How Much Physical Activity is Enough?

by Nina

The Walk by Vincent van Gough

After reading all those posts by Ram and me (Sitting is the New Smoking, The Ill Effects of Prolonged Sitting (Part 2), The Ill Effects of Prolonged Sitting (Part 1)) about the dangers of being sedentary and/or inactive, you might be wondering exactly how much exercise do you need to do to counteract the time you spend sitting. (A great many of us work at desk jobs, so for many of us spending many hours a day sitting is just a fact of life.) Fortunately for us, some scientists had the exact same question. A recent study in The Lancet called Does physical activity attenuate, or even eliminate, the detrimental association of sitting time with mortality? A harmonised meta-analysis of data from more than 1 million men and women reported the results of a systematic review (meta-analysis) of data from 16 studies that associated daily sitting time and physical activity with “all-cause” mortality. 

I don’t want to keep you in suspense, so I’ll just tell you what they found: 60-75 minutes per day of physical activity seemed to eliminate the increased risk of death associated with too much sitting time. Here’s the conclusion of the study: 

“High levels of moderate intensity physical activity (ie, about 60–75 min per day) seem to eliminate the increased risk of death associated with high sitting time. These results provide further evidence on the benefits of physical activity, particularly in societies where increasing numbers of people have to sit for long hours for work and may also inform future public health recommendations.” 

Now that might leave you with an important question: do I have to do all that exercise in single session?

In the NPR piece in which I heard about this study Care To Offset All Your Office Sitting? It'll Take Just An Hour A Day, Allison Aubrey asked the lead author of the study, Prof Ulf Ekelund, PhD, those very questions. He told her that the answer is yes, you can do your exercise in bits and pieces, at different times of the day, and with different types of exercise He said just be sure that the intensity of your exercise is high enough to get your heart rate up (walking at a brisk pace, for example). He also added, somewhat encouragingly, that even 20 minutes reduces some of the risk. But the more you can exercise you can do, the better. 

So that means if you're practicing yoga for exercise, you don't have to do a single practice that is at least one hour long—you could, for example, do one half an hour in the morning and one half an hour in the evening.  And you could also do a shorter practice and combine with a brisk walk or a bicycle ride or any other physical activity that you enjoy. 

I’m sure we’ll be hearing more on this topic in the near future and they'll probably be changing their minds like they always seem to do. But I say for now aiming for 60 minutes of physical activity per day is a reasonable goal to aim for. Are you with me?

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Sitting is the New Smoking

by Nina

Woman Smoking by Kitagawa Utamaro

“Being out of shape could be more harmful to health and longevity than most people expect, according to a new, long-term study of middle-aged men. The study finds that poor physical fitness may be second only to smoking as a risk factor for premature death.” —Gretchen Reynolds, New York Times 

Have you heard the phrase “Sitting is the New Smoking” yet? Because recently I’ve been hearing it more and more often. And although lthough Ram didn’t use it in his recent post The Ill Effects of Prolonged Sitting he did say, “For people who engage in prolonged sitting activities, their risk of heart attack is about the same as smoking.” 

His post cited three different studies that showed the dangers of spending too many hours a day sitting. (That post got me to spend more time standing up at my sit-stand desk!) Then just a week later I read a NY Times article Being Unfit May Be Almost as Bad for You as Smoking about a new study on the longevity of men who were active versus those who were inactive (they measured aerobic capacity to indicate the subjects' general level of activity and fitness). What was special about this study was that it focused on a large group of about 1,000 healthy Swedish men of age 50, and followed them through the rest of their life spans (45 years!). (Many of these types of studies in the past have been done on older people for much shorter periods of time.)

The conclusion of the study Low aerobic capacity in middle-aged men associated with increased mortality rates during 45 years of follow-up was this:

“In this representative population sample of middle-aged men, low aerobic capacity was associated with increased mortality rates, independent of traditional risk factors, including smoking, blood pressure and serum cholesterol, during more than 40 years of follow-up.” 

And not only was poor fitness/low aerobic capacity second only to smoking as a risk factor for increased mortality, it was actually even unhealthier than high blood pressure or high cholesterol! Yes, the study found that the men who were rated as highly fit but who had high blood pressure or high cholesterol levels tended to live longer than men who were rated as “out-of-shape” but who healthy blood pressure and cholesterol levels. 

And although the study just focused on men (an ongoing problem in scientific studies), the NY Times reported that: 

But “there is no reason not to think” that the rest of us would also share any beneficial associations between fitness and longevity, said Per Ladenvall, a researcher at the Sahlgrenska Academy at the University of Gothenburg, who led the study. Past studies involving women have found such links, he said. 

