How to Create A Home Office That’s Healthy and Comfortable

Written by Professor Theodore Henderson in Work From Home,Career,Freelancer

 

How to Create A Home Office That’s Healthy and Comfortable

By

Theodore Henderson

The Wisdom Man

How to create a home office is a task more employees, business owners, and entrepreneurs have to take on daily. Also, a home office is a place more of us get used to every day. Many of us work remotely, freelance, start a home-based business, or more rarely become digital nomads. Even though many of us long to work at home, we aren’t sure how to set ourselves up away from the office.  Therefore how to create a home office that is comfortable, healthy, and productive is our topic today.

It’s not shocking news that office jobs aren’t good for our health. This is something we’ve been aware of for a while, and the evidence only bolsters this view. Perhaps most damaging are the various studies on the adverse effects of sitting at work. Why office work is bad for you is another topic we will touch on today.

The information clearly shows us that sitting for long stretches at a desk can shorten your life by years. Basically, too much sitting is at odds with all the excellent work we’ve put in at the gym. According to the latest federal research done by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), 

Here is a summary of some of those findings:

  • 25 of Americans spend a “butt-numbing” 8 hours a day sitting.
  • 44% report doing no vigorous or even moderate physical activity at all weekly.
  • 11% spend 8 hours minimum a day sitting without leisure-time physical activity.
  • Only 4% spend less than 4 hours a day sitting while being physically active as well.

The problem is that a majority of people don’t have much choice – they work in an office to make their living, so they don’t get to set the rules for how long they’re sitting.

That’s where knowing how to create a home office that is comfortable, healthy, and productive is the difference-maker. You can make the rules yourself if you’re fortunate enough to work from home part or all of the time. Here are things you can do to design and create a home office to be both productive and promote better health.

Let’s Create A Home Office

Use A Standing Desk 

Investing in a standing desk is one of the first things you can use to improve your health. Now you shouldn’t try to use this all the time, as it’s hard to concentrate and get hours of work done when you’re standing up. Nevertheless, for short periods, while you check messages, e-mails, etc., standing up could be a useful way to feel much healthier and even burn some unwanted calories.

More Than One Seat 

A chief culprit that make working in an office so bad is how long we’re remaining in the same position. The position isn’t right to start with, but keeping any pose for this duration isn’t right for you.

So a solution to this challenge is to work on a laptop or a ‘hybrid slate’ PC or tablet, and to then have several seats around the office or home that you can move to.   Space and budget permitting, of course.

A ‘kneeling chair’ could be one of these seats. These chairs encourage you to take up a modified kneeling position. While still not ideal, it will straighten out your back, allowing you to breathe more naturally.   The NY Times published an article on how to pick an office chair that you may find interesting.

An additional beneficial by-product is reducing the shortness of your hip flexors (which is a significant contributor to lower back pain). 

If you have skills you want to monetize or need skilled resources then visit Fiverr Freelancers for more information.

The Regular Desk 

Clearly, your regular desk should also be at the right height for these chairs. Your head should be able to stay upright and still see the monitor well.  So choose your desk wisely.

Let There Be Light 

Natural light is critical for promoting health. Natural light naturally improves your mood and stimulates the production of vitamin D. Also, our body uses it to gauge its sleep-wake cycle. The more natural light in your home office, the better you will sleep when bedtime arrives.

Natural Looking Décor 

Another thing that helps you to naturally reduce stress is to keep a natural-looking décor. Keeping plants in a room has been shown to improve the air quality and our general well being. This positive effect can reduce our heart rates while using stone flooring, fountains, and other more natural items that can all have a similar impact. 

Proper Technology 

You shouldn’t let the technology itself negatively affect your health. For instance, use software that reduces the brightness and wavelength of your screen. It may help you to avoid messing up your internal body clock. Also, you should look into software that encourages (and schedules) you to take regular breaks from your computer.

Here is a Quick Home Office Tech Essentials Checklist

  • A powerful laptop or desktop,
  • HD monitor for laptop,
  • Smartphone,
  • Webcam,
  • Speakers,
  • A regular or Bluetooth headset,
  • And a phone dock for charging
  • Wi-Fi Router
  • VPN
  • High-quality printer,
  • Document scanner,
  • Paper shredder,
  • Surge protector,
  • Backup drive,
  • A noise-canceling headset,
  • And apps for productivity and financial organizing.

