You are doing well by standing. Keeping your core strong will help.
The thing you have to ask yourself is - are you using willpower to overcome bad seating? If you have good ergonomics you will maintain good posture even when you're tired. The idea is to balance your body so it stays in place. Keep your head balanced, your arms relaxed without hunching your shoulders, your wrists at a good angle. If you're looking to the side or up or down, you're going to use muscles instead of balance to maintain your position. (Laptops are not ergonomic and are responsible for long term damage to your body - there are no osha approved laptops)
If you have your wrists at a bad angle, on the hard desk or across the sharp edge of a keyboard, the little ropes and pulleys that get your forearms to move your fingers will wear out. (I use a wrist rest to maintain position, and keep everything warm and comfy)
So true. You can sit on anything with any awkward position you want, sleep 3 hours a day, and don't feel a thing.
Then you turn 30...
As for ergonomic gadgets those never helped, simply trying to keep myself strain free - like instead of having split keyboards holding my hands in angle over the keyboard without bending my wrist -, relaxed, but trying also holding myself not flowing down of furniture. In some kind of balance.
It is funny though that Aeron is brought up as an example of a "universal" design: they are admittedly not universal since they offer 3 sizes (A, B and C). When looking at chairs, I've only went with their Embody because of the fluid back mobility it allows when sitting, though I still wonder if I should have gotten Aeron C (I always found it sad they did not continue with the practice of differently sized chairs with Embody which I love). I've also have a sit/stand desk that I switch between every day for the last ~10 years, but I've still developed back problems.
Why do I say all that — at 6'5" (195cm) I believe to have pretty strong core and legs, but I developed back problems when I got a kid (herniated discs, with a nerve getting pinched in the lumbar area recently). I live in a world where everything is too low for me, and I have to take an unergonomic position to achieve many things. Especially with kids (baby cots, strollers, they are really short, but everything, really).
A dining table chair has a seat length that generally allows me to only rest most of my bottom on it, but basically nothing of the thighs (which are also longer than average even for people my own height), which means that majority of my 90-100kg weight is concentrated on a small area. That hurts, so I have to move around and change the area under pressure.
I had to stop playing jumping sports (I jump around 30 inches/75cm high when not in regular exercise, so that's how far down I "fall" when going down) because impact on landing was too strong and it started hurting in my back. Yet after being in bed rest for 5 days for a pinched nerve, I went for physical therapy and could immediately hold plank position for >1 minute. "Your core is strong, so it is probably genetics", my physiotherapist would say. It's not only genetics, it is the fact that I am outside the design range for all the products that people use every day (I am probably among the 3% of largest humans and even the widest covering "universal" products cover from 5-95%: I can imagine very short people to have similar issues). I can barely find a car I can comfortably drive (if I push the seat back enough so my thighs rest on the seat instead of being in a squat, steering column will frequently not come out long enough, and my shoulders will hurt). I might fit in a Mercedes S-Class, but sorry, I can't afford it (though even that is designed for comfortable sitting in the back).
And I thought that's what the OP is about. Are you averagely sized, or do you maybe have some parts extra long or extra short? Or are your shoulders narrow or maybe extra wide (eg. I can imagine someone with very wide shoulders having more trouble with laptop keyboards)? Even the way our elbows and tendons connect is very different, so relative position of every limb could be taken into account to develop non-universal products.
I guess you have to find where you are "unusual" in your body constitution to really emphatise with the OP and how "universal" design is not the way to go when designing products for the physical world.
The same holds for the virtual world, but for some marginalized groups (at least in the past, like people with disabilities), legislation is required to make sure the basics are available to them. But generally, the market is ripe for less universal products.
That is, I can't lean on youth. But I also don't have near the pains mentioned on so many message boards.
Now, do I have trouble staying focused? Oh yeah. Staying motivated? You bet. Haven't exactly been a pleasant year. But my seating seems to be the least impactful thing going on right now. :(
I think there are a lot of stressed and unconditioned office workers who want some magical device to solve everything. Vertical mice, split vertical keyboards, expensive chairs. None of it replaces exercise.
Might be a controversial opinion.
Most things in life aren't some sort of instant solution. If you run you won't live to be a hundred. If you smoke you won't get lung cancer. What these actions do is shift your probability distribution in certain ways. Running frequently improves your overall life-expectancy, smoking increases your risk of lung cancer¹. You can do everything right and still have trouble. You can avoid every intervention and still have things work out.