Perhaps I am preaching to the choir by sharing this information (because you may already be practicing yoga on a regular basis and understand all its many benefits), but for those who are not yet physically active or who have family members or friends who are not active, the takeaway is clear: start being more physically active! The New York Times article concluded by quoting the Dr. Ladenvall saying that even small amounts of physical activity can have a positive effect.

“Encouragingly, if you now are concerned about the state of your particular aerobic capacity, you most likely can increase it just by getting up and moving. “Even small amounts of physical activity,” Dr. Ladenvall said, “may have positive effects on fitness.”

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The Ill Effects of Prolonged Sitting

by Ram

Paul Writing by Camille Pissarro

We live in a hyper-competitive world, where most of us work at stressful, sedentary jobs. In fact, nearly 86 percent of American workers sit all day at their jobs. Furthermore, accumulating evidence suggests that we spend a majority of our time sitting and indulging in sedentary activities. Sedentary activities includes the time spent sitting in an automotive on a long commute, sitting at a desk at work, sitting on the couch after work, watching television, reading, and playing games or surfing the internet. Recent research indicates that on an average, an American adult spends 10-12 hours each day sitting. Notice that sitting is now the norm and physical exercise is considered an intervention program advised by your personal physician to nullify the negative impacts on your health.

Prolonged sitting time considered as one of the major instance of sedentary behavior has emerged as a strong risk factor for various negative health outcomes. Study results have demonstrated associations of prolonged sitting time with premature mortality, chronic diseases such as cardiovascular disease, diabetes, and cancer, metabolic syndrome, and obesity. Those who spend a lot of time sitting have an almost eight-fold increased risk of dying prematurely compared to those who exercise often and are hardly sedentary. Medical experts agree that one of the reasons for a high rate of obesity, high blood pressure, diabetes, cancer, depression and other health issues seen predominantly in younger age individuals is due to prolonged sitting and physical inactivity. For people who engage in prolonged sitting activities, their risk of heart attack is about the same as smoking. The negative consequences are so alarming that medical experts have started referring to the poor health outcome from prolonged sitting as “sitting disease”. 

The ill effects from prolonged sitting are not restricted to the US population alone. In a recent study All-Cause Mortality Attributable to Sitting Time: Analysis of 54 Countries Worldwide in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine, researchers used survey data from 54 countries, analyzing the time spent sitting more than three hours a day along with data on population size, actuarial tables, and overall deaths. More than 60 percent of people worldwide spend more than three hours a day sitting down, and the researchers calculated that sitting time contributed to some 433,000 deaths a year (nearly 3.8% of all-cause mortality) among those 54 countries. 

The above findings agree with another survey of some 220,000 Australian adults Sitting time and all-cause mortality risk in 222 497 Australian adults that was published in the Archives of Internal Medicine. Those who sat for more than eight hours a day had a 15 percent greater risk of dying within three years than those who sat for fewer than four hours a day. The results were more alarming for those who sat for 11 hours or more a day; they had a 40 percent greater risk of early death compared to those who sat for under four hours. This risk sustained even for those who spent some time exercising. Experts now are of the unanimous opinion that even 30 minutes of physical activity is insufficient to neutralize the detrimental effects of 8 hours or more of sitting.

You may wonder why prolonged sitting contributes to negative health outcomes. There are evolutionary and biochemical reasons for this. As humans, our body was simply not designed to sit for prolonged hours. We were evolutionarily designed to "work out,” as evident from our ancestral hunter-gatherers. Hence our body reacts negatively to prolonged sitting. At the cellular level, numerous changes happen all of which trigger the detrimental effects. Prolonged sitting:

• decreases the activity and levels of an enzyme that helps burn fat
• reduces bone mineral density and blocks new bone formation
• reduces the diameter of arteries putting the individual at risk for heart disease
• makes the body insensitive to insulin thus resulting in type-2 diabetes

Additionally, prolonged sitting affects the architecture of the spine, hips and neck as well putting the individual at risk for skeletal fractures. Furthermore, a recent study Television Viewing and Time Spent Sedentary in Relation to Cancer Risk: A Meta-Analysis found that prolonged sitting whether at work or home increases the risk of three cancers namely colon, endometrial and lung. The study also found that high participation in sedentary activities and low participation in physical activities was linked with a 41 percent higher risk of recurrence of colorectal adenomas.

For many of us sitting for eight hours a day at our job is inevitable. This compounded with the extra sitting outside of work is what makes it harmful. Besides, too much sitting is harmful even if you're getting enough exercise. This means you could be meeting the recommended guidelines for a daily exercise but you will still be at higher risk of disease if you sit for long periods each day. So how can one avoid the dreaded effects that come from prolonged sitting? The best solution is to drastically change your lifestyle. While standing for long hours by no means is the answer, most experts recommend a 50:50 sit-stand allowance for optimal health. If your occupation involves sitting for long periods, work at a standing desk. The potential benefits from a standing desk are manifold including: higher productivity, reduced absenteeism, and lower health care costs among many (see A Neutral Posture White Paper). Experts also agree that it is beneficial to interrupt sitting time as often as possible. One way to do this is to move or stretch for at least 10 minutes for every hour of sitting time. 

