IN MY SHOES: Perpetual Motion Machine
Jim Sollisch, creative director at Cleveland, OH, advertising agency in Marcus Thomas, extols the virtues of being fidgety in this Wall Street Journal op-ed:
I was one of those kids who couldn't sit still. My mother was forever saying that I had shpilkes—Yiddish for ants in your pants. Who knew it could save my life?
According to a recent study by the American Cancer Society, the more you sit still, the higher your risk of premature death. Women who sat for more than six hours a day increased their risk of premature death by 37% and men by 18%. Even in healthy people with normal body weights, too much sitting seems to have a negative effect on blood sugar and blood fats. Too much idle time decreases the production of lipoprotein lipase, or LPL, that's vital to healthy processing of fat. And the scary part is that sitting for long periods of time seems to negate the health benefits of rigorous exercise. …
When I'm forced to sit in a meeting, I bounce my legs, cross and uncross them every 10 seconds, and squirm in my chair. If that chair's got casters, I might even give it a spin. And that's before the meeting starts. During the meeting, I stand for a while or pace.
Not only does all that tapping and leg crossing and squirming burn off calories, but fidgeting also has a positive effect on brain activity. There are literally hundreds of studies showing that physical movement provides a boost to thinking and problem-solving. There's even a study that found that people could solve word association problems faster when walking backward than when sitting still or walking forward.
Editorial Note: The Stiletto is herself a fidgeter, and definitely thinks better when she’s on the move than when she’s sitting still. The only medical downside she can think of to fidgeting is not being able to lay still enough during an MRI to allow the technician to capture a clear, crisp image of whatever part of you is being scanned. “Open” MRI machines are great for claustrophobiacs but don’t help the fidgety at all.
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