The majority of the employed population are required to work (while sitting at a desk) for a long period of time. Prolonged sitting and poor posture has caused me neck pain, back pain, headaches, and shoulder pain. The repetitive strain from sitting at a desk has also caused chronic tension and dysfunction in my muscles and tendons. All these not only affected my productivity at work, but also my quality of life away from my ergonomic office. Most of the factors that affected my posture were within my control. Once I learned how to correct them, they were not hard to change. But, these good posture habits took some commitment to maintain.
How to Have Good Posture at Your Desk
Maintaining proper sitting posture is a life-long process. There are many variables to living a healthy lifestyle while sitting at a desk. Hydration, nutrition, breathing, body awareness, and self-healing are also some important variables when it comes to maintaining proper posture during a long day. I’ll get into those in more detail in other articles. Today, let’s start with how I changed some bad habits and got into a good posture position.
Keep the body in alignment while standing and sitting at a desk
Proper sitting posture is a very symmetrical position. With the exception of clicking a mouse with my dominant hand, all other actions should mirror each other, when it comes to comparing the right side of our bodies to the left side. Symmetry requires keeping the body in alignment. If one small aspect is off on one side of the body, other issues go out of alignment as well. When I first assessed my own poor posture, there were multiple asymmetries that I’d never realized before.
The first issue I found was how far I reached for my mouse. Before my poor posture self-assessment, my mouse was located too far away from my body. It was still within extended arm’s reach, but my mouse needed to be placed within a comfortable arm’s reach instead. Once I moved my mouse as close to the keyboard as possible, I noticed a lot less extension (and pain) throughout my right arm, as well as my right shoulder, and the right side of my neck.
One of the causes of this overextension is that my chair height was too low.
When my elbows are below my desk, that’s one way of knowing that my chair height is too low. In this case, I’d have to move my elbow away from my torso in order to use my mouse and my keyboard. One of my main protocols, when it comes to sitting at a desk with good posture alignment, is to raise my office chair so that my elbows are just above my desk. This allows me to keep my elbows tucked relatively close to my body. This also reduces extension (and pain) throughout my right arm, right shoulder, and the right side of my neck when using my mouse.
In this picture, you’ll notice the woman’s left arm is not kept close to her upper body.
This will likely cause her the same pain I experienced when I used to sit with poor posture like this. The first thing I did to correct this was raise my office chair higher. If she doesn’t raise her chair, there is no way she can touch her laptop without letting her left elbow flare away from her body. Once she raises her office chair, it’ll be easier to keep her left elbow tucked in close to her body. This also decreased the pain and dysfunction I had throughout my arm, shoulder, and neck once I took up this good posture habit permanently.
However, there is another issue she will create for herself once she raises her office chair. She will be even farther away from her screen, which will strain her vision. Also she’s already looking down at her screen at too much of an angle. Once she raises her office chair, she’ll be looking down even more. She would benefit greatly by using an external monitor. She could still plug her laptop into it, so she can use the keyboard on her laptop.
The top of the external monitor would ideally be at eye level.
I’ve also used an external monitor, where my eye level was just a couple inches below the top of the monitor. This worked fine for me. The main thing is that we shouldn’t have to look up at any angle at all to see any part of the monitor screen. I’ve made this mistake before too and it caused me a great deal of neck pain from looking up.
Finally, it’s easy to notice that she’s leaning her body to the right, partially supporting herself with her right elbow on her desk. This may seem like a minor bad habit, but it can easily become addictive to fall into. She’s probably deactivated most of her back muscles on the left side, while her back on the right side is activated. This misalignment can lead to an imbalance of back tension and back pain.
Take breaks and stand up every 30 minutes
I never have more than 30 minutes of sitting time at once. I used to have a sedentary time limit set for myself at 45 minutes. Since I’ve lowered it to 30 minutes, I’ve experienced much less negative effects from the repetitive strain of sitting at at desk. The health benefits I’ve noticed from this new limit of 30 minutes are less tension, stiffness, and soreness in my muscles. I’m maintaining proper sitting posture better and longer during a long day. I’ve also noticed a productivity increase and cost benefits. If I’m sitting at a desk longer than 30 minutes, or even 45 minutes, I might be working a longer duration of time, but my mental clarity is not as sharp as it would be compared to sitting for shorter periods of time.
I don’t necessarily get a ton of physical activity in between my 30 minute increments of sitting at a desk. It’s usually just enough to get the blood flowing throughout my entire body, get some movement in, drink some water, and maybe eat some food. Personally, these breaks are usually anywhere from 5 minutes to 30 minutes long, depending how busy I am. During this time, I’m always either standing or walking. I make sure that I am not sitting, even if it is in a different capacity, like on a couch for example. I’m always either standing or moving during my physical activity breaks. To read more on this good posture habit, see my article titled How Often Should You Stand Up From Your Desk.