For those of us who have an active yoga practice, you can either bring in a mini office yoga series (Featured Sequence: Mini Office Yoga Practice) or supplemental yoga with you (Yoga, Your Companion Through the Day). If you need to stretch your back and do not have too much time at hand, you could think of the mini series for the back (Featured Sequence: Low Back Care). Since prolonged sitting is not only having an impact on public health but also has effects on the health span of the individual, it is never too late to make simple changes and maintain a reasonable amount of activity particularly across the middle and later years to avoid early death and serious illness. 

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Energizing Yourself: Overcoming Styana and Alasya (Rerun)

by Nina

Women and Birds at Sunrise by Joan Miro*

I don’t know about you, but Ram’s post The Dangers of Being Sedentary scared me a bit. 

Findings from a recent study showed that individuals who sat for more than 11 hours daily were 40 percent more likely to die within the next three years than those who sat for four hours or less daily—even when people’s physical activity at other times of the day was accounted for. Studies have also indicated that sitting daily for less than 3 hours and watching TV for less than 2 hours extends life expectancy by an estimated 1 to 2 years. Studies reported in the prestigious journals Lancet and the British Medical Journal suggest that a sedentary lifestyle is the cause of one in 10 deaths worldwide. It’s now known that Americans are working less (26 minutes a day less compared to Y2007) and idling off more. Adults in the U.S. spend an average of 55 percent of their day engaged in some kind of sedentary behavior (see Sedentary behaviour and life expectancy in the USA: a cause-deleted life table analysis).

In his post, Ram identified two obstacles that cause us to be sedentary: styana (inefficiency, idleness, procrastination, dullness) and alasya (laziness, sloth). The problem is, how do we overcome these obstacles? I mean, we all basically know that sitting around all day isn’t a good thing, but after hours of doing it—so many of us sit at desks all day or have long commutes—inertia tends to set in. And this can create a lot of resistance to the idea of getting up to practice yoga, even if you know it will be good for you and that you’ll feel better afterward. You think: Oh, I just don’t feel like it today—maybe tomorrow.

"Old man, stiff man, weak man, sick man, they can all take practice but only a lazy man can't take practice." — Sri K. Pattabhi Jois

I know this because even after years of practicing yoga at home on my own, I sometimes notice that tendency in myself. I do have some tricks up my sleeve, however. And I thought today would be a good day to share them, so you’d have some new ideas for fighting both styana and alysya.

My first trick is a mental one: I tell myself that I don’t need to do a full practice, that I can just do one single pose, you know, like Downward-Facing Dog. But I might want to warm up a bit before that one, so, let’s see, maybe a Half Downward-Facing Dog at the wall followed by a full Downward-Facing Dog on my mat. And guess what, by that time, my energy starts flowing and my momentum starts to build, and I end up doing a full-length practice.

My second trick is to pick a pose to start that will energize me, even just a bit. I know that moving with your breath is a good way to fire up your energy. So standing in Mountain pose and raising arms overhead on the inhalation and down by your sides on the exhalation is a good way to energize yourself, maybe even shake off a feeling of depression, and that can lead to some other vinyasas or who knows where.

But if you don’t feel like standing up—yeah, I know, sometimes you just don’t—you can get on your hands and knees and do the Cat-Cow pose, inhaling as you come into the Cow position (the sway back position) and exhaling as you come into the Cat pose (the arching position). That leads very nicely into Downward-Facing Dog pose, and then maybe Standing Forward Bend, by which time you might feel ready to stand up on your mat!

My third trick is that when I’m feeling particularly tired or lazy, I tell myself that I can start lying down. Ah, yes, lying down sounds real good.

Often I start with Reclined Leg Stretch and other reclined hip openers, and even just moving my legs around gets me in the mood for a Downward-Facing Dog pose (and helps make that pose easier), which in turn leads....

Another way to energize yourself is to open your chest, and that’s also a good way to counteract all the forward bending you’ve been doing by sitting down for hours. Good news is this is also something you can do lying down. Try a passive backbend over a blanket roll or a bolster for three or more minutes (see Featured Pose: Supported Backbend). Then roll over and see what you might feel like doing next. Lately I’ve been starting by doing a reclined shoulder opener that my teacher often has us do in the middle of class: lying on your back, with a strap just above your elbows, bring your arms up and overhead (if they don’t reach the floor, try holding a block between your hands). Three minutes of that, and if I’m not ready for Downward-Facing Dog pose, I might procrastinate a bit with some reclined hip stretches. It’s all good. 

