Home Treatment for Repetitive Stress Injury

I’m a lucky girl — my office is my home and any coffee shop, library or friend’s house I choose to work at for the day. Sometimes I’m on the road in meetings but mostly I set my own hours, schedule and choose my clients. I’ve had my share of bad office conditions, though, and I’ve come to believe that despite the environment you’re forced to work in each day, there are ways to make it more comfortable and healthy.

Usernomics recently posted a list of statistics from recent research, highlighting how much an office environment can affect workers, and how unhappy most are with the facilities they work in — extreme temperatures, bland or dumpy facilities, and safety risks are just some of the terrible conditions that people live with day in, day out, 40+ hrs/week.

The stress caused by these environments alone can have a bad affect on your health, both your psychological state, as well as your body’s physical ability to fight infection and the tension and inflammation accompanying an overuse injury.

So, I’m writing up a few ideas for those of you coping with atrocious offices. Even if the only space you’re afforded is a cramped cube, you can still incorporate your own style and artistry — Cubistry, we’ll call it — and wow your coworkers with the comfort of your space.

Plants — getting some houseplants can help bring a drab room to life, literally. In addition to making a space feel more livable, some plants also improve the air quality, breathing in the carbon dioxide and hazardous chemicals and breathing out clean oxygen you can breathe. Peace lilies, grape ivy and orchids are great office plants, because they thrive in low lighting conditions. Your local nursery should also have other suggestions, too.

Lighting — You might not be blessed with a window view, but you can simulate sunlight by supplementing those awful fluorescents with full-spectrum desk lamps. If you have your own office, get a full spectrum floor lamp and leave the fluorescents off during the day. Your visitors will feel wowed when they walk into your specially-lit office, as if they’ve stepped away from the office world for just a moment.

Decor — Everyone has their own aesthetic when it comes to colors, images, and knick-knacks. You can infuse your own into your space easily. If you can’t hang pictures in your cubicle, you can at least tack in some photos, or a swathe of fabric you like. I once hung an elegant strip of dark red silk across an office cubicle, and to my surprise, everyone who visited me commented on that simple touch.

Knick-knacks — We all have the squeeze-toys, stuffed animals, photo cubes. How about using interactive knick-knacks? — rubix cubes, puzzle games and the like are great diversions from a boring, drab office, and you can use them to get your coworkers to visit you and set other visitors at ease.

Music – Keep your coworkers and yourself on the ball by putting on some light music during the day. If you can’t all agree on a radio station, use your headphones. You can import CDs to iTunes, listen to Internet radio or try out Pandora.com, where you can design your own radio station.

Ac-scent-uate — What does a dingy office smell like? Usually, stale coffee and building materials. You can cover this up by using aromatherapy techniques. Light perfumes, great-smelling lotions, or even a simple water-based spray, such as rosewater, can help your cubicle smell like a place you’d want to spend time. Be sure to use natural scents, because many people are allergic to perfumes!

Clean, clean, clean — Last but never least, it’s important to be a good housekeeper in your office. You can’t control the rest of the building, but you can take some time out once a week to wipe down your computer, desk and keyboard with some anti-bacterial wipes. This is a really great step to staying healthy when everyone around you seems to be coughing and sneezing — I once read somewhere that keyboards usually harbor more bacteria than toilet seats. Yuck!

So, there you are, with some ideas on how to make your living space more comfortable. I’m sure you’ll have your own ideas too, of things you’ve tried or seen in your colleagues’ spaces, so feel free to share them in the comments section.

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