Poor Lighting, How It Affects Your Productivity and Health

Lighting is one of the most important elements in everyday life; this holds true for professionals working from home. However, poor lighting is often ignored in discussions over productivity and well-being. If your home office isn't well-lit, poor lighting could be affecting your work efficiency and overall health more than you think.

Second, poor lighting may turn out to be extremely unproductive. Too little or too much light can result in irritating the eyes, including headaches and tiredness that reduce one's ability to pay attention. Over time, this will affect your ability to concentrate: you may take more time for simple tasks or make more mistakes. Bad lighting in a workspace depresses your mood, too, and lowers your motivation and reduces your creativity.

Adding to all that, poor lighting takes its toll on your health, too. Squinting at poorly lit screens can cause eye strain that can result in long-term vision problems. Besides these minor complaints, lighting can affect your body's circadian rhythm-your internal clock that controls your sleep-wake cycle. If it's too dark around the workspace during the day, you mess around with this rhythm and end up lethargic, hence not being able to catch proper sleep at night. Poor sleep then affects cognitive functions such as decision-making and problem-solving, aside from creating a vicious cycle of less work performance.

Lastly, inadequate lighting can result in poor posture wherein one strains to have a better view. This may eventually lead to neck, back, and shoulder pains that can be developed over time. These aches might appear minor at first but could balloon into chronic pains if not properly taken care of.

Surprisingly, it is amazing how much your productivity and health can improve with just investing in good lighting solutions-be it variable desk lamps or ceiling lighting. You seriously might be underestimating how much of a difference that would make into having an incredibly well-lit workspace.