Anyone who sits for long periods of time notices one thing: poor posture after ten minutes or so. Your body winds up slouching or contorted in some serpentine position in search of that comfortable, yet elusive angle. Watch people rock or turn if they sit in a swivel chair. When you get up from the chair, you cannot help but notice the stiffness in your lumbar region, or lower back. This is because you have been subjecting your lumbar region to more pressure than it should be exposed to. Years of this abuse can only mean one thing: nagging, debilitating back pain.

Various solutions have been used to offset this: lumbar support cushions or ergonomic chairs. These are not viable long term solutions for one simple reason: they do not address the source of the problem, which is a weak lower back. The benefit of these devices is that they provide short-term relief from injuries, like a splint or a cast. While no one keeps a splint or cast on for years, people see no problem with "splinting" their back with a lumbar cushion or ergonomic chair for years. This is only an accommodation of the problem, not a solution.

Another problem with these devices is that your body still gets "stale" after sitting in one position for long, and your body fidgets for another position in which to relax. Alas, these devices lock you into one position, and you must get up or adjust the device, if it allows for it.

Perhaps the most discouraging aspect of some of these devices is the price. A friend with serious back pain once told me that the price of a Swiss ball was a mere 5% of the price of his special ergonomic chair. These devices can be quite the sticker shocker, yet they still do not strengthen your back one bit.

The Swiss ball is superior to the other devices in all of the aforementioned areas: it addresses the source of the problem, it encourages active sitting and perhaps most importantly, it is very inexpensive. Additionally, it provides a means of exercising in a variety of ways that strengthen your whole body, and not just your back. It is a Swiss army knife of sorts.

It is very easy to maintain proper (lordotic) posture while seated on a Swiss ball. Your body finds the right position and settles into it quite easily and nicely. After the first day of sitting on the ball, I noticed a low-grade fatigue in my back, as if I had been working out. I realized that I was subjecting my back muscles to a new load; that of keeping my body in proper posture while seated on a round ball. The beauty of the ball's instability is that it forces your body to adjust itself on a continual basis to stabilize your body and prevent you from falling off. But do not think this is a tightrope walk where you are about to fall off at any second. It is quite easy to stay seated on a Swiss ball. However, your body continually has to do subconscious micro-adjustments to stay balanced. This is a free workout you can do every day, all day, at work and get paid for it!

The instability of the ball lends itself to continual adjustment of the body. Nervous or pent-up energy can be easily channeled into moving the body around while seated on the ball. This ensures that the body will not go stale, because it is never in the same position for very long. When it wants to move, it can, rather than letting you know after you move that it has been getting quite sore. Additionally, the continuous movement keeps your spine healthier and minimizes the back pain you already have. When I get stuck on long phone calls, I take my feet off the floor and "perch" on the ball. This forces me to work a bit more to stay on the ball, and gives me another kind of workout. A bonus is that you can periodically stretch out by draping your back on the ball - try that on your ergonomic device!

The extended benefit of the Swiss ball is a better posture. Continuous hunching over a monitor while sitting in a chair leads to the vulture look. Poor posture can easily be attributed to weak back muscles. The forward lean is due to the fact that the back muscles are unable to counteract the chest muscles. Over time, this unhealthy situation is begging for back pain to happen. Couple this with the fact that the aging process is accompanied by muscle atrophy, so that without an ongoing strength program, poor posture will eventually and inevitably overtake the body.

One of the most amazing aspects of the Swiss ball is how much money you don't pay to strengthen your back and banish back pain. The top end price of the Swiss ball is where most quality ergonomic devices start. From there, the price tag can be up to 50 times higher for the top end of these devices.

So, don't just sit there!...Sit there on a Swiss ball.