And if this strategy doesn’t work? What if you only end up doing just the one or two poses? Well, that’s much better than nothing. It might even start a new habit that will allow you to gradually grow into a longer practice over time—my own home practice started with me practicing just a few poses. And, besides, you can always try again in a couple of hours....

Of course, what I’ve mentioned here are just a few of many possibilities. Readers, how do you shake off your lethargy and start moving? I’d love to hear your recommendations.

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The Negative Effects of Inactivity on Your Nervous System

by Ram

Office at Night by Edward Hopper *

In the Yoga Sutras, Patanjali describes styana (inactivity, sedentary) as one of the several distractions that serve as obstacles on the journey toward perfect health and enlightenment. Data gathered from 33 countries indicate that sedentary lifestyle accounts for six percent of all cases of coronary heart disease, about 7 percent of type 2 diabetes, and 10 percent of breast and colon cancers. That puts inactivity up there with smoking as a possible barrier to increasing life expectancy (see Inactivity 'killing as many as smoking'). 

A sedentary lifestyle is one in which, among other things, you sit for more than 3 hours, sleep for extended periods of time, watch long hours of TV, or simply idle away the time. But humans are designed for movement and physical inactivity is against the evolutionary norms for humans as the human body simply is not built to be inactive. Go back to history and notice that pre-historic men were always active—often quite strenuously—to get food, find shelter and simply survive. They naturally spent a lot of time outdoors walking, hunting, gathering, and performing various other physically oriented tasks. To them this was not a physical exercise or "working out"; it was just normal life.  In today’s world, however, activity/exercise is primarily an intervention—something we do to guard against the negative impacts of a sedentary lifestyle.

Inactivity is not only having an impact on public health but also seems to decrease the life span of the individual. Studies reported in prestigious medical journals suggest that prolonged inactivity is the cause of one in 10 deaths worldwide. Adults in the U.S. spend an average of 55 percent of their day engaged in some kind of sedentary behavior (see Sedentary behaviour and life expectancy in the USA: a cause-deleted life table analysis). Such prolonged inactivity puts an individual at risk for many chronic diseases, particularly cardiovascular disease, Type 2 diabetes, obesity, and high blood cholesterol. It also weakens the musculoskeletal system, increasing the likelihood of osteoporosis and the risk of falls and fractures. Those who maintain a reasonable amount of activity particularly across the middle and later years are twice as likely to avoid early death and serious illness compared to the inactive individuals. 

This reminds me of my earlier post The Power of Mental Exercise, Part 1 where I mentioned that our brain is "plastic," which refers to the brain's capacity to rewire itself through mental activity, learning and experience. When we learn new things, our brains put out new neural branches and form new connections; the brain constantly changes and rewires in response to experience and learning. Plasticity is the reason why stroke patients can relearn skills after sustaining brain damage. Plasticity also explains how a healthy part of the brain might assume the job of a damaged part. Studies have shown that physical and mental exercise rewires and remodels the brain. 

Having realized the ill effects of inactivity on the physical body, researchers took the next and the most obvious step of investigating the effects of inactivity on the brain and cognition. Very little is known about whether inactivity alters the structure of the brain and the subsequent consequences that arise as a result of this alteration. But common sense and our own personal experiences tell us that we feel depressed, dull, or gloomy after prolonged inactivity. Some of us even complain of “fogginess” or “murkiness” after idling away for prolonged periods. 

In order to obtain empirical data on the relation between inactivity and brain health, researchers performed experiments on mice. Scientists gathered two groups of rats and placed one half of them in cages with running wheels to keep the rodents very active. The other group was kept in cages that restricted their total activity so this group would remain sedentary. After three months, the animals were injected with a special dye that colors a specific set of neurons in the rostral ventrolateral medulla, a region of the brain that controls the autonomic nervous system (ANS) activities, including breathing, blood pressure, and other metabolic functions central to our existence. An advantage of monitoring this specific area in mice is that in humans this region of the brain functions similarly. When the ANS functions optimally, information from the neurons travels to the heart in a coordinated and regulated manner. This causes the blood vessels to either widen or contract as demanded by the situation. A disorderly and overly active ANS is problematic as it could turn on the sympathetic part of the system erroneously, which could result in faster heart and breathing rates, and increases in blood pressure. 

When the scientists dissected the brains of rats in the above-mentioned study, they found noticeable structural and functional differences between these two groups. Inactivity not only affected the neurons and brain function but the heart as well. While the neurons in the brains of the active rats were well shaped, had perfect branching, and were functioning normally, inactivity triggered unregulated and unrestricted neuronal branching making them hyper sensitive. This in turn resulted in erratic hyper-activation of the ANS and cardiovascular disease. In effect, these neurons had changed in ways that made them likely to over-stimulate the sympathetic nervous system, potentially increasing blood pressure and contributing to the development of heart disease. The findings are important as they address the mechanism by which inactivity increases the risk of heart disease. Though the study was primarily done in mice, the risks associated with inactivity can be extrapolated to humans as well.

