How to escape your desk and take a walk post lunch

A break for a walk can invite the muse to whisper ideas that may not have occurred to you in your chair

- Shoba Narayan

How do you work? ...you probably spend long hours in front of a computer. I do. It didn't occur to me that the chair I was sitting on was the source of my back problems. It took me several visits to an orthopedic surgeon and an acupuncturist to realize that I had to change my work patterns, hence my proclamation that the second villain of the modern age is the simple chair.

Anthropologists say the human body is made for standing and walking, not sitting. We sit far too much and far too long. So, how do we incorporate standing and walking into our lives? Some Silicon Valley executives work using an 'air desk', a stand that allows you to type on your laptop while walking or running on a treadmill. Many use standing desks, and others walk while talking on the phone. The late Apple chief executive, Steve Jobs, was famous for his walking meetings, where he would discuss business issues with co-workers while taking a walk.

Walking your way to health is a cliché. Everyone advocates it. In his 2011 book Thinking, Fast and Slow, Nobel-prize winner and economist Daniel Kahneman talks about the speed of walking. A stroll at your normal pace, he says, is good for mulling over or coming up with new ideas. In contrast, power walking at high speed requires effort and attention from the brain and body, leaving less room for the serendipity of brainwaves or brilliant ideas.