Use posture-friendly props like ergonomic chairs and standing desks
Ergonomic chairs and standing desks are a great way to get out of that mundane position of sitting at a desk. I break the routine by working in multiple positions throughout the day. Sitting at a desk is not the enemy here. Repetitive strain is the enemy. Holding our muscles and tendons in the same position for prolonged periods of time is what is damaging our bodies, not the actual position we are in. If we work at a stand desk for 40 hours a week, that will also damage our bodies. However, it’ll just be in different ways compared to sitting at a desk. If we could work in the most ergonomic office chair that existed, repetitive strain would still create pain and tension in our bodies if we sat in it for 40 hours per week.
The different positions I work in are sitting at a desk, working at a stand desk, sitting on a stool at a stand desk, and sitting in a recliner (using a laptop). I make sure that I’m comfortable when I’m in these positions. I make sure that none of my joints, limbs, back, or neck is neither overextended or compressed.
Use exercises that promote good posture
I never realized how destructive sitting at a desk was until about 10 years into my office career. There are a lot of exercises that promote good posture while sitting at a desk. Today, I just want to mention one body part that I’ve really been working hard on lately. Surprisingly, this body part that took a massive beating from my poor posture was my glutes. After sitting on them for a long day, 5 days a week, they become tight, weak, and deactivated. Not only did it affect my proper sitting posture, it had a negative effect on me away from my desk, during my workouts and sports that I played.
My gym routine
Lately, my normal gym routine includes something every workout that is hyper-focused on activating, strengthening, and increasing the blood flow through my glutes. This exercise is called a glute kickback. I do it on a cable machine, in a standing, bent over position. In order to use the weight from the cable machine, I bought a pair of velcro foot straps that have a metal D ring on each strap. I use it to attach to the cable. I got these from Amazon for about $20.
I’ve been doing this exercise 3 times a week for about 6 weeks. It’s helped out a lot in strengthening my glutes and improving my posture. With stronger glutes, my lower back and my legs are also feeling and working better. I’ve included some pictures below as visual aids. *Disclaimer: I don’t get paid or compensated in any way by the company that makes these bands, nor by Amazon. I’m a fan of the product and I bought it with my own money.*
*Disclaimer: Nothing in this article is medical advice. I write about my experience and what has helped me fix my posture, heal my injuries, and improve my quality of life.*
Below is a video of the glute kickback I described above. There are many different versions of this exercise. This video shows me demonstrating the version that works the best for me.
Wear supportive footwear and keep feet flat on the floor correctly
When we are sitting in an ergonomic office chair, you are able to rest your feet. However, that doesn’t mean we don’t need to wear supportive footwear. When sitting, our feet aren’t supporting the full weight of our bodies,. But they are still supporting the weight of our legs (which is a lot). The office chair doesn’t support all the weight of our legs. So, gravity is pulling our legs to the ground and our feet are the connection point. The first key habit I make sure to do is make sure I have my feet flat on the floor. If I don’t have flat feet, that means I’m not using a balanced approach to supporting my feet (or my legs).
When keeping my feet flat, I make sure that my arches aren’t also pressed down flat on the floor. I’ve gone through a phase where I had flat arches. It causes muscle tension and dysfunction throughout my legs and into my lower back. When sitting, I make sure to support my feet with strong arches. I place the rest of my feet flat on the floor, and I wear supportive footwear.
I like to wear shoes that feel natural with my feet flat on the floor.
The key for me here, in finding a shoe that feels natural but is also supportive, is making sure the shoe is actually shaped like a foot. The main thing I do when I buy shoes now is make sure the forefoot is wide enough for me. Check out the picture below for a visual example of what I’m talking about.
You’ll also notice that the shoes in this picture are actually shaped like a foot. For years, I’ve worn shoes that’ve been very narrow in the forefoot. Recently (the past 6 months or so), I’ve been wearing shoes daily that have a wider toe box. I’ve noticed a huge improvement in how my foot feels and functions now that my forefoot has just a little more room to spread out and fit inside of the shoe, as opposed to being pushed up against the outside wall of the shoe.
Thanks for your interest in improving your posture while sitting at a desk. You’re taking accountability for a difficult monster of a problem and you should be proud about that. Correcting and improving posture won’t be easy, but it does get better.
If this article was helpful, check out my book titled “45 Ways to Improve Computer Posture.” It’s available in both digital and paperback versions.
>>> Click here to pick up your copy
This book explains how to improve your posture through different variables of health and wellness. These include sitting posture, standing posture, sleep, hydration, and breathing. Poor posture is not just how we sit at a computer. The health habits we practice, 24 hours a day, are directly related to how good (or bad) our computer posture is.
Go to SittingPosture.com/book to learn more.
Take care,
Todd Bowen
P.S. You can sign up for my free computer posture newsletter here.