By encouraging you to be physically and mentally active— helpful for preventing a whole host of health problems—we’re doing you a favor. Instead of idling away your time or sitting on the couch watching a TV show, there is no reason you can’t simply get off the couch and do a little bit of yoga, right next to the couch (or anywhere else in your house). This blog has got lots of mini practices that you can do. You could try a practice you find in a yoga book or DVD, or you could just start out with a Reclined Leg Stretch or a Downward-Facing Dog pose and see what happens next.  If you skip just one TV program, you can do a half an hour of yoga without even leaving the house (see Creating a Mini Yoga Practice). On our blog, we’ve got yoga poses you can do at work, at the airport, or anywhere else you can’t roll out a yoga mat. Whatever it is that you do, make sure you are more active and just have fun incorporating a home or office practice. You’ll be surprised at how rewarding it is!

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The Ill Effects of Prolonged Sitting

by Ram

Van Gough's Chair by Vincent van Gough

A quick question: are you sitting while reading my blog post? If you are, then maybe you should stand up to read it! According to a new study, sitting for long periods puts you at a risk of early death. (This sentence definitely made you stand, correct?) Most people in present day society spend the majority of their time sitting. A typical U.S. adult sits for an average of ten hours per day. Too much sitting is associated with numerous problems, including obesity, high blood pressure, osteoporosis, cardiovascular disease, colorectal cancer among others. Prolonged sitting does the following:

• decreases the activity of an enzyme which helps burn fat
• reduces bone mineral density and blocks new bone formation, raising the risk of fracture
• increases cholesterol levels and reduces the diameter of arteries putting the individual at risk for heart disease
• decreases insulin sensitivity and triggers type-2 diabetes

For many of us sitting for eight hours a day at our job is inevitable. Compounded with extra sitting outside of work is what makes it hazardous. Most importantly, the ill effects of prolonged sitting occur regardless of the individual’s physical activity. Those who exercise daily may assume that their vigorous training regimen protects them from the harmful effects of prolonged sitting. Unfortunately, it doesn't. Several independent research studies show that even an intense activity will not undo the deleterious effects that come from sitting for 8-10 hours in a day. Thus, too much sitting is harmful even if you're getting enough exercise. This means you could be meeting the recommended guidelines for a daily exercise but you will still be at higher risk of disease if you sit for long periods each day.

Recall that in my earlier posts The Power of Mental Exercise, Part 1 and Part 2, I emphasized incorporating mental exercises as a daily regimen to keep physically and mentally fit.  Now it appears that simply sitting or remaining sedentary changes certain brain cells such that it affects not just the brain but the heart as well, putting the individual at risk of heart disease. Findings from a recent study showed that individuals who sat for more than 11 hours daily were 40 percent more likely to die within the next three years than those who sat for four hours or less daily—even when their physical activity at other times of the day was accounted for. Prolonged sitting has become the norm rather than an exception. In today’s society it is very easy to end up sitting 12-15 hours a day. If you have a commute of 1-2 hours round trip, work in an office that requires you to sit for an average of 8 hours and follow it up by watching TV for a couple of hours of each night, you end up spending the vast majority of hours sitting.

This is against the evolutionary norms for humans as the human body simply is not built to sit for prolonged hours. Go back to history and notice that the cave man was always active—often quite strenuously—to get food, find shelter and simply survive. They naturally spent a lot of time outdoors, walking, hunting, gathering, and performing various other physically oriented tasks. To them this was not a physical exercise or "working out." It was just normal life.  In today’s world, activity/exercise is primarily an intervention; it is something we do to guard against the negative impacts of a sedentary lifestyle.

The question is: how can you avoid the dreaded effects that come from prolonged sitting? The only available option is to drastically change your lifestyle. Standing for long hours by no means is the answer or a panacea. Prolonged standing comes with its own baggage of ill health, especially to the legs, knees and lower back. For optimal health we need to reduce sitting time and increase "non-exercise" physical activity. Most experts recommend a 50:50 sit-stand allowance. Experts also agree that it is beneficial to interrupt sitting time as often as possible. One way to do this is to move or stretch for at least 10 minutes for each hour of sitting time.

Here are a few strategies to lessen the sitting hours and help incorporate more physical activity throughout the day:

1. Do not sit for more than two hours continuously. Take a break to do yoga or walk. Try poses from our office yoga series (see Mini Office Yoga Sequence and Office Yoga Sequence. And remember to bring supplemental yoga with you. Stand up for at least two minutes for each hour of sitting. Short breaks can make a big difference. If you have trouble remembering to take a break from sitting, use an alarm to draw your attention.

