Sculling Your Way to Better Performance at Work

I just got back from a routine physical with my primary care physician. He’s a really nice guy and has proven to be a good doctor over the years. He’s not without his eccentricities, but I think that makes him a much more pleasant doctor to visit - but that’s just me. Anyhoo, I’m there getting the standard work-over that comes with a physical and he starts telling me about how his wife recently went to a sculling and yoga camp in Vermont. I found it a little bit odd, but he’s talking about sculling like it’s riding a bike or something else that most people have done. I’ve never sculled, but I’ve canoed, so I guess I’m at least in the ballpark.

So he goes on to discuss how well his wife (in her mid-50s) performed at this camp, outdueling some women who were 20 years younger, etc. From prior visits, he knows that I’m self-employed and am pretty much a desk-jockey when it comes to my productive working hours. So he suggests that I take a look at this book (which I later heard him pushing on the middle-aged woman in the next room), Younger Next Year for Women. This is a book that explains how, with the proper exercise and common sense, women can maintain the energy and physical abilities of a 50-year-old well into their 70s and 80s. The doc was quick to acknowledge that I’m only 33 and a man, but that he thought the book did a great job of explaining the fundamental principles of a healthy lifestyle without the gung-ho machismo of Younger Next Year (apparently for men). A prouder man may have taken offense, but I harbor no delusions regarding my physical status.

So the doctor goes on to explain that studies have shown that people who are physically fit perform much better at desk jobs than those who are unfit. The studies seem to suggest that people who are fit have a greater ability to focus entirely on the work at hand without worrying about the fact that they may have eaten too much for lunch or that they can feel a fat roll resting in their lap. The body is perfectly at ease and is freeing the mind to devote all of its energies to the task at hand. I’m no doctor, but this all sounds legit to me. And I’m saving up for my new sculling boat, starting……..now.

Tags: employee fitness, employee health, health and fitness, healthy workers, office fitness

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