Want to help boost all your life skills at once in less than a minute? This quick stand and stretch exercise can help you feel fresh and ready to take charge!
Every week, your free Young Professional training gives you tips and challenges to build your top life and work skills:
All of these skills are affected by your mental health and taking a fresh approach to whatever life throws your way. So how does this quick stand and stretch exercise help? It gets the blood and oxygen moving round your body. A quick stand and stretch can help you feel fresh, in the moment and ready to take charge!
Stand and stretch exercise – boost your Young Professional focus
Unless you’re working outside, you often don’t get much of a chance to move around a lot in the day. If you study in school or college, or work in an office, you can get sluggish and restless by the end of the day if you’ve been sitting around a lot. This can make you feel trapped or frustrated, and it can also drain your focus.
All the Young Professional skills you are learning to develop need a bit of focus, and so does your everyday life. This stretching exercise can help! Please note – if you have any physical disabilities that mean you can’t stand and stretch, you know your body best. See if you can consider ways to tweak this exercise to make it work comfortably for you. You can also talk with your doctor, physio professional, carer or support group for ways to move and exercise, if possible, in a way that is right for you.
If you are able to, here’s a way to stand and stretch over your day to get the blood (and focus) flowing:
- Set an alarm for every half hour
- Stand up
- Stretch your arms above your head and take a few slow, deep, breaths.
- See if you can feel the blood going round your body, from your toes to the tip of your head.
- See if you can feel like a burden you didn’t even know was there is being lifted.
- If you can, take a short walk. Get a glass of water before heading back to your desk.
This exercise takes almost no time at all, but can make a big difference to your day. It helps to melt stress away so you feel more fresh even when it’s afternoon and you’re desperately waiting for hometime or the weekend.
TOP TIPS:
If you’re still a student, obviously you don’t want to disrupt the lesson by standing and stretching! But you can nip to the restroom in between classes and stand and stretch in a cubicle where no-one can see you.
Setting an alarm on your phone can help you make a quick stand and stretch become part of your everyday routine. It can be a vibrate alarm or silent notification if you don’t want your phone beeping at you all the time!
