Is there anyone who sits at a desk all day and does not have a spot between their shoulder blades that aches by four in the afternoon?

I had that ache for six years. I assumed it was just what desk work costs you. It is not, and the fix was not a two hundred dollar chair.

The problem is not your posture, it is your stillness

There is no perfect position that stays comfortable for eight hours. Any position, good or bad, becomes painful if you hold it long enough. The research on this is fairly consistent: the people with the least back pain are the ones who change position most often.

So the goal is not to sit correctly and freeze. The goal is to move.

Set up so that moving is easy

1. Feet flat on the floor, thighs roughly parallel to it. If your chair is too high, get a footrest or a box. Dangling feet pulls on your lower back all day.
2. Screen top at eye level. Stack books under the monitor. Looking down for eight hours is what makes your neck hurt, not your eyes.
3. Elbows at about ninety degrees with your wrists straight, not bent up or down.
4. Screen an arm length away. Closer than that makes you lean forward without noticing.
5. Support your lower back. A rolled towel behind your lumbar curve works as well as most built in supports.

Stand up once an hour, even for thirty seconds. This is the single most effective thing on the list. Set a timer if you have to. The ache I had for six years went away in about two weeks once I started doing this, and I changed nothing else.

The moves that undo desk damage

• Chest opener: hands behind your back, clasp, pull your shoulders together, hold twenty seconds.
• Neck turn: look over each shoulder for ten seconds. Do not roll your head in circles.
• Standing backbend: hands on your low back, gently lean back and hold ten seconds.
• Hip flexor stretch: half kneeling, tuck your pelvis, hold thirty seconds each side. This is the one most desk workers need most.

The order matters less than doing any of it at all. I keep a timer that goes off at the fifty minute mark, and when it rings I stand up, do two of these, and sit back down. It takes ninety seconds.

What I got wrong for years was chasing equipment. I bought a lumbar pillow, a keyboard tray, and a standing desk converter before I ever tried simply getting up. The equipment helped marginally. Standing up every hour helped enormously.