Are you having a hard time working from your home office? Does your back or neck pain feel worse when you’re working at home? There is a way to fix your workspace so that it becomes a comfortable and pain-free space for work.
Almost 40% of jobs can operate from home. Most of them include indoor jobs that don’t need big and heavy machinery or equipment, like knowledge workers. If your job is one of the 40% that you can do at home, consider optimizing your home office for its ergonomic value.
Keep reading to learn more about how to master ergonomics at home.
1. Create a Home Office Optimized for Productivity
A home office ergonomics aspect is to have a space optimized for productivity. Find a spot or room in your home that is quiet, well-lit, and comfortable. It needs to be spacious enough for you to move and do your work, plus some stretching during breaks.
Any room in the home can become a home office. The important thing is that it allows you to focus on your tasks and meet your deadlines. That means it needs to be far away from distractions and stressors as much as possible.
Consider the airflow, temperatures, lighting conditions, and ambiance of your chosen workspace. As a note, you may want to consider staying away from your bed. It’s too comfortable and can instead pull you to the realm of sleep, especially if you lack sleep.
2. Make Sure Your Desk Levels All the Right Things
If you want to practice ergonomics at home, you’ll need a desk that has the right height. If you’re using a computer, it’ll be easy to move your LCD screen so that it is at the right height. The ideal height of your screen is that the search bar of your browser must be level with your eyes. This is so that your neck and upper back aren’t straining to meet your eye level and screen.
Your desk also needs to be low enough for your arms to rest on them without straining to stay up or down. When you use your keyboard or mouse, your wrists mustn’t bend up or down. Their natural position is also one that’s angled inwards rather than be parallel to each other.
When your hands are in the typing position, your wrists shouldn’t carry the weight of your arms and hands. This is the common cause of carpal tunnel syndrome. Avoid wrist rests or lower palm rests since they keep the blood from flowing through your hand.
3. Practice Ergonomics at Home by Sitting Right
For the best ergonomic home office, get a good chair. You must always take good care of your spine, especially since it supports your entire body. The best way to give it some love is to practice good sitting posture and sit on a good chair.
Today, you can find a lot of good office chairs that give you good lumbar support. First, let’s answer the question of what is a good office chair? A good office chair supports your lower back so your spine is in the natural S-shape.
A good chair also gives you the space to keep your knees and elbows at right angles. This will save you from unnecessary muscle strain and stress. Finally, your chair also needs to be at the right height so that it allows your feet to be at rest and not dangle.
As a tip, you can also look into getting a gaming chair. Gaming chairs get optimized for people who spend a lot of their time seated and working in front of a computer. Does that remind you of other types of people other than gamers?
4. Move Around Every Half Hour, Including Your Eyes
Once you buy an ergonomic home office chair, it can be easy to get comfortable with it. Plus, you’re working from home where everything you need is at arm’s length or a few steps away. Compare this with the office where you need to walk a little further to reach the photocopier machine or break room.
The problem with working at home is that you lose track of how little you’re moving around. This is how you grow the risk of developing health problems linked with being sedentary for a long time. Thus, even while in your home office, you want to get up and move about the house.
You should get up and stretch or walk around the home during your breaks. Do your best to take a minute or two every 30-45 minutes. However, if you can’t afford to do this, then switch your position from sitting to standing every half hour or so.
Finally, don’t forget to give your eyes some rest when you take breaks. You can follow the 20-20-20 rule for this one. Every 20 minutes, make it a habit to focus on distant objects 20 feet away for at least 20 seconds. This can help you treat digital eye strain or the stress on the eyes from looking at a screen for too long.
5. Use a Sitting-Standing Desk
Speaking of standing and sitting, sitting down for too long can harm not only your spine and general health. In a recent study, scientists found that it can also increase heart risk. Thus, you want to make sure that you often switch at least between standing and sitting.
Invest in a convertible sitting-standing desk. You can also create a DIY sit-stand desk if you have the time to do so. If you’re a laptop user, you can switch between using two tables with different heights instead.
The convertible sit-stand table is one of the best ergonomic home office ideas. If you don’t have the time to DIY a convertible desk, you can pick one from online stores instead. If you’re resourceful, you may also find other ways to get around your limits and fulfill this need without spending money.
Stay Healthy and Comfortable While Working at Home
That’s it for our guide on how to master ergonomics at home. We hope you picked up something valuable from this guide on ergonomics. Also, we wish you a healthy and safe work-at-home experience.
Do you want to learn more about other ways to make your days at remote work more comfortable? We’ve got more guides, tips, and tricks for you. All you need to do is to check out our other posts for more content like this.