2. If your occupation involves sitting for long periods, you can work at a standing desk. The potential benefits from a standing desk are manifold, including, higher productivity, reduced absenteeism and lower health care costs among many. And if you are attending meetings that require long hours of sitting, try standing midway through the meeting. If you're worried about any impending stares from your colleagues or manager, just hand over this article to them.

3. Take every opportunity you can to walk. Use the stairs instead of the elevators to get to your location. Use the bathroom on the ground floor or the basement and take the stairs to go down. In the parking lot, try parking farthest away from the building’s entrance door. If you are in the shopping mall or grocery store, try parking farthest away, not only from the store entrance but also from the parking cart corrals. A yoga trick you can try while you are walking—as long as you’re not carrying anything—is to cross your arms behind your back and hold your elbows or forearms. This will open your chest and stretch the fronts of your shoulders, which become tight from typing, driving, and so on.

4. Walk or bicycle to work. If you live too far away to walk or ride, consider driving part of the way and walking or using the bicycle for the remainder. For people who cycle regularly, you can use your yoga practice to balance your body (see Yoga and Cycling).

5. Instead of sitting on a couch while you are watching TV, reading, listening to music and/or socializing, try sitting on the floor in different seated positions, including Seated Crossed Legs, Cobbler’s pose, Hero pose, Thunderbolt pose, Wide Angle pose (Nina likes to fold laundry in that pose), and so on. Try to change positions every 10 minutes or so. And add activity to your TV time by doing supplemental yoga during commercial breaks.

Notice that all the household furniture from lunch tables to computer desks is designed with sitting in mind. So an upright, activity-centered lifestyle will require modifications to the furniture setting.

There is no doubt that excessive time spent in sedentary behavior is not only having an impact on public health but also has effects on the life span of the individual. Those who maintain a reasonable amount of activity, particularly across the middle and later years, are twice as likely to avoid early death and serious illness. However, it appears that it is never too late to make some changes and experience these positive outcomes. The antidote for these obstacles and their consequences are awareness, focus and determination. So take my advice, get off the couch/chair and seek some enjoyable activity that involves some movement.

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Energizing Yourself: Overcoming Styana and Alasya

by Nina

I don’t know about you, but Ram’s post yesterday The Dangers of Being Sedentary scared me a bit.

Findings from a recent study showed that individuals who sat for more than 11 hours daily were 40 percent more likely to die within the next three years than those who sat for four hours or less daily—even when people’s physical activity at other times of the day was accounted for. Studies have also indicated that sitting daily for less than 3 hours and watching TV for less than 2 hours extends life expectancy by an estimated 1 to 2 years. Studies reported in the prestigious journals Lancet and the British Medical Journal suggest that a sedentary lifestyle is the cause of one in 10 deaths worldwide. It’s now known that Americans are working less (26 minutes a day less compared to Y2007) and idling off more. Adults in the U.S. spend an average of 55 percent of their day engaged in some kind of sedentary behavior (see Sedentary behaviour and life expectancy in the USA: a cause-deleted life table analysis).

In his post, Ram identified two obstacles that cause us to be sedentary: styana (inefficiency, idleness, procrastination, dullness) and alasya (laziness, sloth). The problem is, how do we overcome these obstacles? I mean, we all basically know that sitting around all day isn’t a good thing, but after hours of doing it—so many of us sit at desks all day or have long commutes—inertia tends to set in. And this can create a lot of resistance to the idea of getting up to practice yoga, even if you know it will be good for you and that you’ll feel better afterward. You think: Oh, I just don’t feel like it today—maybe tomorrow.

"Old man, stiff man, weak man, sick man, they can all take practice but only a lazy man can't take practice." — Sri K. Pattabhi Jois

I know this because even after years of practicing yoga at home on my own, I sometimes notice that tendency in myself. I do have some tricks up my sleeve, however. And I thought today would be a good day to share them, so you’d have some new ideas for fighting both styana and alysya.

My first trick is a mental one: I tell myself that I don’t need to do a full practice, that I can just do one single pose, you know, like Downward-Facing Dog. But I might want to warm up a bit before that one, so, let’s see, maybe a Half Downward-Facing Dog at the wall followed by a full Downward-Facing Dog on my mat. And guess what, by that time, my energy starts flowing and my momentum starts to build, and I end up doing a full-length practice.

My second trick is to pick a pose to start that will energize me, even just a bit. I know that moving with your breath is a good way to fire up your energy. So standing in Mountain pose and raising arms overhead on the inhalation and down by your sides on the exhalation is a good way to energize yourself, maybe even shake off a feeling of depression, and that can lead to some other vinyasas or who knows where.

