A few years ago, Susan and I purchased watches with a number of fitness features. The watches track how many steps we take, how far we have walked, record calories burned, minutes of exercise, and hours in which we have stood enough to record motion. One of the features of the watch is that it gives a little vibration at about 5 minutes to the hour if I have been sitting for the rest of that hour. If I am able, I stand and walk around for a few minutes and the watch records another hour in which I stood. If I am in a meeting I will sometimes shake my hand enough to trigger the motion sensors in the watch to think I’m engaging in a more physical activity.

We bought the watches in part because they record heartbeat and have a basic ECG function that can detect abnormal heartbeats such as atrial fibrillation. Because Susan had a near-fatal experience with the condition and I experienced atrial flutter that was detected by the watch and triggered a series of medical interventions including a cardiac catheterization to correct the condition, we do pay attention to our watches. We also bought the watches because we were influenced by a brilliant heart doctor who happens to also be a bit of a technophile who spoke positively of his watch.

I’ve wondered how that watch would have responded to me when I was in my preteen and early teen years. Of course the technology had not yet been invented in those days, so it is idle speculation. I was a fidgeter. I used to bounce my knee so much that it made the dining room table vibrate and prompted requests from my parents to “sit still!” I would play with my hands, or with anything that fell to hand such as a paper clip, a rubber band, a bottle of glue, pencils, and the like during class at school. My constant fidgeting was noticed by my teachers who sought to remedy the situation.

In the early years of my college education, I suffered from hives that were made more painful because I could scratch at my arms, especially the insides of the elbows nearly constantly. I would scratch as I read, as I sat in class, and in almost every setting.

I recognize the behavior in my son and my grandson. Both are constant fidgeters. I joke that tiny items such as paper clips or the plastic ties for bread bags keep turning up all over our house. I will find items from the kitchen on the book shelves in the study and items from my desk on the end tables in the living room. I know that these items have traveled in the hands of our son or our grandson who can’t resist picking them up and playing with them in their hands.

As part of my seminary education, I learned about centering prayer and other meditation techniques. Through regular practice I became more able to calm my self, sit quietly, and meditate. I found that being mindful of my breathing helped me calm my physical body and control pain. After discovering that I don’t respond well to certain types of pain medication when I injured my back, I developed the ability to use meditation to control my response to pain. Once when I was burned the dermatologist who was helping me recover commented about my “Zen-like state” when receiving painful treatment. I am no expert in Buddhist practices and I’m not sure of the connection between my meditation and Zen Buddhism, but I took the doctor’s comments as a compliment and appreciated the simple fact that I was able to avoid opioid painkillers.

Learning to calm myself, however, is not all positive. It makes my watch think that I am not standing when I clearly am. The watch measures motion and my practice of stilling my body and my mind doesn’t give it anything to measure. More importantly, I have read a bit about medical studies that are showing that fidgeting is beneficial. James Levine, a professor of medicine at Mayo Clinic is an expert in obesity. He says “the fidget factor” is an outward manifestation of an innate impulse to move. Growing evidence is showing that the impulse to fidget helps those who are fidgeters unconsciously manage their weight by prompting them to move. Studies have shown that slimmer office workers tend to act on their fidget impulses more often, standing and moving around for two hours more each day than those with obesity.

It turns out that fidgeting is natural. Humans have a biological predisposition to movement. Even a slight fidget, such as tapping a toe, helps to burn of excess energy that otherwise ends up being stored as fat. Fidgeting while sitting can increase the amount of calories burned by up to 29% compared to lying down without moving. Fidgeting while standing up such as rocking or shifting from foot to foot, boosts the number of calories burned by 38%!

Experts are not suggesting that fidgeting is a replacement for exercise. They have noted, however, that those who give in to the urge to fidget are more likely to get the exercise their bodies need.

Maybe after all of these years of teaching myself to be calm when I need to wait and to sit without fidgeting have resulted in some habits I need to change.

When we had tiny children in our home, I noticed that I would rock when I stood, even if I was not the one holding the baby. This tendency has reappeared each time we have spent time with an infant grandchild and when I am around new babies at church or in other settings. I noticed then that the simple rocking movement while standing is not a deterrent to conversation. Unlike my wildly shaking knees when I was a teen, I can stand with others who barely notice the gentle rocking.

I doubt that there is any hard evidence that those who fidget live longer than others. There are genuine benefits to having learned to calm myself including reduced stress response. However, I do think I am going to think more positively about the urge to move and learn to give in to it. I don’t need a watch to remind me that moving is good for me, but I guess having one doesn’t hurt, either.