Squatting or Kneeling May Be Beneficial for Health
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Somewhere I came across the idea that squatting could help. I started to squat instead of bending over or kneeling whenever I needed to gather up something or do some work at ground level, just a few seconds or minutes at a time. It took a few weeks before I could so comforably. The ankles and hips needed some time to adapt.
The lower back pain mostly went away over a few months. This was probably had the highest benefit to effort ratio of any health improvement project I've done.
Someone once told me: "the most ergonomic position, is the next position".
Yup, similarly "the only bad position is the one you're in for too long"
A valuable insight. No single position is perfectly ergonomic; Shifting one's pose as the body requires it loadbalances stress and maintains bloodflow.
The education/employment complex places way too much emphasis on sitting still (in a chair).
https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2018/02/26/5877352...
When exercising, you want to lift with your back specifically to strengthen the muscles involved. The lift they're describing is basically a deadlift, which is one of the key lifts involved a typical weightlifting plan (lifting with your legs in another one, so don't skip that).
You do have to be careful not to try to lift too much weight to avoid injuring yourself, but as long as you don't overdo it, you will reduce your risk of back injury because your muscles will be stronger and less easily injured.
Let’s just say men are given a much more succinct set of directions in a weightlifting gym.
I had back pain from "programmer's hunch." I resisted doing yoga because I thought I was too cool to do "hippie stuff," but I started doing yoga and my back pain went away. Is my spirit cleansed from opening my spinal chakra? No. My yoga routine includes many body positions I never enter during a typical day, most importantly lordosis.[0] The first time I did the lordosis pose my back crackled and popped. The second time not so much. These days I gracefully enter the pose with ease, and my back pain has magically disappeared.
Btw, there is no notion of a spirit cleansing in yoga. This is all hippie marketing.
I spent a couple of hours cleaning my apartment with the tracker on, consciously deciding to kneel and squat whenever I could. Not only did it make the cleaning feel more enjoyable, it burned way more calories than I expected.
My preference in bicycles being standard road bikes makes me guess my preference is not common. It also makes me question how much of this is tangled in the placebo effect. Notably, I am not claiming there is no effect. Just that the agent isn't what we modified.
It feels more comfortable than just sitting normally. I am quite a tall person (192cm) so hypothetized that's the reason I prefer it
Not sure if health benefit is real
Edit: as noted by KozmoNau7 in another comment, "In a proper deep squat, your thighs and calves are touching and your feet are flat on the floor"
For the third mandatory exercise, I would add a body weight exercise, namely burpees, ideally strict pushup burpees. Great cardio and activation of the upper body in addition to the legs, plus explosiveness.
Non-acute knee problems are often found in people who are unable to do this type of squat, as limitations in ankle and hip flexibility (often combined with weakness in these parts) puts a large(r) strain on the knees.
I've been doing weightlifting for many years, and I can do a full squat with my feet and knees together, which I certainly could not do when I started. Keeping flexible only gets more important as you age.
It's not for flexibility that I can't get into a deep squat. It's because my belly and thighs don't let me compress far enough to be in a balanced position when I do. I end up being back-heavy and toppling over!
I'm working on the weight factor generally (down 30lbs this year!), but is there an adaptive way I can add this into my day to be slightly more active and receive the health benefits? Or do I just have to wait a bit?
If I squatted with my feet on a slight incline, that would tilt me forward enough not to fall backward, but would it start straining all the wrong places?
Weight lifters often wear shoes with a definite incline while squatting, so do not worry about that (though my guess is it will not solve the basic problem you described).
This is the way I’ve seen different people with different limitations continually make progress until they can do it properly.
As for being back heavy, squat shoes are commonly used in weightlifting and they have an incline built into them. If you don't want to buy squat shoes you can always put a block of wood or something that's about an inch or so under the back of your foot to give you an incline. This helps you get deeper.
Look at how a toddler squats, that's basically it.
And kudos on your weight loss already! Squats are for everyone, really. It's one of those ways our bodies can naturally be more flexible than we might think. Now, if you have issues getting back up from a full squat, you may need a helper or a handhold like the edge of a table, at least in the beginning, and that's fine. I can't do one-legged squats (pistols) without stabilization, I just can't.
This is the most basic position people use in India during sitting and eating food.
Follow up this one with the lotus pose, as it automatically stretches your back and leg muscles.
By that time, it may make it easier for you to squat.
Depending on how close you are to being able to squat with flat feet, you can put books or something under your heels.
W.B. Yeats, "The Municipal Gallery Revisited"
Time for the kneeling/squatting desks. Now that's a conversation.
Any startups working on this already?
Kneeling is pain though. I'd rather sit cross legged than kneel for any length of time. A cross legged desk would work, as well. It would just be about a foot high.
I think a combination of positions is probably best to get variety in muscles you're using. Reminds me of a theory I heard that hard-backed chairs are actually better because they make you fidget and readjust your body, versus using the soft chair as an external spine
It doesn’t go low enough to squat though. I doubt many would.
It would be quite difficult mechanically however. In a normal adjustable desk you only go from 1x to 1.5x height, which is trivial. With a table you can use while kneeling you would need to go to 2x height to sit in front of it or to 3x height to use it standing, all while maintaining the stability we expect from a table.
I've toggled between squatting and cross-legged (half-lotus) sitting for about 4-5 years when I work from home. I think it helps really well to reduce tension or pain in the lower back. Squatting is not all that comfortable for typing, though.
Seems like the most important thing to do is spend less time at the office.
I'm starting to get increasingly annoyed by these general health advisories that are revised every couple of years, when people realize that once it's applied to the wrong part of the population it does more harm than good.
You won't bake apple pie when you're allergic to apples from the daily newspaper menu.
Is that a big portion / a good example?
One of them thinks it's a genetic condition that always needs to be corrected or addressed and the other believes that most of people have it without ever exhibiting symptoms because, as I said earlier, their usage pattern never triggers any symptom.
The others don't notice anything, so that's not "a big portion" at all.
If it was a high % they would be tested by default. Eg. Like the heart is tested when you do sports ( eg. Soccer) on a competitive level.
People who suddenly train intense are always suggested to see a doctor if it's not too sudden and to have a check-up. The responsibility is to the person who is training intensely, not the one who is giving the exercises in a certain niche.
On the subject of what position we should take all day while working. Someone says sit in a chair, but some conditions are aggrivated by long periods of sitting, such as those who have a femoroacetabular impingement. Someone else says stand, that hurts some people's backs. Someone says walk, not everyone can walk though, so now I'm annoyed too. Someone says lay down, but not everyone has a fancy lay down desk setup, I'm triggered.
Perhaps more vague "check with your doctor" disclaimers are the solution?