Regular Rest Breaks 

Oh, and take regular breaks from the home office. This is crucial not just for your eyes, but also to keep your blood circulating. Don’t work for more than 60 minutes without getting up. Walk around and look at something other than your computer screen for a while. 

Apps such as Focus Me are a tremendous help with scheduling your work and breaks.  Google timer also is a simple online timer the same as you may have on your smartphone that you can use but doesn’t replace work scheduling software.

Loneliness and Working Online

Being a successful blogger, digital marketer, or another form of internet entrepreneur is a fantastic achievement. And, in many ways, it can improve your life to a considerable extent. Becoming a successful content creator/marketer/blogger grants you the financial independence and the ability to control your income. But it also gives you creative freedom and, theoretically, allows you to accomplish the kind of work/life basis that many of us are missing.

But of course, like anything, there is an element of the ‘double-edged sword’ here, and there are downsides. One of the very biggest ones here, which many us don’t anticipate before going into this business, is loneliness. When you go out on your own and can give up the day job, the commute, and office politics, it can feel like a breath of fresh air. But then later when you hear about your friends’ Christmas parties and their office romances, you can start to miss the camaraderie that working with other people provides.

In fact, as you sit there typing away most days, you can start to find yourself getting rather bored or going out of your mind for the lack of people to talk to. Here we will look at some ways you can avoid this, and how you can avoid letting your blogging drive you mad…

Get Out Of The Office

Many people want to blog for a living because they want to ‘work from home.’ Do note, though, that work from home here is really more of a figure of speech rather than an accurate description of where you are going to work. Because actually when you’re self-employed, you can work anywhere. Why not then go and work in a cyber café, library, or coffee shop in town? This way, you can at least get to chat with the staff that works there and maybe some other remote worker types. 

Or alternatively, you can sit in a pub or remote worker-friendly restaurant (more of these every day), or when it’s sunny, relax on the grass in the sun with tea or juice. This way working for yourself becomes much more desirable. At the same time, you’ll be likely to meet more interesting people, have more conversations, and perhaps even meet a potential date. Of course, you also need to be amenable to speaking with people for this to work.

Meet Up With Others

You can also make blogging friendlier by using the opportunity to meet up with people you don’t usually see. You can meet up with your friends for lunch or reach them after work for a “happy hour” if they finish early. You’ve got the time, and you can do things like design projects while you chat. And in fact, this will be a lot more friendly than most people are in the office anyway. Apart from anything else, you’ll be chatting with your real friends rather than just colleagues.

Network, Network, Network

Networking and interacting with other bloggers, writers, and visitors are very good for your website and a smart way to promote your business and make new contacts. It can make your business more friendly. So stop stalling and attend live or virtual networking events, work face to face with designers and marketers, and respond to your fan mail rather than locking yourself away.  Get up, get going, and build your network now.

Create a Home Office – Conclusion

I want to conclude not on how we set up the furniture in our office but on the effect a good layout can have on our health.

Regardless of size, resources, setting, and budget your home office should be set up to provide opportunities to promote physical activity. The CDC’s Division of Nutrition, Physical Activity, and Obesity supports worksite wellness programs, and you should have your own little routine, to increase physical activity because of the following:

  • There are numerous health benefits related to physical activity. These include a lower risk of chronic diseases such as diabetes, heart disease and stroke, some cancers, and depression.
  • Employees spending 7.6 hours a day on average at their place of employment.  And work at home or home-based business types exceed that number in many cases.  Make sure your home worksite provides an opportunity to significantly increase physical activity.  That can be as simple as going for a daily walk.
  • Many barriers to physical activity can be addressed by connecting with others you know or via Meetups or exercise clubs. For example, a simple plan to meet a group each day at a particular day for a walk or common exercise may address barriers such as not having time to walk, concerns about neighborhood safety, or lack of social support.

It’s suitable for your home office, and it’s even better for your mental health.  For more working from home tips and strategies see our post Work From Home Best Practices For Maximum Productivity. 

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Also if you are considering digital marketing strategies and attracting more clients see our post called How To Choose Your Email Marketing Software.

It is an excellent review of the who, what, why, and how along with reviews of the top email marketing platforms for small businesses and entrepreneurs.

About The Author

 

Theodore Henderson works with business owners, entrepreneurs, and corporate professionals on their business skills, marketing, and leadership strategies. He is an Amazon best-selling author, a Certified Career Coach, Business Skills & Leadership Coach, and a Certified Social Media Security Professional Powered by CompTIA. Visit The Wisdom4Business Blog for the complimentary series on business startup and entrepreneurship.

 

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