Working Out While Working: The Fit Freelancer

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Freelancing is a great way of life and a lot of people who take it up in favor of their regular job start with the illusion that they will be spending less time working and concentrate more on living a balanced life.  Especially in the post-covid era, more people are turning to WFH options.

What a full-time freelancer soon realizes, however, is that it’s very easy and extremely tempting to tip the scales where freelancing is concerned. The ability to choose your own workload gives you the freedom to make your schedule as light – or as hectic- as you want. 

We’ve all been down that road before, accumulating more work than we can handle because a new project seems too good to pass up. We end up spending more and more time in front of our workstations as the weeks pass. 

The realization hits us when signs of constant fatigue start to show.

These may include:

Backache

Headache

Deteriorating eyesight

Lack of stamina and physical strength

and even RSI (Repetitive Stress Injury).

I have saved the best one for the last...weight gain! 

Yes, it happens to the best of us. Sitting down or even lying down with a laptop and “working” gets to your body’s metabolism, resulting in weight gain among other things. 

For those of us who need to produce “creativity” on a weekly schedule; catalysts are required in the form of sinful pleasures like coffee (with a generous helping of cream, of course!), chocolates, ice cream, and snacks to keep up the sugar level. It is, after all, what works most efficiently in refreshing your brain, right? 

But once you have stacked up on sugar, you realize it was salt that you really needed!  

Have you ever noticed the rate at which a bag of potato chips empties while you proofread a document halfway through your workday?  

When I started freelancing two years ago, I was in great shape. Maybe it had something to do with the interferon treatment that I had recently received that shed off more weight than I had ever lost in my entire life or the fact that I used to walk regularly and combine the routine with aerobics and yoga sessions to fight off the pain, but I was happy with it. Things went well for a while; I kept an hour aside for a walk, and another one for exercise. My son was barely a year and a half, so he was manageable without consuming my entire day. But as he grew up, and as my workload increased, I simply had no time left for exercise. 

It got to the point where I had all of the above-mentioned problems, including initial signs of RSI plus weight gain. 

I set out to remedy the problem, bought an elliptical trainer, and put it in my home office. I also made it a standard practice to sit at a proper desk while working and maintain proper posture to help with the RSI problem. 

I have to make a conscious effort to do it, but I always take a break every two hours, if not earlier. I get on the trainer; do a quick 15-20 minute session and some stretching to straighten my back and get back to work. 

The advantage of keeping the trainer in my office is that it’s always in front of my eyes, and it reminds me that I have to use it.

(Plus, I like to believe that having it close to me might scare a couple of pounds away!) 

I know how it goes for working parents, who have to take care of the house, raise kids, feed them, and help them with schoolwork, and still meet work deadlines. I’m one such example, with a preschooler who is more than a handful! My husband is always away for work, and I have to take care of everything myself! This increases the stress in my schedule, and I get very little time to work out, but by making a conscious effort, and stealing a few minutes out of my workday, I have managed to maintain my health and fitness while juggling work, home, and family. 

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Ayesha S. is a published author, storyteller, and copywriter with 10+ years of experience. She made quite a few U-Turns in her career and finally ended up following her passion for the written word. Her poetry has been published in leading newspapers since she was twelve. She loves to play the piano, travel, paint, and listen to music. She spends her days running after her beautiful children and her nights meeting deadlines for copywriting projects, all the while playing home base to a pilot. She is still wondering how she manages to write for pleasure in between!

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