But if you don’t feel like standing up—yeah, I know, sometimes you just don’t—you can get on your hands and knees and do the Cat-Cow pose, inhaling as you come into the Cow position (the sway back position) and exhaling as you come into the Cat pose (the arching position). That leads very nicely into Downward-Facing Dog pose, and then maybe Standing Forward Bend, by which time you might feel ready to stand up on your mat!

My third trick is that when I’m feeling particularly tired or lazy, I tell myself that I can start lying down. Ah, yes, lying down sounds real good.

Often I start with Reclined Leg Stretch and other reclined hip openers, and even just moving my legs around gets me in the mood for a Downward-Facing Dog pose (and helps make that pose easier), which in turn leads....

Another way to energize yourself is to open your chest, and that’s also a good way to counteract all the forward bending you’ve been doing by sitting down for hours. Good news is this is also something you can do lying down. Try a passive backbend over a blanket roll or a bolster for three or more minutes. Then roll over and see what you might feel like doing next. Lately I’ve been starting by doing a reclined shoulder opener that my teacher often has us do in the middle of class: lying on your back, with a strap just above your elbows, bring your arms up and overhead (if they don’t reach the floor, try holding a block between your hands). Three minutes of that, and if I’m not ready for Downward-Facing Dog pose, I might procrastinate a bit with some reclined hip stretches. It’s all good.

And if this strategy doesn’t work? What if you only end up doing just the one or two poses? Well, that’s much better than nothing. It might even start a new habit that will allow you to gradually grow into a longer practice over time—my own home practice started with me practicing just a few poses. And, besides, you can always try again in a couple of hours....

Of course, what I’ve mentioned here are just a few of many possibilities. Readers, how do you shake off your lethargy and start moving? I’d love to hear your recommendations.

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The Dangers of Being Sedentary: Styana, Alasya, and Yoga

by Ram

Dance by Marc Chagall

Yoga and Ayurveda are sister sciences, with Ayurveda being the healing side of Yoga, and Yoga serving as the spiritual side of Ayurveda. Through the practices of Ayurveda and Yoga an individual is able to connect to his/her true nature through direct experience, and live a meaningful and purposeful life. This would mean following stable routines, having a balanced and nourishing timely diet (see You Are When You Eat) and adapting the eight fold yogic path (ashtanga yoga). However, there are a number of obstacles that arise on the journey to a meaningful life that can prove to be a challenge. In the Yoga Sutras of Patanjali, verses 1.30-1.32 describe several distractions that serve as obstacles on the journey toward perfect health and enlightenment. 

vyadhi styana samshaya pramada alasya

avirati bhranti-darshana alabdha-bhumikatva
anavasthitatva chitta vikshepa te antarayah

“Nine kinds of distractions that are obstacles naturally encountered on the path are physical illness, tendency of the mind to not work efficiently, doubt or indecision, lack of attention to pursuing the means of samadhi, laziness in mind and body, failure to regulate the desire for worldly objects, incorrect assumptions or thinking, failing to attain stages of the practice, and instability in maintaining a level of practice once attained.”—translation by Swami Jnaneshvara

Sitting for more than three hours, sleeping for extended periods of time, watching long hours of TV or simply idling away the time would qualify as “styana” (inefficiency, idleness, procrastination, dullness) and “alasya” (laziness, sloth), which are now thought to be responsible for decreasing life expectancy in the United States. While technology may have increased our productivity, it has certainly made us lazier. Sitting for long periods, sleeping for more than the required hours and watching TV are the most common activities performed by indolent individuals. That puts these activities up there with smoking as a possible barrier to increasing life expectancy.

Findings from a recent study showed that individuals who sat for more than 11 hours daily were 40 percent more likely to die within the next three years than those who sat for four hours or less daily—even when people’s physical activity at other times of the day was accounted for. Studies have also indicated that sitting daily for less than 3 hours and watching TV for less than 2 hours extends life expectancy by an estimated 1 to 2 years. Studies reported in the prestigious journals Lancet and the British Medical Journal suggest that a sedentary lifestyle is the cause of one in 10 deaths worldwide. It’s now known that Americans are working less (26 minutes a day less compared to Y2007) and idling off more. Adults in the U.S. spend an average of 55 percent of their day engaged in some kind of sedentary behavior (see Sedentary behaviour and life expectancy in the USA: a cause-deleted life table analysis).

Data gathered from 33 countries indicate that sedentary lifestyle accounts for six percent of all cases of coronary heart disease, about 7 percent of type 2 diabetes and 10 percent of breast and colon cancers. The findings also suggested that if only 10 percent of those who are currently inactive started to exercise, 533,000 lives would be saved; if 25 percent began moving, 1.3 million deaths could be averted. Studies have also shown that even children are spending more time sitting at home than playing outdoors. Health experts are unanimous in their opinion that an adult requires at least 30 minutes/day of physical activity to stay fit while children require at least 60 minutes of playtime.