So, if you're outcomes-oriented you modify your environment and behaviour to match the outcomes you want based on what you know to be capable. Getting vertical mice, split keyboards, expensive chairs are all interventions that shift your distribution to better outcomes. Lifting well and frequently, having better posture, taking breaks to move are also interventions that shift your distribution to better outcomes. Each intervention moves you to a better state of being.
Some interventions require you to apply techniques of willpower and motivation. Others require you to place yourself in an environment where those things aren't tested. Yet others are just tools. I think I would go out on a limb to say that most people younger than their early 30s who aim to spend themselves into good health are making moves that are rational.
Credentials here at bottom to prove I'm not some fat guy trying to justify not working out. My lift PRs indicate I'm not a novice (though not particularly exceptional). My weight at PRs (unless otherwise stated) was 165 lbs (75 kg). My height is 6' (184 cm).
Deadlift: 375 lbs at 180 lbs body weight, 3x315 lbs at 165 lbs
Squat: 275 lbs
Front Squat: 225 lbs
Clean and Jerk: 135 lbs
5k time: 23:53 (within 3 mos of the PRs)
¹ A quick test for your intuition for these events is to imagine in your head what you think the incidence of lung cancer in heavy lifetime smokers is and then look it up. 95%? 75%? 50%? 25%? 12%? 5%?
Are there any proven benefits to lifting heavy weight (compared to let say having a regular physical activity such as swimming, hiking, cycling, bodyweight exercises?)
So, if you're wondering about whether lifting is good for your health, you should first identify what outcomes you're aiming for and then look for yourself what interventions increase the likelihood of those outcomes. I cannot provide specifically the information you desire in an economical way¹.
But it's unfair to just leave you with nothing, so here's a starting point in your research (apart from the Wikipedia article on Weight Training²): https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2453303/
¹ For instance, maybe you don't care to be able to run some arbitrary distance. Maybe it isn't important to you to be able to cliff dive. Maybe it isn't important to you to live to 80. Maybe you consider being muscular to be of negative utility on its own. The state space is too large for me to capture here.
² https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weight_training#Health_benefit...
https://time.com/4803697/bodybuilding-strength-training/
It also increases your baseline strength, which is in turn one of the strongest correlates to maintaining health at any age.
We're not talking about crazy hypertrophy type lifting - bench 135, squat 185, deadlift 225 and you will not have rsi problems.
Ironically my RSI began within a few months of starting weight training.
Is that ok with you?
If exercise and hard work were that easy everyone would just do it and we would have far fewer problems.
I had lower back pain while sitting at a desk when I was younger.
Once I started lifting weights, and specifically doing heavy deadlifts, I've never had back pain again.
Interestingly, a lot of people are afraid deadlifts will cause back pain, but in my case at least, it cured back pain.
I used to have back and wrist pain. Now I do mild exercise like a brisk daily walk and 100 burpees. Basically the bare minimum to check off my exercise box. I read Sarnos book and took to heart the idea that a lot of aches and pains are not injuries but are in your head.
Now I have no aches and pains ever.
I have been most happy (backwise) while running and doing a light version of cross fit (where correct lifting was a part of) couple of times every day.
There is no amount of exercise that will let any human hold a squat position for 8 hours day-in, day-out.
As OP indicates, "universal" design is the problem.
I've done that for decades. I'd periodically suffer from debilitating back pain, where I couldn't even tie my shoes. I finally went to the doc, who said my problem was "weak back muscles". I pointed out the running, and the doc said "running does nothing for your back."
He gave me an illustrated guide to back exercises, aka core strength exercises. I do them 3x per week, and added some more I derived from yootoob back excercise.
Does it work? Hell yes. I wouldn't say my back never bothers me, but the pain has faded enough that it doesn't bother me anymore, and no more debilitating episodes.
It's been well over 10 years now. I don't enjoy the exercises, but I enjoy being free of the pain.
Doing this for hours on end trains the body tries to use its hip flexors for everything. Standing, lifting things, walking, even slow running. The hip flexors aren't meant to do this, and they are connected of course to your back muscles.
But the back muscles activated in concert with the hip flexors are not the "right" ones. They contort your back and cause imbalances and eventually back pain.
Running CAN help undo this.
But at certain paces of running (very slow ones that aren't much more than walking), the butt still is not used well, and you're not working to undo the 8+ hours of training you've given your hip flexors.
The more vigorous the running, the more your "prime path" evolutionary pathways of hamstrings, gluteus maximi, and lower back will be activated and trained.
Of course the older you are, the harder it is to do these paces, either sustained or speedwork.
