A TOUR OF MY FURNITURE FREE HOME

hi everybody Rory legs and a wellness architect and functional life stylist from roar Alexander comm and today I am going to introduce you to my furniture free house so we all know that sitting is the new smoking and studies have shown us that on average people spend 13 hours a day sitting at another 7 to 8 hours in bed meaning on average people are 20 to 21 hours of either sitting or laying down in other words just being in static non-moving positions now when people talk about sitting in the new smoking at all they're not necessarily talking about you you you know just about the sitting position in fact you know this studies have shown that people with standing desks if you only stand are no better condition really there's just least other problems but the fact is we are stationary and in these static positions too long and static positions that are lowering our range of motion you know the average bed now is over about 3 feet high the average chair has you sitting in 90 degrees toilets are getting higher we are not doing enough squatting enough bending and just purely enough just non-static movement and including movements that go through our full range of motion so I'm gonna show you how I of design my house to maximize movement and maximize that non 90-degree sitting how I always have a you know basic my PJs packed with different angles different positions and just very small movements this stuff is not rocket science but I've really designed my house to be very much about movement and not about sitting I'll also show you my workspace with that supposed sitting I rarely honestly ever sit I don't remember really the last times I sit very often in a ninety-degree chair that's not to say I don't want to drive in my car obviously you have to but the fact is most of us you know you look at what the average person does sleeps for 8 hours get up make a cup of coffee sit down write they say that maybe they want some breakfast TV you know whatever then they go they sit on the toilet then golda they get ready they sit in the car they get the office they sit again they sit sit maybe they get up to do a little bit of um grab some lunch maybe go get some water things like that then they get back in their car or in the train or whatever they're getting into they sit again they get home they sit down again basically they're sitting until they go to bed now if you're lucky some people go to the gym in the middle but on average only 31% of people having a gym membership or go to a gym then of course having a gym membership doesn't mean you're going statistics have shown that a larger number of people that after your memberships go only once if at all so you know there's a big problem there and then this is the other thing too a lot of people think that just because they have a gym membership that because they go to the gym you know even let's say you even go I'm just gonna throw it up and let's go and say you every single day for an hour you do the math you are still only four percent more active than somebody who doesn't go to the gym at all now that's not to say those four hours are not important they are I was at the gym this morning but there is no way that that one hour of activity at the gym and let's talk about a lot of the average gyms you know I'm here in Vancouver a lot of the average humans still sit down to do your you know leg extension sit down to do leg curls you know lie down there's a lot of lying down and sitting down very little movement going on even in the gym so people go to the gym and a lot of them still end up spending a good majority of their time either laying down or sitting down sure they're activating some muscles but there's better ways to go about it so today I'm gonna show you a very few simple things now I'm not saying you have to turn your whole house into kind of a a movement focused or furniture free house like I am and you're gonna see what I say when I say I'm furniture free doesn't mean that I don't ever sit down I'm sitting down right now but we'll go over where I'm sitting we'll talk about how I sit how I sleep how I eat and how I work hope you guys enjoy this video so the first thing you're gonna notice in my house is my standing desk over here I have a standing desk with a bar stool now I you're sitting right now you gonna always a chair well that is true because like I said just doing standing all the time is not as does it's really no better so what I can do with quite often there's I'll stand on my desk to do my work but also on my stool I can sit down I can sit down with one leg I can place my foot up on the crossbar down here I can switch my feet I can put both feet up so quite often I'm just kind of half sitting on it like this kind of leaning on it so that's one of the that's one of the first things you'll notice now one of the next things you're gonna notice when you come to my place is my japanese-style dining table so I'm really inspired by Japanese culture I love the way that they really focus on movement so one of the first things I did when I come back to Canada is I said I really want a Japanese table when I was living in Asia in fact the whole four years it was in Thailand we almost just always sat cross-legged just like this just on the floor to do eating and it really grew on me but at the same time I don't really like I'm not a big fan of having the food on the ground really so I found my solution with this japanese-style dining table I have these time mats you could sit on with your knees I do my work and I do almost all my meals at my table right here now behind here you can see my few pieces of furniture what I have here is a very low beanbag style chair when I sit on it as you're gonna see I'm actually in a very deep squat position so this is where I do majority of my sitting now beside it so I have this big Jo beanbag chair and that is kind of where I like to lie down I like to kick back if I'm doing some work you know okay I lay back on that I can lay back and read a book it just keeps me on the floor constantly changing around my leg positions I've noticed since I started using this stuff since I moved back to Canada that it's really helping to improve my mobility as well it's a great way just to make sure that I'm in all these different issues I'm never sitting in that you know 90 degree angle if I am sitting it's quite often in a deep squat on that bad boy right there now in the