An age old tradition, setting yourself a New Year’s Resolution is a good way to beat the winter blues, putting the overindulgence of the festive period behind you, and setting yourself up for the year ahead.
Resolutions can involve absolutely anything, but for most they revolve around improving health and living a more pious life. Whether it’s quitting smoking/drinking, getting to the gym more regularly, or even taking up a totally new activity, setting yourself one goal can be transformational for some people. More often than not though these resolutions are quietly put to one side by the time January comes to a close. So what’s the key to maintaining a New Year’s Resolution and to beat the winter blues?
See our two top tips for how to beat the winter blues.
How can you beat the winter blues?
In order to beat the winter blues set goals for yourself that are realistic and achievable.
Two simple ways to beat the winter blues:
- Setup a home gym
- Stand and move around more at work
Our first tip to beat Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD) or the winter blues, is to setup a home gym and plan in regular exercise. Regular exercise releases endorphins, which reduce anxiety, alleviate depression and boost self-esteem.
The second tip is to stand more at work, especially if your role involves prolonged sitting at a desk. Standing desks can help individuals to boost energy, improve mood and productivity.
Home Gym
Planning on hitting the gym? Why not create that home gym you’ve always dreamt of. One of the hardest steps for ensuring you get enough exercise is making it to the gym in the first place. You could make things considerably easier and bring the gym to you. Whether it’s a corner of your garage or spare room, you don’t need a huge amount of space to create an area dedicated to exercise. Just 1.8m2 will give you enough space for a piece of CV equipment, a set of weights and a yoga mat!
The key to a professional look and comfortable exercise space at home is the right equipment, and this includes floor protection. Sport Tile is an interlocking system of rubber tiles that can be used to cover even the most irregular shaped room with a surface that will reduce noise, lessen impact from weights and CV equipment, and protect domestic floor surfaces such as laminate or tiles. Creating a dedicated space for exercise will also increase the chances of you sticking to your goals, and help prevent the rowing machine becoming a glorified clothes horse.
For the aspiring muscle builder you may also be looking for somewhere to throw your weights around at home. Don’t risk putting a crack in that concrete or lovely engineered hard wood though. Weightroom Mat is natural rubber mat available up to 17mm thick that will bounce back from pretty much any weight dropped on it. For heavy dumbbells or benches these mats are hard to beat for durability and floor protection. Following home gym tips will help you to beat the winter blues.
Standing at Work
2016 saw the most coverage yet on the dangers of sitting all day at work, and the importance of getting up from your chair to improve circulation and long term health. (Standing also burns off more calories than sitting!) So many of us face the eight hour slog in front of our computer screen each day, but research is making it increasingly difficult to ignore the dangers and do something about it. Yes, sitting at work has been dubbed ‘the new smoking’.
This is a topic close to COBA’s heart, because at the other end of the same debate COBA have long warned of the risks faced by factory workers of standing all day on a hard floor. So don’t jump straight into a standing office without planning your workspace carefully. If you can afford it then the premium option is to replace your desk with an electronic rising one, however manual standing desks and desk adapters all get to the same point.
Do your cables reach? Be careful to ensure your cables make the distance from the socket to your computer and peripherals at the new height, otherwise you could get a nasty surprise when you raise it for the first time.
A comfortable standing mat such as Orthomat® Office will not only take the strain off of your joints and increase micro body movements and blood flow, but will raise the chances of your meeting your goal by making the experience comfortable. Just try small stints of an hour to begin with, working your way up to 2, and then even 4 – as recommended by Public Health England.
Whatever your resolution is this year, give yourself the best chance of sticking to it. By equipping yourself properly, you’ll be set to beat the winter blues.
