Photo by ChrisL AK
There’s an old saying that “the pen’s lighter than the spade”.
Back when going to school was a novelty for families used to toiling on the land, adults said it to children, to encourage them to study hard and make a better (and easier) life for themselves.
These days, you don’t even need to lift a pen. OK, a computer’s heavier than a pen, but you don’t need to lift it to work with it. You just need to glide your hands over the keys.
You hardly need to lift a finger.
So if you’re just sitting there all day, it makes no difference whether you’re in shape or not. Right?
Oh sure, if you consider the health implications, then of course you should be doing some kind of exercise, for your own benefit. But day to day, as an information worker in the creative economy, it won’t make any difference to the quality of your actual work. Right?
Wrong.
In his book Brain Rules, molecular biologist John Medina reports on a research investigation into the effects of exercise on cognitive performance, using a sample of 10,000 British civil servants between the age of 35 and 55. The researchers categorised the civil servants’ physical activity as low, medium or high, depending on their exercise habits.
Those with low levels of physical activity were more likely to have poor cognitive performance. Fluid intelligence, the type that requires improvisatory problem-solving skills, was particularly hurt by sedentary lifestyle.
(John Medina, Brain Rules)
So let’s suppose that you’re engaged in a creative profession, where ‘improvisatory problem-solving skills’ are critical to your economic success – but you’re too busy working (or too plain lazy) to take any exercise beyond a trip to the coffee machine. According to the research, with every day that goes by, you’re becoming less and less creative – and less and less competitive.
Are you still sitting comfortably?
Why Your Brain Needs Exercise
Medina points out that the human brain did not evolve in an environment remotely like the modern workplace. Our ancestors had to negotiate rainforests, deserts, mountains, plains and icy wastelands – all the while catching enough to eat without being eaten ourselves.
our evolutionary ancestors were used to walking up to 12 miles per day. This means that our brains are supported for most of our evolutionary history by Olympic-caliber bodies. We were not used to sitting in a classroom for 8 hours at a stretch. We were not used to sitting in a cubicle for 8 hours at a stretch. If we sat around the Serengeti for eight hours – heck, for 8 minutes – we were usually somebody’s lunch.
(John Medina, Brain Rules)
Since the brain evolved inside such active bodies, Medina argues, it makes sense to assume that it works best under conditions of high physical activity. This assumption is confirmed by biologists:
exercise gets blood to your brain, bringing it glucose for energy and oxygen to soak up the toxic electrons that are left over. It also stimulates the protein that keeps neurons connecting.
(John Medina, Brain Rules)
It’s starting to look like exercise, for knowledge workers, is a no-brainer.
How Much Exercise Should You Be Doing?
If you’re a marathon runner or gym bunny, give yourself a pat on the back and carry on.
But what if you’re more Jenny Craig than Daniel Craig? Do you have to commit yourself to a bone-crushing physical regimen, or does the research offer any crumb of comfort?
Actually, the findings could be a lot worse for the exercise-averse. According to Medina, “even couch potatoes who fidget show increased benefit over those who do not fidget”! You’ve probably guessed that it will take more than fidgeting to get yourself into a state of top mental performance. But it’s less than a marathon:
In the laboratory, the gold standard appears to be aerobic exercise, 30 minutes of play, two or three times a week. Add a strengthening regimen and you get even more cognitive benefit.
(John Medina, Brain Rules)
There, that’s not too bad is it?
And if you’re prepared to entertain one of Medina’s off-the-wall ideas, you may not even need to leave the office. He’s actually installed a treadmill in his own office, and a special stand so that he can type on his laptop while he walks.
“Treadmills in classrooms and cubicles” might sound like the ravings of a mad scientist – but the scientific evidence backs him up.
As another old saying goes, it’s crazy but it just might work.
