Table of Contents
- The Setup
- The Benefits
- Necessary Precautions
- What Can I Do Short of Getting a Standing Desk?
- Summary and Final Words
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Introduction
Thinking of switching over to a standing desk? It’s probably not the simplest things to do, but with a simple plan, and some necessary precautions, I’m confident that anyone can make the transition.
All-in-all, it’s one of the best transitions that I’ve made. This post discusses some the benefits, as well as the problems (and solutions) along the way.
The Setup
First, let’s discuss my personal setup. Here’s a picture:
Yes, that’s a ladder that I use as a chair. I didn’t want to blow a huge sum getting a bar stool that was tall enough (I’m 189cm/6’2”) so I opted for the $60 solution.
The desk is propped up by an ELFA rack, which I got for about $400 all-in-all. The setup was probably the trickiest part, since it involved drilling 6 holes into solid concrete. I’ll have to thank my Dad for helping with that one =).
Needless to say, there are plenty of ways to get a standing-desk setup, and I won’t dwell on them. The only prerequisite is that the monitor should be at eye level and that typing can be done with forearms parallel to the ground or slightly angled down.
Benefits
There are 3 main benefits that come from using a standing desk:
Better Posture
Which implies:
=> less pain (particularly in the low back and neck)
In a typical seated position, you’re rounding what is supposed to be neutrally position spine both at the neck and lower back. Your shoulders are sloped forward and your glutes are inactivated.
What this means is increased likelihood of problems developing in these regions.
=> longevity
Literally. A study done by Patel et al, reviewed in detail at weightogoly.net, showed a positive correlation between sitting and death risk factor.
Worse still, this trend was true across all physical activity levels. ie: runnings 10 miles a day isn’t going to negate the perils of sitting around for 6 hours a day. The charts on the weightology article summarise the findings better, so I encourage you to view the post.
But essentially, the message is that sitting around too much is bad for you.
Finally, McGill et al has advocated that there is no “best posture” per se. Rather the most intelligent thing to do is to have varying posture. With the standing desk, this comes naturally, as you will see below.
Increased Caloric Burn
This comes both from the increased caloric burn of standing in and of itself, as well as the tendency to move around more while standing.
To appreciate the impact this can have, we need to take a tangent to understand the significant sources of caloric burn. You’ll find this in the footnotes[1], since it is rather long.
The Main Point
What determines the caloric burn of the average person is what they do during sustained periods of low-intensity activity.
Using a standing desk means that this sustained expenditure is greater than when using a regular seated desk.
For the average person, switching to a standing desk, when executed properly will burn an extra 700-900kcal a week, the equivalent of burning about 0.2 – 0.25lbs of fat. [2]
Sit-and-mull vs Pace-and-think
This is one of those benefits which I can’t offer a good explanation for.
When I’m engaging in a high flow-state activity like programming or writing and meet a temporary block, I’m more inclined to pace around and (consequently) branch off on a different train of thought, which often leads to exploration and quicker resolution of the problem at hand.
This is as opposed to either sitting there and mulling over the problem again and again (subconscious), or visiting some Social News Site, forums or some other form of procrastination.
It’s probably the dynamic nature of your physical position that drives a similar dynamism in your mental outlook. For me, that means greater productivity, which is always a plus.
Necessary Precautions
Note that I said that the benefits are great if “executed properly”. If done in a haphazard way, this can lead to further complications.
In particular, standing for long periods of time is a huge strain on the legs.
Now, I’m a young guy (20 years), with enough training experience, access to the relevant equipment, and bearing sufficient knowledge about human physiology and movement. And yet, I’ve had some complications with using a standing desk.
The only way to fix those was through experimentation, and given my youth, I decided to experiment a little more aggressively.
1st Experiment
For the first 2 weeks, I made it a point to clock in 4 hours at the standing desk a day. This was a big jump, and as expected, came with its consequences.
I developed mild plantar fascitis along with really sore arches within those 2 weeks. I’ve got flat feet, so that didn’t help either.
Fortunately, this was a quick fix, and 3 days of myo-fascia release therapy and stretching and the pain was gone for good.
2nd Experiment
Ok, so let’s try again with another 2 week bout. This time, I consciously experimented with changes in my stance while working, while making at effort to cut down the
Resolution
Good news is that as of now, I’m working happily at my standing desk. It took 8 weeks of experimentation along with multiple problems along the way.
I eventually settled on a whole bunch of heuristics, which I’m sure are too long list, many of which are subconscious.
However, I can pin-point the most important changes that I made to 3 major points:
Find the optimal sit:stand ratio
For me, this was about a 1:2 ratio. So, I’ll be sitting for approximately 20 minutes every hour, which is more often than not interspersed as random 5 minute sitting intervals.
