During last week's storm I wrote about how when afforded the opportunity to work from remotely and when you need to you shouldn't feel bad about it (if you want to read that click here). While I continue to wholeheartedly agree with this, after working remotely for 5 days I've begun to wonder: does working remotely make you fat?
I'm sure me feeling like this has nothing to do with their copious amounts of cheese my friends and I ate over the weekend, or the 3 am corn dogs on Saturday, or the loaded tater tots on Sunday (jealous? judging?)
But changing your work location often significantly change a person's routine, not necessarily in a bad way, but this in turn impacts meals, gym time, etc. Many people probably revel in this and refine their schedules so that they are able to take an 11am workout class. In DC I had my schedule down so that I would often work remotely early in the AM then head into work to make a 11am personal training session (miss those days!!) then be at my desk by the time my coworkers were halfway through lunch.
I no longer think that I can offer the reasoning (okay, I'll call a spade a spade... the excuse) that I'm still getting accustomed to my routine because I have been living my life in Atlanta for nearly 7 months (woah!) now. Sure there have been some sizable shifts in my life since moving but it's time to get it together and avoid the times when I'm working remotely (or hosting visitors) to warrant massive tater tot consumption, or whatever.
I have some strategies that I like to follow, and I can probably get better at following. As I work to get better at these when I work remotely down here I thought I’d share!
1. Eat 4-6 small-ish
meals
It's often said that this is really the best way to eat in
general but when you're going out to dinner and such it's hard to keep it up. Since
I tend to graze when working remotely anyway I like to consider the grazing my
meals which also tends to make these healthier since mentally I know I need
actual nutrients in a meal and just having handful after handful of cheeze-its
won't cut it.
2. Make breakfast count
This is likely a personal thing since I know many people
don't like big morning meals but I need a pretty sizable breakfast to not be
cranky but no earlier than about an hour after waking up. It also helps me
avoid graze (meal) #2 until noon or so.
3. Make exercise a part of the day
This should really be regardless of working remotely or not,
but when working remotely I find that my work and my personal life can tend to
feel extra blurred. It's a blessing and a curse
4. Don't sit in PJs all day
It's important to make sure your pants still fit every once
and a while but I find this is one way that I feel like I'm accomplishing
something. Don't get me wrong, I'm not
getting dolled up, in fact I am often simply changing into different
comfortable clothes but it still tends to help me feel like I'm doing more than
sitting in sweats in front of a laptop.
5. Change into your gym clothes
Bringing 3 and 4 together a bit, a friend of mine once told
me her strategy to ensure she worked out on Sundays: she would immediately put
on her gym clothes upon waking up. It's like a nice reminder that you that you
still need to work out throughout the day.
6. Drink water
Yup this one's also not rocket science, and this is not just
good for you if you're working remotely, but my manager and I were talking the
other day about how we both tend to not drink a ton of water when we're remote.
When I'm in the office I drink a couple cup-fulls (16oz?) of water in the
morning and then again in the afternoon; I also have at least 1 cup of green
tea a day. So how to do this? For me it might mean that I just need to emulate
the size of the cup I drink out of in my apartment.
7. Plan out your day
No surprise that I'm a big planner. But this doesn't have to
be a crazy plan or anything and is something that I think is beneficial when
you're in the office as well. I just
find that taking a moment in the morning to map out and overlay when each of
the above things will happen (exercise, small meal #3, and so on) will happen
each day you're more set up for success!
Writing out this list makes me want to be remote all over again but then again, it probably wasn't a bad thing that I had to put pants on yesterday and today.
No comments:
Post a Comment