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Corporate employees lead a lifestyle which is often desk-centric. The habits they develop over the years while working in a sedentary environment take a toll on their health.
In this podcast, Ashdin Doctor talks about building habits for corporate wellness.
Key Takeaways
- The modern office is Industrial Revolution efficiency fused with armed-forces hierarchy. Ashdin's diagnosis of why employees burn out: the structure was never designed for humans. Efficiency ("how fast?") plus hierarchy ("are you following orders?") are the two forces everyone is bending under.
- Chase energy habits, not wellness habits. Twenty-somethings don't care about wellness because their bodies don't hurt yet. Reframing the goal as higher energy to the same work lands better — five-hour tasks become two-hour tasks when focus and vitality show up.
- Google's remote-work burnout was a buckets problem. Working for Google Southeast Asia and Europe during lockdown, Ashdin found employees collapsing four life domains — work, relationships, chores, personal — into one. Assigning hours to each bucket gave people back their days.
- The working-from-home cure: a chair nobody else is allowed to talk to you in. Even a dining-table chair becomes "office" if family treats it that way. Wearing work clothes at home helps too. The stress sits in the in-between — not fully working, not fully off.
- Men burn out without community — and the "lone wolf" narrative makes it worse. His prescription for men struggling with mental health: hire a coach, join a sports or walking community, and find trauma circles or brotherhoods (online or in-person). Celebrating isolation is dangerous because men were never designed for it.
- Ergonomic supports make your body weaker. The lumbar cushion and neck pillow hold you in position so your core never engages. Japanese-style sitting — back erect, off the backrest, almost balancing a glass on your head — trains posture. Start the day there; return to it when you notice you've drifted.
- Hunching has three downstream costs. Mentally it feels like being a victim (chest closed, low confidence). Physically it traps the shoulder girdle in internal rotation, making overhead movement painful. And it compresses breathing — less oxygen, muddier thinking.
- Three quick workplace habit upgrades. (1) Standing desk — or a laptop on a stack of books. (2) Walk during phone calls, don't sit. (3) Rotate sitting positions (floor, sofa, chair) so no one pattern compounds. Walking meetings after lunch, group standing-desk sections, and 20-minute power naps around 2:30pm round it out.
- Work-life balance is a lie — structure is the real lever. He treats WLB like cycling: sometimes you lean left, sometimes right, but overall you're moving straight. What matters is scheduling personal commitments — workouts, meditation, reading, date nights — onto the same calendar as work meetings. Empty time gets eaten by Instagram, not by life.
- The habits you choose today build the future-you. Good or bad, the actions and thoughts today compound into who you become. Don't worry about the present — design for the future self you want.
In Ashdin's Words
On why the corporate world feels wrong
The corporate world we look at right now is nothing but the efficiency from the Industrial Revolution and the hierarchy of the armed forces. We as employees are subject to these two big forces — how fast can you do something, and are you following my orders or not. Most of the problems employees face come from these two angles.
The entire breakfast we eat came from the Industrial Revolution. Nobody ate breakfast before that. People had to travel long distances to factories and wouldn't get their 11 or 12 o'clock lunch, so breakfast was invented.
On energy over wellness
Think about when it comes to productivity — how much effort does it take to get this done? If you can improve that, you get so much work done with time for other things later. What used to take five hours now takes two. That's the focus that comes from higher energy habits.
On the remote-work buckets method
At Google, there was no distinction between personal life, professional life, relationship life. Everything merged. You'd wake up, switch off your alarm, start seeing emails — working from your bedroom in pajamas before your technical workday had started.
We broke it into four buckets — work, relationships and social life, chores, and personal time. How many hours a day do you want in each? The personal bucket is alone time, hobbies, the things that give you fulfilment. Many times we burn out because we don't feel fulfilled — we don't realise we're doing anything that makes a difference.
On working from home habits
Tell everybody in your family — "I am working now, do not come and disturb me." Even if it's a common dining-table chair, when you're on this chair, nobody in your home is allowed to talk to you. Something as simple as wearing your work clothes at home — you put on work clothes, now you're at work. The stress was in the in-between.
On men and community
We are celebrating the whole concept of "I'm a lone wolf, I only do things my way, the world is against me." Men were not designed for that mentality. Remove community and your ability to open up, to express feelings, changes. Men are not taught how to explain feelings — "I feel good today" is not a feeling; "I feel betrayed today" is.
Three things men can do: hire a coach; find a community of men doing something you enjoy — basketball, walking, tennis; and find a brotherhood or trauma circle. It all revolves around community.
On posture as a mental lever
Stop using ergonomic supports — back cushions, neck pillows. They hold you in a position where you're not using your muscles, so your core gets weaker. Sit the Japanese way — at the edge of the chair, back erect, almost balancing a glass on your head. When you hunch, you feel like a victim — chest closed, low confidence, defensive like a boxer. And you can't breathe properly, which means you can't think properly.
On simple workplace upgrades
Use a standing desk — or put books under your laptop. Walk around during phone meetings instead of sitting. Find two other sitting positions — floor, sofa — so your body gets a varied sitting diet. In offices, a group standing-desk section, walking meetings after lunch, and 20-minute power naps around 2:30 make a real difference.
On work-life balance
Work-life balance is a lie. Sometimes you're working more, sometimes less. It's like cycling — sometimes more on the left, sometimes on the right, but overall you're going in one direction.
Schedule not just work meetings but personal meetings and meetings with yourself — workout, meditation, reading time, education time. Put it on your Google Calendar. At a glance you see what today is going to feel like.
On the long game
The habits you choose today, the actions and thoughts you have today, are what create your future. If you want an awesome future, you have to have awesome habits today.
About the Speaker
Ashdin Doctor is The Habit Coach™. He believes that awesome lives start with awesome habits.
Back in 2014 Ashdin was unhealthy, overworked, stressed and sleep-deprived. Till it caught up with him and he found himself collapsing on the floor clutching his chest unable to move.
It was then that he realised that his life needed to change. In this pursuit, he informally studied various perspectives on health, nutrition, fitness, exercise, anatomy, nervous system, habits, motivation, lifestyles, meditation and sleep.
He has partnered with thought leaders, doctors and experts in various fields related to lifestyles and health. Having changed his life around, he began sharing these learnings with others.
Hence he started the habit coaching business called Awesome180 (Www.Awesome180.com). The Awesome180 program focuses on building one’s foundation habits – sleep quality (not quantity), nutrition (not diet), movement (not exercise), de-stressing, hydration and breathing. These form the foundation of creating Awesome Lives.
Apart from coaching his clients one on one. Ashdin has conducted workshops for Google, Herba Life, Bank of America, YPO, EO, Rotary Club and many others.
His book “Change Your Habits Change Your Life” has been published by Harper Collins.
Connect with me on Linkedin
Show Notes
(00:31) Would you like to tell us how you work?
(01:42) Why is employee health important for an organization?
(04:33) How can an employee, in today's world, adapt to the needs of the current environment he is working in? And how will he improve his wellbeing in the process?
(07:45) How can a person adopt a high energy habit?
(10:45) What does a man need to do to improve his mental health?
(16:33) What was the outcome of the Google Project?
(19:12) What habits can a person adopt to improve his posture, thereby improving his mental and physical health?
(23:55) What are the things that organizations can do to build a workplace culture of wellness?
(28:40) Would you like to share more suggestions for our listeners?