This constant switching of positions served both to look after posture as well as to make me move around a little more.
Learn to Stand
For me, I worked best switching between two postures – one with heels touching each other and legs straight, and another with feet slightly wider than should width and leanining a little further back.
They both recruit slightly different musculatures, which means fatigue buildup is less severe.
Keep on Tweaking and Fixing
Needless to say, this doesn’t mark the end of the experimentation. If any issues come up in the future I’ll apply the same attitude to fixing them.
Important Point: YMMV according to context
Your mileage may vary (YMMV) depending on who you are and what your situation is like.
Admittedly, my issues stemmed from multiple stressors, from being at the standing desk for 10 hours a day (in the beginning, standing still for a large portion of that), to biking 15km every school day, to squatting with 100-150kg on my back twice a week.
I’ll place my bets that any life stressors, ranging from inadequate sleep to a family crisis would make more difficult than usual to switch to a standing desk.
What Can I Do Short of Getting a Standing Desk?
This world isn’t black and white.
While a standing desk makes it easier to achieve dynamic posture, that doesn’t mean that you can’t simply prop your legs up on the desk one moment, and then 15 minutes later be crouched over the screen, and another 15 minutes later be sitting cross-leg and upright on the chair.
Take more frequent breaks, and by that, I mean physical breaks. Basically, stand up and stretch. Still, that doesn’t have to kill productivity. Perhaps bring your laptop with you and continue working. Or maybe boot up some articles to read on your smartphone and catch up on some reading. Or simply write down the problem on a piece of paper, stand up, and pace around while staring at the problem from “a different angle”. And of course, there’s the option of just doing nothing at all.
Summary and Final Words
Note that this post discusses a largely preventative measure for future postural and other problems. For some who have already been sitting too much, too often, for too long in their lives, there will be underlying issues that need active fixing.
This will be discussed in a future post, probably in the next 2 weeks.
That aside, switching to a standing desk is a fantastic decision for most. I do not recommend that people dive straight in. Take it slow, experiment with how to stand and how long to stand, gradually getting used to the dynamism of the new workflow.
Don’t be afraid to back off when things don’t feel right, and always keep a positive mindset.
—
Footnotes:
[1] -Go Back to where you left off
Essentially, most people overestimate the number of calories they burn through exercise. And more importantly, underestimate the amount of calories they burn through everything else.
This “everything else”, is what we call Non-Execise Activity Thermogenesis, or NEAT. The name says it all – calories burned through anything that is not conscious exercise.
Just to set the numbers straight, I reproduce a table from a study done by Levine et al measuring the caloric burn of various activities:
Note that the superscript 2 on some of the standard deviation values is a reference to the local footnote, not a ‘square’ operator.
Let’s assume that a person is average, and use the averages in the table. We get:
- 80kcal/hr sitting motionless vs 87kcal/hr standing motionless
- 117kcal/hr sitting fidgeting vs 147kcal/hr standing fidgeting
- 200kcal/hr walking at 3.2km/hr, or 2mph
- 300kcal/hr walking at 4.8km/hr, or 3 mph
There are 2 things to note:
- Fidgeting burns a lost more calories compared to being motionless.
Assuming you work for 8 hours a day, the difference between fidgeting and being motionless is 300kcal sitting and 480kcal standing. Don’t forget, these are averages, if you compare the difference between the petite, calm, measured lady and the tall, lanky, fidgety guy, I’d bet you’ll see a difference in NEAT of close to 1000kcal.
- Sustained periods of low-intensity activity burn a lot of calories.
Think of the those people who are on their feet all day (eg: your local mailman). I’m sure they are averaging a walking speed of at least 2 mph. Multiplied over 8 hours, that’s 1600kcal vs your sedentary office worker at a measly 640kcal!
Now compare this to exercise. Let’s say you go for a 5 mile run in the morning, and burn 600kcal (again, see this article to know why that figure is accurate), and then proceed to sit around for 7 hours. That’s still only 1160kcal (<1600kcal).
Remember, that these are averages. Smaller people burn proportionately less than larger people. This very literally is the reason you see the huge variance between caloric burn of various individuals. As a math exercise to the reader, go calculate the caloric expenditure of a 50kg lady walking at 3 mph (burning 220kcal/hr) and a 70kg man walking at 3mph (burning 220 * (70/50) = 308kcal/hr) and extrapolate the results to 8 hours or more to realise just how many big macs the man can afford over the lady.
[2] - We’re going to assume that 1 pound of fat provides 3,500kcal. Hence, 700/3500 = 0.2lbs and 900/3500 = 0.26lbs
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