Life got easier.

The lift arrived.

The remote control arrived.

The car moved closer.

The shopping came to us.

Then work moved onto a screen.

One by one, tiny reasons to move started disappearing.

Nobody planned it.

We just got really good at making life convenient.

We used to move because we had to.

Not exercise.

Not workouts.

Just getting things done.

Walking somewhere because there wasn't another option.

Getting up to answer the phone.

Going to a shop.

Taking something to somebody instead of sending it.

Standing up to change the television channel — remember that?

Individually, none of these movements seems important.

But stack hundreds of conveniences together and something interesting happens.

You can now get through an extraordinary amount of life without moving very far at all.

Your job changed too.

For millions of people, work once required considerably more physical activity than it does today.

Researchers have examined how occupational activity in the United States changed over five decades.

In the early 1960s, almost half of private-industry jobs required at least moderately intense physical activity.

By 2008, that figure was around 20%.

The researchers estimated that daily occupation-related energy expenditure had fallen by more than 100 calories over that period.

Work hadn't disappeared.

The movement inside it had.

Then came the screen.

Computers transformed what humans could do.

Now one person can write, design, calculate, communicate, buy, sell, organise and meet people around the world without leaving the same chair.

That's extraordinary.

It's also a completely new physical environment for the human body.

UK data show just how normal sedentary work has become.

Research using accelerometers has found office workers can accumulate a large proportion of their working day sedentary.

And unlike a workout, this isn't something that happens for 45 minutes.

It's the background to the entire working day.

Convenience isn't the enemy.

We're not giving up Deliveroo and taking the stairs to the 28th floor in protest.

Technology has made life safer, faster and more connected.

For many people it has opened possibilities that didn't exist before.

The interesting question isn't whether we should reverse it.

It's this:

If technology keeps removing movement, where are we going to put movement back?

Because we're still building.

Voice control.

AI assistants.

Autonomous vehicles.

Robots.

Automated checkouts.

Home delivery.

Remote everything.

We're becoming exceptionally good at removing friction from life.

And usually, that's the point.

One click.

One command.

Don't get up.

We'll bring it to you.

Convenience keeps winning. Movement keeps losing little jobs.

Maybe movement needs redesigning too.

Exercise is one answer.

Walking is one answer.

Standing desks are one answer.

Taking the stairs is one answer.

But modern life isn't going backwards.

We're going to have screens.

We're going to have desks.

We're going to have long journeys.

We're going to sit.

So perhaps the opportunity isn't simply to tell everybody to live differently.

Perhaps we need better ways to move inside the life we actually have.

That's where MicroMovement fits.

Robori doesn't ask you to abandon the desk.

It doesn't ask you to stop working.

It puts a small physical movement back into a moment modern life made still.

Because progress doesn't have to mean motionless.

Technology changed the way we live.

Maybe it's time movement caught up.

Made to Move.

Go deeper

Trends over five decades in US occupation-related physical activity — PLOS ONE

Sedentary behaviour and physical activity in office workers — PubMed

WHO Guidelines on Physical Activity and Sedentary Behaviour