones, your head and chin are forced to jut forward in order to see your screen.
Now, roll your pelvis slightly forward until you notice a natural arch occurring in your spine.
And now, find the place somewhere between the two extremes where you can have a slight arch in your lower back and you feel centered on your pelvic bones. This position allows your shoulders to stack on top of your pelvis and your head to sit lightly on top of your neck. When your bones are stacked on top of one another, you won't need to use so much muscular energy to hold yourself up.
3. Allow your belly to be soft as you slightly arch your lower back and feel how much easier you can breathe when your belly is relaxed, than when you "engage your stomach muscles."
I know that conventional fitness coaching wisdom tells us that we have to "engage our abdomen to protect our lower back," but I beg to differ. Contracting your abdominal muscles might be useful when you're lifting something heavy or working out, but is not helpful or necessary during the day or for healthy sitting posture and constant contracting inhibits easy, flowing breathing.
4. Allow your arms to hang in a relaxed manner from your shoulders and bend 90 degrees at the elbow. Your wrists and forearms are resting on the desk surface. Muscular tension is not necessary in your arms, wrists and hands.