When your blog starts going well, you might decide it’s time to give up the day job and go ‘full time’. This is an excellent feeling and a great moment – all of a sudden you’re able to enjoy true financial freedom and passive income and you’ll never have to make a busy commute into work at 7am again!
At the same time, blogging full time also comes with a few drawbacks. Chief among these is the simple fact that it’s not terribly healthy. Oftentimes, we don’t think about health tips for bloggers. After all, bloggers can work whenever they want, so they have plenty of time to work out, right? Hahaha, only bloggers know this is not the case.
When you blog full time, you’ll be spending most of your day sitting in front of the computer at home and staring at a screen.
Even if you’re not a full-time blogger, but spend a large portion of your time blogging, you may not realize the amount of time you spend in a sedentary position. As you may imagine, this has consequences – so read on to find out how to avoid the most severe of those…
Table of Contents
Health Tips for Bloggers
Exercise and Stretch
Sitting is incredibly bad for you. Not only does it mean your heart is at a complete rest, which can cause it to atrophy but it also means that you’ll be in the same position for long periods of time shortening your quadriceps, loosening your hamstrings and hunching over. Back ache and poor mobility are almost guaranteed if you aren’t careful. Yikes!
The best tonic for these problems is to exercise daily and to stretch daily too. Ideally, do this just after you wake up and that way you’ll be able to freshen yourself up for the day and enjoy feeling more focused for the remaining hours.
It’s also important is to get up and walk around during your work sessions. Be careful of getting “in the zone,” and staying put in one spot. You might look up several hours later with a sore back. Schedule in ten minute breaks every hour and use them to get some movement and some fresh air!
Define Your Work Environment
Another big problem for bloggers is that their work environment happens to be the same as their resting environment. The easiest solution for this is to define a workspace that is not your bedroom, and leave your work out of your resting areas.
For some people, working from home means never leaving the house, which is a surefire way to get poor sleep and cabin fever. It also means you’re taking no steps. If you’re working from home, you can still wear a pedometer to track your steps.
When working out, make sure you’re working out at the gym. And at the same time, consider working somewhere other than your home. You can get fresh air, social interaction and great beverages if you work in a coffee shop instead. Another good option is to work in a public library. I like to designate a couple days a week as “work away from home” days, and I actually look forward to them now.
Stress Management
Finally, make sure you are managing your work/life balance, whatever that means for you. As a blogger you are always working and never working. Be disciplined to maintain a separation between your working hours and your resting hours. If you have to block chunks of time throughout the day to work that’s ok as well.
Remember, as a blogger you do not have to maintain a regimented corporate schedule. Build a flexible schedule that fits with your needs and your lifestyle.
Ciao,
Kemya
