When it comes to our physical and mental wellbeing, there is no time like the present to dial it up a notch- preferably, with the help of an expert. 50-year old fitness guru, Japheth Amimo grew up in Eastlands and worked his way to the top of his field. He was employed by some of Kenya's most prominent organizations including the Holiday Inn, Serena Hotels and the United Nations Organization. He was also the personal trainer to the late former President of Kenya, Daniel Arap Moi. More recently, Japheth has been running his own company, Japheth Powered Fitness.In this interview, he opens our eyes to some of the complications that come with our current lifestyles and offers practical steps we can take to make improvements.How has COVID-19 affected your business?People stopped showing up at the gym. There was no money coming in. The rent was due. I had no choice but to close shop. It's been tough.One thing I'm learning, however, is that I can and probably should re-work my business model. I still have people reaching out to me for my services online and suddenly, my networks have expanded beyond the borders. Right now I'm thinking, do I really want to go back and restrict myself to a physical gym when I can work from anywhere in the world?Do you?I can't answer that definitively yet, but COVID-19 has given me pause for thought. And with the current circumstances, I think the demand for postural rehabilitation services around the world will go through the roof.Why?Because people are confined to their houses. They are spending a lot of time sitting. Postural problems were bad enough before COVID-19, and now, they will be bigger than ever. About five years ago, CNN did some research where they coined the term 'Sitting is the new smoking'. We call it the sitting disease. Because in the long term, sitting for extended periods of time can be devastating to your health.You see, human beings were not designed to sit. At the beginning of our evolutionary journey, we were picking fruits, scavenging and digging. We were continually moving. Fast forward to today, and our hunting and gathering is on the computer where are sitting down, staring at a screen, in bad posture, for hours on end. It's the nature of many jobs.And it doesn't just end with the jobs. We also sit in traffic during our daily commute, we sit in front of the television at home, we sit down when we are having a meal. There's a lot of sitting in our lives. And so specific muscles forget to work because we are not using them anymore. When we evolved into becoming bi-pedal, our glutes and our spine strengthened so we could stand. Our abdominals became stronger and were firing up different muscles in order to reinforce our upright position. Now, because of sitting all the time, our abdominals have forgotten to do their job, and our glutes have gone to sleep. From my work, I have realized that the most common cause of back and neck problems is bad posture.Would you say technology created this problem?Yes. The industrial revolution led to what we call bloodless injuries. These injuries are caused by moving in a particular direction, repetitively. Aside from sitting at our computers, think of a supermarket teller who is seated in one position all day, moving items from left to right, left to right. They start getting elbow pain, wrist pain, neck pain, back pain, and it intensifies over time. When they go on leave, it goes away, and when they come back to work, it returns. Many people can relate to this. You go to get your passport picture taken, and the photographer asks you to look up, but you think you're sitting up straight, right?Read full interview on Qazini