The COVID-19 pandemic has caused a lot of upheaval for people from all walks of life, and whether you’re a student or a professional, you may well be doing a lot more things from home than you would have previously. While the pandemic situation is starting to improve thanks to vaccination, many people are still working or studying remotely, and as businesses and colleges have become used to working this way, it could well be that this will remain the status quo for a lot of people even as things return to normal.
Equally, there has been a rise in home working and online degrees over the past decade regardless of the pandemic, and so you may find yourself needing to find ways to stay healthy and productive while working at home anyway. Plenty of degrees have been available to do completely online for years now, such as online doctor of education programs, nursing programs, and MBAs, so good advice about keeping yourself healthy both mentally and physically while spending a lot of time at home will still be useful even outside of the current global situation.
Here, we are going to give you a complete guide to staying healthy in body and mind while still meeting the challenges that come with being productive at home:
Your Working Environment
One of the first things you need to ensure is that you have a good space set up to work in. While it may be okay to work on your laptop in bed or on the couch for an hour here and there, this is not a healthy position to be in when you are studying or working for hours at a time. You need a good desk that positions your screen at the right height, a proper office chair with five wheels that is fully adjustable, and you may also need some other ergonomic equipment like a foot rest or wrist wrests for your keyboard and mouse, depending on your height and whether you suffer from any wrist pain when you use a computer a lot.
Essentially, you should be considering your workspace in the same way companies are expected to consider workspaces in offices. This is because you can easily develop back and neck pain, and serious issues like carpal tunnel syndrome, when you work for long periods in a less than optimal position.
As well as your desk, chair and computer, you should also ideally ensure your working space is somewhere you don’t go for any other reason. If you have the space in your home to have a whole room dedicated to being your home office, then this is the best solution. If not, converting a corner of your living room or even your bedroom into a small office area can be a good idea. The reason why you want to do this is because it helps you switch between ‘work mode’ and simply being at home.
If you study or work in the same places you watch TV, eat and rest, it can be difficult to get in the right mindset to start working, and also difficult to feel like you ever actually stop. Another advantage to having a dedicated space where you only work is that you can tell other people you live with that when you are there, you are not to be disturbed. This can make it easier to avoid distractions as your partner or family will have a clear sign of when you need to be left alone.
Schedule
Something that is key to staying mentally well while you are working or studying intensively is having a good work life balance, and this is the same when you are working from home. However, where you don’t have the same structure to your day as you do when you attend a college course or go to a workplace every day, it can be easy to end up working at strange times, procrastinating because you figure you can just do it later, and ultimately feeling like you are always working. You instead need to provide that structure yourself, and work to a schedule.
You can base this around what you want to achieve each day, and set aside time for each thing you need to do to achieve it, or you can simply set yourself working hours (with breaks included) and stick to them. There are lots of ways to plan and manage your time, and you may need to experiment to find the one that works best for you. What is important is that you do approach your working time with a plan in mind regarding how long you will work for, and when you will start and finish. This stops you putting things off or overdoing it and burning the candle at both ends.
There may be the odd occasion where you need to put in some extra hours – if it is crunch time at work or you have some important college work to do – and this can be a fairly normal part of life. The important thing is that these are rare occasions, rather than becoming your normal working pattern.
Sleep
Good quality sleep is vital not only to your physical and mental health but also to your performance in your work or studies. This means you need to keep your sleeping times as regular as possible, and avoid going straight from working to trying to sleep. Have a routine before you go to bed that includes some time spent mentally unwinding, even if you work in the evening. This could mean taking a relaxing bath, reading for a while, or watching TV – whatever you find helps you get ready to sleep. You should be going to bed tired, but not exhausted.
Some people find that they have difficulty sleeping when they work or study from home, and this is often due to the fact they use up their mental, but not their physical energy during the day by spending all day at home. If this is a problem for you, you may need to incorporate more exercise into your daily routine – we’ll take a look at that in the next section. Sleep problems may also arise if you are still preoccupied by what you were doing in your work or studies when you go to bed, and this is why it is important to separate working time from sleeping time by doing something you enjoy.
