Do you spend most your day sitting, whether it’s at a desk, behind the wheel, on the couch … or all of the above? Even if you’re making the right moves for your health in other ways, you could be sabotaging your health just by sitting.

The odds of diabetes, heart disease and cancer go up when you’re sitting down for long periods, even if you maintain a healthy weight and don’t smoke. Research suggests that even those who get the recommended 30 minutes of exercise are at risk from long hours spent sitting down.*

The key is to break up long periods of sitting by moving your body at more frequent intervals throughout the day.

Stand up for your health – Try these tips to get up and move more:

• Get up for a glass of water every couple of hours.
• Watching TV? Stand up (or dance around!) during commercial breaks.
• Set reminders to take a lap around your office building or neighborhood. Start your own walking group!
• Desk job? Try sitting on an exercise ball to engage your core muscles, or consider a standing desk or treadmill desk.
• Make a date for an after-dinner walk.
• Go high tech! Try on a wearable health tracker, pedometer or fitness app to measure your steps.
• Play active (motion-controlled) video games instead of passive (hand-controlled) games, or better yet, play tag or football outside.

* American College of Sports Medicine Exercise Sciences Reviews, “Science of Sedentary Behavior,” July 2010.

You can eat and exercise regularly for optimum health—but are you breathing for optimum health?

Here’s how to tell whether you breathe with the best of them.

Stand up and breathe deeply. As you inhale, does your belly go in or does it go out?

It should go out, breathing experts say, but many people expand only their chests, not their diaphragms (see “A belly breathing how-to”). That means they’re not breathing as deeply as they can.

Why bother about breathing?

Slow and controlled inhaling and exhaling can help you relax under tension or stress.

Anxiety and stress have been shown to lead to mood swings, sleep difficulties and concentration problems. And chronically high levels of the stress hormone cortisol can boost your blood pressure, speed your heart rate and weaken your immune system. Studies show that stress may also restrict blood flow to the heart, which is dangerous for people with coronary artery disease.

Breathe deeply, and you’ll feel more relaxed and mentally alert, say researchers. Deep breathing can be practiced nearly anywhere—in your car, on line at the grocery store or when your auto mechanic hands you a repair bill for $500. A proper breathing technique may even increase your exercise endurance and prevent “side stitches” during exercise.

The American Heart Association recommends that smokers trying to quit practice deep breathing when they feel the urge to light up. But if stress makes you reach for cookies or a cocktail instead, slow, deep breathing may squelch those destructive behaviors while lowering your heart rate and blood pressure.

A belly breathing how-to:

• Lie on your back with your legs either outstretched or bent with feet flat on the floor.
• Support your head with a pillow if desired and make sure you’re comfortable.
• Place one hand on your abdomen and the other just above your hand on your torso.
• Inhale through your nose and mentally count to four, expanding your belly as you fill it with air.
• Exhale while counting to four and release all the air from your belly. Note the rise and fall of your hand on your abdomen.

When you have become adept at belly breathing while reclining, you can try it at different times throughout your day while you’re sitting or standing.