The Secret Astronaut Tip That Will Help You Live Longer

Perhaps you have a job that requires you to sit in front of a computer screen for hours on end. Or maybe your favorite pastime is sitting in front of the television after work until midnight 5-days a week. Don’t forget those large chunks of time spent sitting in our cars, driving all over town and running errands. If you have back pain, you may need to spend less time sitting.

There is a growing amount of medical research that links excessive sitting time to poor health and a shorter lifespan. Even for those who exercise regularly, too much sitting can be bad for your health. As a former director of NASA’s Life Science Division, Dr. Joan Vernikos offers some simple strategies to counteract the negative effects of too much sitting.

Vernikos is one of the primary physicians responsible for maintaining the health of our brave astronauts during space travel that could often last for several weeks at a time. According to Vernikos, even people who exercise for at least 30-minutes a day can have many of the associated health benefits essentially eradicated by sitting too long at a desk each day. Sitting can even lead to premature death.

During her scientific research, Vernikos focused on what types of physical movements are substantially reduced with prolonged sitting. Her goal was to determine why regular exercise does not appear to compensate for the associated poor health benefits of sitting at a desk all day. What she discovered is considered revolutionary in the field of medical science.

Believe it or not, Vernikos has determined that standing up from a sitting position is more beneficial than walking. As counterintuitive as this initially seems, a crucial contributing factor is the number of times that we stand up throughout the day. The act of standing up is not what is truly beneficial in counteracting the negative effects of prolonged sitting. It is the change in posture.

To put this another way, if you want to offset the ill effects of sitting, then interrupt your sitting posture multiple times during the day. Vernikos believes that intermitted interactions with gravity will help to boost our long term health. So if you want to live a longer and healthier life, simply stand up from your chair approximately once every twenty minutes. Even when working at a desk, it is important to keep moving.