Exercise
Working or studying from home generally means spending a lot of time sitting down, and not getting outside much. This is bad for you in a lot of ways. It can lead to postural problems, make it hard to sleep, and of course cause you to lose muscle mass and gain weight. It is therefore really important not to neglect exercise no matter how busy you are.
There are lots of ways you can incorporate exercise into your day even while staying at home. Some people even buy an exercise bike that fits under their desk so they can peddle it while they are doing lighter work (it can be difficult to do more intense work like writing while you are peddling, but for things like watching lectures or sitting in on online meetings it can be a great way to move your body and also stave off boredom). Other people develop a routine of doing a workout in the morning before they start working, such as a yoga or Pilates workout, or some strength training. There are plenty of free workout tutorials on YouTube if you don’t know where to get started or want the feel of being at a proper exercise class. As well as these, there are also lots of aerobic workouts you can follow, such as dance workouts, kickboxing workouts, and HIIT, and including something like this in your lunch break or after you finish work can not only help you stay fit, but also boost your mood and invigorate you.
An even better option, if it is appropriate where you live, is to go out for a walk or run. This not only gets you the exercise you need to stay healthy, it also gives you a break from being at home. Getting outside for a while can break up your day and make you feel much less like all you do is work and sleep!
Food and Drink
When you are working solidly it can be tempting to have a load of unhealthy snacks, skip meals, and live off coffee or energy drinks. This is a bad idea for fairly obvious reasons, but it is a trap many of us fall into. Ideally, you should try to get into the mindset that you don’t need snacks on hand to work or study, but if you are someone who likes to graze, then look for healthier options like fresh vegetable crudites with hummus, seeds, or berries, and keep things like chips and chocolate as a treat. Make sure you are having proper meals at regular times each day, and keep an eye on your nutrition. Even if you find yourself relying on takeout quite often due to lack of time or just not feeling like cooking after a long day of work or college work, there are plenty of healthy options you could be ordering rather than always falling back on pizza or other fatty, unhealthy things. Alternatively, you could try preparing a big batch of a few healthy dishes you enjoy at the weekend, and freezing portions you can microwave and eat easily throughout the working week.
Hydration is also really important. If you tend to rely on caffeine a lot, then be aware that this actually dehydrates you, so you need to make up for that by having plenty of water or other non-caffeinated beverages throughout the day. If you become dehydrated, this affects your mental productivity and focus as well as becoming potentially dangerous to your health. If your preferred way to stay hydrated is with soda, then go for the zero calorie options – sugary drinks are basically empty calories (as well as being bad for your teeth) and switching to the sugar free versions is one of the easiest ways to watch your weight without having to really give up anything you enjoy.
You may also find it beneficial to take a multivitamin every day. Most people don’t really need a vitamin supplement, but when you are staying indoors a lot, vitamin D deficiency is a possibility, and it never does any harm to take a daily vitamin anyway.
Social Time
Working from home or doing an online degree course can prove to be a bit lonely, especially if you live by yourself or the people you live with are out all day. This is even more the case if you were previously used to a work or school environment with friends you interacted with all the time. The pandemic has led to feelings of isolation for a lot of people, and this is one of the biggest problems when it comes to the mental health aspect of spending a lot of time at home alone.
At this point, in many areas it is possible to go out and meet people, with places like coffee shops and restaurants now functioning more or less normally, so if you can, arrange to meet up with friends to make sure you get some social contact. If you aren’t able to see people in person, however, make a point of taking some time each day to talk to someone by phone or video call, or even just chat online. Everybody needs to interact with other people sometimes, even if you are an introverted person, so don’t neglect this need.
By taking care of all of these aspects of your life, you should be able to stay healthy and productive and limit stress while you are working from home during the pandemic, and beyond.