kitchen I just have this this is am so tall so difficult to show everybody thinks as I've always so it's taller than everything else this is just a standing bar tables so quite often in the morning this is where I calm I make my coffee and I stand here and I drink my coffee I can you do some stretches like this while I'm drinking my coffee but again stool I think I've ever used this stool action pretty that's pretty dusty I've never actually used that stool for it now is your in the intro I also talked about beds being really high again I have stolen from Japanese culture and what I did is I just took the idea of the futon and I kind of I westernized it a little bit I was actually saw a picture on Pinterest that was really interesting and what they did is they just took some of these shipping crates you know these typical wooden shipping crate so you can get almost anywhere that gets big deliveries quite often they'll just give them to you however do your research make sure you get non-toxic ones and what they did on the Pinterest um a little picture I saw is they took these they painted them white which I have not done yet but I'm getting gonna get around to it and they also put some lights in underneath so for fun I like to turn on these lights you can see them going under there when this is paid a way to look really nice and then just a non spring just your typical IKEA foam mattress now as you can see I am in a very deep squat position so I can sit cross-legged like this if I want and then every morning for me to get out of bed basically I have to get into a deep squat and stand up or you know I have to put my hands down go down here and stand up so you can see it's significantly different than the typical three foot you know one meter tall beds that people just pretty much slide out of and they're already standing up so that is my solution to the bedroom out on the floor I have my traditional Mysore yoga mat which I picked up when I was on my trip with Ramona Braganza through India and above it as you can see up there just a little bit I have a plastic pyramid that I picked up a pyramid Valley Meditation Center not that I'm a pyramid power person really but it's kind of a nice little reminder of just when it's time to meditate so you know I could just do any kind of stretching I wanted here in the morning if I want I can do a little bit of breathing practices before I go to bed at night stuff like that but again just having my little Mysore yoga mat on the ground again along with that just helps to me to remind me to get in my movement and make sure I'm getting in my breathing practices before you ask me what it is that I keep on my the staff table I have my function compass I picked up at Hong Kong along with some Chinese and Thai coins over here I have my Thailand chopstick set and then over here that is a Tibetan singing bowl as well as some of the books I'm reading right now one is Fung Shui your life and the other is the non tinfoil guys to EMFs in case you're wondering what this stuff is over here this is actually my newest shipment from anthro desk anthro desk is an awesome canadian company that does everything when it comes to basically standing desks and optimizing your workspace this is a brand new fatigue mat they just sent me that I'm gonna be taking actually to my stand-up desk today which is downtown as well as this this is if you watch my other video you'll notice I had to put my laptop on a box in order to bring it up to my eye height this is actually a really cool swivel arm which I'll show you guys at the end of this video as well when I show you what my workspace looks like that's gonna allow me to basically bring my laptop up to a height yeah keep my Bluetooth keyboard have my proper elbow height finally we get to the washroom now you're probably saying well what can you possibly do in a washroom well there's two things that you can do what I do one I don't actually have you up but I'm gonna tell you about it cuz it's been on the top of my list for ever I just haven't got around to getting it yet but I will get it very soon so in the shower if you want to these are very easy you know you can actually find these quite a lot in the kind of the farm medical pharmacies this is a shower stool usually reserved for people that need to sit in the shower a lot usually you find it for older people or people that are injured but what you can do because again it's only 712 of 12 which is highs if you want you can have one of these in your shower and you can actually get down into a deep squat and sit in the shower so in the morning you can do your standing shower but you can also sit down let the water come down on you and if you're into cold showers it's a great way just to sit there and just suck it up now the other thing that I don't have and I'm not gonna show you right now because I don't have it is obviously a squatty potty actually I'll show you a picture of it right now so the squatty potty basically allows you to get into a very deep squat position which is better for the body it's better for our physiology studies and lots of research that 90-degree angle that we sit in traditionally right now is actually not very good it puts a lot of pressure on our internal bowels so having a squatty potty's gonna set you up into that proper position now if you've ever been to Asia or even parts of old Europe quite often a lot of North Americans and surprisingly go into the toilet and they just gonna see a hole in the ground and then quite often we're stuck like you know got hands of the laws and we're doing all this weird stuff well that's because a lot of the Asian culture especially especially today they just can still get down into a nice deep squat position quite often you'll see them just eating in the squat position they just converse in a squat position so getting into that really deep squat position is a great way to start improving your mobility to start improving your life so what I would suggest is getting yourself maybe a couple you know 12-inch wooden stools that you can place around the house and that it's just gonna remind you again just little things to remind you oh I should probably do my squats today so you can go to any hardware store any store really even in the mall just get a little 12in stool place it down somewhere and just say to yourself you know what every day I'm going to sit in a deep squat for three minutes you can also just do things