The Dance by Marc Chagall

Thus, there is no doubt that excessive time spent in sedentary behavior is not only having an impact on public health but also has effects on the life span of the individual. Those who maintain a reasonable amount of activity, particularly across the middle and later years, are twice as likely to avoid early death and serious illness. So take my advice, get off the couch and go to the nearest yoga studio for a yoga asana session or seek some enjoyable activity that involves a lot of movement. However, let me also remind our readers that physical activity need not be yoga asanas alone and neither does it have to be strenuous to achieve health benefits. The US Centers for Disease for Control and Prevention (CDC) recommend the following that constitutes physical activity: walking stairs (instead of taking the elevator), gardening, raking leaves, dancing, walking to different stores in the mall while shopping, carrying a grocery basket rather than pushing a cart (when applicable), parking in the farthest parking spot and walking to the office or store.

People of all ages benefit from doing any one or some or all of the above mentioned daily physical activities. Sedentary people need to start with short sessions (about 10 minutes) and gradually build up to the desired level of physical activity. It appears that it is never too late to make some changes and experience these positive outcomes. The antidote for these obstacles and their consequences are awareness, focus and determination (see Thoughts On Dhyana). Cultivating these qualities can prevent us from getting entangled and lost in the mire of delusion that can come from the above-mentioned obstacles (see Achieving Stillness in Turbulent Situations).

Note from Nina: Ram recommends getting off the couch and going to a yoga studio for an asana session, but there is no reason you can’t simply get off the couch and do a little bit of yoga, right next to the couch (or anywhere else in your house). We’ve got lots of mini practices on our blog (look on our index for the three “mini” entries) that you can do, try a practice you find in a yoga book or DVD, or just start out with a Reclined Leg Stretch or a Downward-Facing Dog pose and see what happens next. If you skip just one TV program, you can do a half an hour of yoga without even leaving the house. I started my home yoga practice when I was working full time at a software startup company and co-parenting two young children, so I know you can do this! And, of course, if you’ve been following our office yoga series, you’ll know that we’ve got yoga poses you can do at work, at the airport, or anywhere else you can’t roll out a yoga mat (look on our index for the “office yoga” tag).

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Sitting is Bad for You

by Nina

Sitting by Nina Zolotow

Yesterday’s New York Times article “Get Up. Get Out. Don’t Sit.” reported that two different scientific studies have added to a growing consensus that “the more time someone spends sitting, especially in front of the television, the shorter and less robust his or her life may be.”

The studies, including one published in the October issue of The British Journal of Sports Medicine the other published on Monday in the journal Diabetologia, looked at TV watching habits as a way of learning more about the effects of sedentary behavior on health. The conclusions? Sitting actually reduces your life expectancy. An adult who spends an average of six hours a day watching TV over the course of a lifetime can expect to live 4.8 years fewer than a person who does not watch TV.

“Every single hour of television watched after the age of 25 reduces the viewer’s life expectancy by 21.8 minutes.”

Unfortunately, for us yoga practitioners, the results are true even for people who exercise regularly. The article quotes one of the authors of the study in the British Journal of Sports Medicine, Dr. Verrman, saying, “a person who does a lot of exercise but watches six hours of TV every night might have a similar mortality risk as someone who does not exercise and watches no TV.”

Furthermore, it’s not just TV watching itself that causes the problems. In modern society, many of us—including me!— have jobs that require sitting in front of the computer all day. Dr. Emma Wilmot, a research fellow at the University of Leicester in England, says that while we might try to convince ourselves that 30 minutes of exercise a day will protect us, we “are still at risk if we sit all day.”

The author of the article goes on to speculate way this may be true, quoting David W. Dunstan, a professor at the Baker IDI Heart and Diabetes Institute in Australia, senior author of the Australian study, and a pioneer in the study of sedentary behavior, “The most striking feature of prolonged sitting is the absence of skeletal muscle contractions, particularly in the very large muscles of the lower limbs.” The thinking is that when your leg muscles don’t contract, they require less fuel, and the surplus, in the form of blood sugar, accumulates in the bloodstream, contributing to diabetes risk and other health problems.

The article recommends reducing the hours you spend sitting, starting eliminating one hour of sitting a day. And you just know that I’m going to recommend some yoga! Obviously, if you have not already done so, incorporating standing poses (those really cause your leg muscles to contract!) into your daily practice is vital. But what about outside the yoga room? How about taking a short break and doing some office yoga? Our office yoga series includes some seated poses, but we also have a number of poses you can do in your office attire that require getting up and out of your chair!

Try one or more of our Standing Shoulder Stretches. Or how about our Standing Leg Stretches? Even Half Dog pose at the Wall, which you can do almost anywhere (try putting your hands flat on the desk, if you don’t have a free wall space) and in any attire, requires getting out of your chair and moving those legs!

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