Office work is hard work, it takes a toll on our mental and physical well being, we sit for long hours at our desk, which requires a great deal of focus and concentration on completing our daily tasks.

A sedentary lifestyle which involves no movement and sitting for long periods of time, causes what is known as Sitting disease.

Here are some harmful effects on the body, when you spend too many hours sitting at your desk:

1) Excessive sitting makes you lazy and your body gets used to long hours of being inactive which causes health problems like obesity, heart disease and diabetes which are called lifestyle diseases.

2) When you sit for a long time at your desk, it has an adverse effect on your ability to digest the food that you eat, the lack of physical movement prevents the body from burning calories that is needed as fuel to keep your body moving.

3) Sitting continuously affects the way we sit, we may sit with our shoulders bent forward and depending upon your height, we may strain our eyes and our neck to look at the screen, all this has a long time impact on our physical well being.

4) It is not just excessive sitting but sitting incorrectly, can affect our knees and lead to joint pain due to inactivity.

5) Sitting at your desk, can cause obesity and weight gain, we tend to lose track of how much food that we have consumed and this leads to overeating which combined with no physical activity can cause permanent damage to your health.

Now that we know how sitting at your desk for too long is dangerous, here are some ways to prevent it:

A) While sitting at your desk and going about completing your work, you need to make sure that a proper distance is maintained between you and the computer screen, it should not be too near or too far, it should be at eye level.

B) You have to be careful how you sit, do not be too relaxed, the ideal sitting position would be to sit up straight without bending your back and shoulders and avoid stretching your legs or crossing your legs, it is better to keep your feet in a flat position without putting a strain on the knees.

C) Instead of sitting continuously, try standing and getting some physical movement whenever possible, this will help the muscles of the body and improve the blood circulation.

D) Most of us spend a lot of time at our desk checking emails, messages, reports etc., instead of waiting for talk to your colleagues by video call, it is better to walk upto them and meet them physically, it will help you to get out of your seat and get some much needed physical movement.

E) Try to find constructive ways of moving away from your desk by practicing simple exercises that makes you feel refreshed and energized and helps to reduce the constant pressure from meeting deadlines.

We are competitive by nature and we think that sitting at our desk will help us get ahead, the fact of the matter is excessive sitting has the opposite effect and puts an end to everything that we have worked so hard to achieve in life.