like wall sits now of course the last thing I always do I head out this door and they'll go for a walk walking one of the best things that you can possibly do for your health I try to walk every single day even if I go to the gym I just don't say well I went to the gym so that's my activity today I will still go for a walk every single day it doesn't have to be very long honestly just a walk around the block is more than fine enough now little tip for you if you wanted to leave burn some extra calories you want to help keep the fat off try to taking a little walk either before or after your dinner particularly after your dinner is really gonna help you digest it or doing a little bit of a speed walk before dinner just helps with regulating blood sugar levels a little bit more so try to get into walking at least once every single day all right so I lied there's one more thing I'm going to show you because I haven't shown it to you yet and that is my feet Oh everybody loves feet but what is this I'm wearing on my feet well these are toe separators so you know different companies sell them in fact I even see one right now advertised an Instagram that sells them for I think it's about $65 for a silicone pair of these all you do is should place them between your toes now do not spend $65 these you can get at the dollar store in fact I think it's for what is it is a manicure as a pedicure such ever'one the feet is that women do quite a bit a good time these you can get at the doll or store but what they do is they just allow you to spread your toes out a bit which is healthy for your feet a lot of times you know especially around here we often have our you know feet inside socks inside shoes all day that is literally like wearing mittens imagine if you just wore mittens for you know eight to 10 hours a day even longer on your hands every single day imagine what would happen to your hands they would pretty much end up like this maybe the thumb is free but your hands would end up if you did that every single day they would end up in this really stiff position where they build must become more like you know like penguin penguin wings or anything else so same idea with your feet your feet are meant to be very movable and des terres now if you see babies babies are great they can cling on everything with their feet make you move their feet independently when we get older we don't do that so having a pair of these yoga toes is a great way I throw these on quite often and I just try to wear them for as long as I can but as promised here's a quick little just sneak peek at my anthro desk workstation huge shutoff by the way to answer desk for hooking me up really large so to show you guys what I got going on over here so this is where I do a huge majority of my work you can see this is quite often where I record my podcast from my focus right track station there my microphone set up and then of course you've got yourself a camera up here so I can face it like this it records me while I'm doing my podcast on top of that is my anthro desk standing desk now what I did to upgrade it just a little tweak because I am a big fan of whiteboards is I install this whiteboard paper on it so I've turned about maybe about 25% of my standing desk into a whiteboard desk as well and then on top of here this is brand new I again answer desks at me I had my laptop set up in a box they've sent me this really great swivel that allow us to bring the laptop right up to my eye height now of course you know standing we said before is not just a total solution so a couple more little hacks I've put in here is this is my brand new fatigue map by the way you definitely need a fatigue mat when you're out of standing desk it's a you cannot have you cannot stand all day without a floozy desk the other thing I've done is you can see I have a 12 inch squat stool as well as an Ikea table that I can use when I want to get down into a nice deep squat position so what I'll do very often as I move basically through standing now this of course is an electronic standing desk so I can just press the button it can lower the sitting if I do want to sit and then I can also do some squatting the desk of course doesn't go to squatting because that's not what normal people do but that's why I have this my little 12 year stool and here to allow me to do some squatting as well fan back here if I want to do a few little exercises just to wake up the old muscles but all in all this is my anthro desk standing desk workstation let's go back to my house well there you have it a tour of my furniture free movement inspiring house again really simple things like I said you don't have to necessarily go and take everything apart but honestly getting yourself a Japanese dining table throwing yourself down with a beanbag setting up a little area in your house when I call the Zen zone that just reminds you to do some movement throwing in a 12-inch squat stool anything like that there reminds you just to get a little bit more movement in your day think about lowering your bed now one of the reasons I don't actually have the Japanese style entirely on my bed is because you know when you place it on the floor kinds of keeps in the moisture so by having that couple inches under there allows the air moisture to go through now in a Japanese traditional house what they normally do is they just roll up their futon every day so in other words they take apart their bed they put it back and forth every single day obviously I'm not gonna do that that's not the proper kind of mattress for that but you want to make sure you're not just throwing a mattress on the ground either because you're gonna get a bunch of you know moisture in there and that leads to mold problems like that so hope you guys enjoyed the tour of my home and of course of my workspace that you also saw if you did please share this video and don't forget to visit me at WWE and recom you can catch up with my blogs there and also check out while you're there my health by design eight week total health body and life transformation program I'm looking forward to helping you live stronger longer and better talk to you guys again soon

Channel: Ror Alexander: Health By Design

Views: 7,442

Rating: 4.5208335 out of 5

Keywords: anthrodesk, standing desk, mobility, furniture free home, no furniture, steps, step challenge

Id: Lg8nSpka2y8

Length: 17min 53sec (1073 seconds)

Published: Sat Jan 19 2019