Straight leg deadlifts can also help, but still isn't as good training for undoing the sitting position.
It's entirely possible this is useless for preventing back pain, or may even be bad for my back, but I wanted to share.
The hardest one for me is lying face down, arms extended forward. Lift your chest and legs off the ground. Oww! These are called "Supermans" because you look like Superman flying through the air.
It'll give you a vast new appreciation for when a dancer lifts his partner overhead by the waist and she gracefully lies prone only supported by his hands on her waist.
I double-dare you to even get your hands an inch off the ground!
One of the best things about the Bay Area is that HM chairs are always easy to find used on Craigslist for ~$250 and they'll last 10+ years. That's not expensive at all.
Tip: replace the wheels with "roller blade" chair wheels. They're quiet!
That said, I probably only work in my office half the day and work in other spots around the house (including the dining room table) the rest of the time. (And get up and walk around quite frequently.)
So far, my body has been happy spending extended amounts of time in any chair I set under it. Including the staple dining chair, or uncushioned outdoor wooden chair.
However, I rarely sit still for long periods of time. I'm constantly shifting my position and doing all sorts of seated acrobatics to relieve tension and get variation. (I do this also in fancy ergonomic chairs.) Maybe this is what makes it work? I have no idea.
Check out how these guys suggest to adjust their chair -- you can follow this with any adjustable chair and you will be 100% good to go IMO: https://www.hermanmiller.com/content/dam/hermanmiller/docume... (PDF)
Then again, you are lucky because all manner of injuries, genetic weakness, and former life conditions have not all occurred, thus gotten you to this healthy spot. For instance, car or sporting accidents or falls, these could all lead to chronic weakness in the body, and luck determines their occurence.
No RSI/other issues to me also (knock on wood) and I am over 50 but I am starting to sense more and more that recliner (even if 4 hours) is not good and consciously try to reduce an hour or 2, but was quite hard to do that with the recent bay area heat and fires.
Chairs? I am trying to move my office chair home, but that is so that I can cut down the recliner usage, but if I had a better dining arrangement (or my old dining arrangement) I probably would not bother.
I don't use a wooden chair, though, because I like the wheels and ability to rotate. But I much prefer very-very basic office chairs to all these gaming super-ergonomic overpriced whatever. I mean, they felt cool when I sat on them for the first time, but then it turns out to be fucked up in ways I admit I'll never be able to predict when buying one.
I feel a major change in comfort and that I need to “offset” the discomfort prolonged hours in the dining chair gives through standing and exercising.
Basically, if I am more conscious about standing and exercising I too have no problems with the dining chair - but it does require more exercise than the office chair for the same level of comfort I feel by the end of the working day.
It sounds like your routine is already good enough to offset it.
Regardless of what I just said, I still have a nagging feeling about long term consequences.
Here's where it gets weirder though. I used to have padding on my chair. And it was the the kind of shitty strap on padding that would slide around, and after it did, my leg would reliably fall asleep. One day I got tired of it sliding around and just removed it. My leg never falls asleep anymore.
Only complaint is that leg reinforcement has an II shape instead of H, so there is a little bit of sideways instability.
Before purchasing a chair, I went to an office furniture and tested several chairs and had the employee point out why people preferred different chairs. In the end, I got an Aeron. Also, it comes in 3 sizes and I made sure to get the correct size for me.
Maybe sitting in less comfortable chair is better than a comfortable one over long periods because you adjust your posture more. I personally haven't noticed this but maybe I do it unconsciously.
Like you, I exercise.
It is mentioned in the article briefly, and I feel it is a missed opportunity to discuss it.
I currently use a series of exercises that I designed specifically for combatting the ails of sitting, and it has been a big improvement. The chair i use matters less now.
It could be you have better sitting discipline (I tend to slouch when I sit), might be that you are more active (I didn't notice any issues last summer, when I was sailing every weekend, but then, I was not sitting at my dinner table for that long either), might be your regular chair is not that regular :)
When the WFH wave hit, people seemed to be going mad buying webcams and office chairs. Loads of people I work with spent a lot of energy researching and discussing chairs etc.
I have a sit-stand desk and I stand for perhaps 2 to 3 hours any working day. But the rest of the time I just sit on a normal old wooden dining chair. No pain. No aches. No RSI. No CTS.
I've been doing this for decades and nothing seems to have gone wrong yet. I do run 2 to 4 times a week so I do wonder if that helps avoid problems?
Are all the uber-expensive office chairs just snake oil? Or have I just been lucky?