This may come as a shock to you, but being at a desk all day for work means . . . you're not moving. Try to control the feelings of horror; I know this is a lot to take in.

Sarcasm aside, yes — I knew that by working at a desk job, where the emphasis is on sitting down and writing all day, I wouldn't be moving as much anymore. But I didn't fully realize the gravity of the situation until I slapped a tracker on my wrist last week.

It all started with a shiny new Fitbit Alta that I received at an event. I had no idea what to expect when I opened the box (to be honest, I just assumed it was a pedometer) and went in with a super open mind. I learned about the tracker's capabilities and my nerdy brain was immediately enthralled; I love data and was excited to analyze movement (and sleep!) in a new way. "This will be great!" I thought. "I'm so active, this little band is going to be like positive affirmation . . . ON MY WRIST!"

But the first day tracking my movement came with a shock that perhaps shouldn't have been much of a shock: I wasn't actually moving . . . like, at all. I went from an event in the morning straight to the office — in an Uber. From there, I sat at my desk all day, only got up a few times to go to the bathroom and grab food that was just downstairs, took the train home (more sitting!), and walked a few blocks back to my house. Grand total: 1,898 steps.

To someone who had no frame of reference in regard to step goals, this seemed like a decent amount; then I realized the average recommended amount is 10,000. I hadn't even made it a fifth of the way to the recommended average (insert Keanu Reeves [1] *whoooaaaaa!*).

Ten-thousand steps equates to roughly five miles, which, when you think about it, isn't all too much for a full 12- to 16-hour day. And those 10,000 steps can have a serious impact. Celebrity trainer Harley Pasternak noted it as one of the top three ways to lose weight [2], and we spoke with one woman who lost over 100 pounds [3] by starting with 10,000 steps per day.

I consider myself pretty active; I work out five to six times per week, I love to go for runs [4] (I'm running my fifth half-marathon at the end of July), and even on days when I'm not exercising [5] in the traditional sense, I am still pretty mobile and love hiking, biking (very casually), exploring, and anything to do with swimming and water sports.

It was a hard thing to realize that those activities only make up a fraction of my week, especially compared to the amount of time I'm not active. Like I said, it's obvious that sitting down at a desk = no movement, but the disparity was now dramatically apparent — and there were numbers to back it up.

To be honest, I never thought I'd get a wake-up call from a step tracker. It might sound silly, but seeing my stats all laid out really was my wake-up call. The numbers (although not a hard and fast quantifier for all activity) put so much into perspective. I'm now acutely aware of just how sedentary I can be on an average day.

Am I going to be pacing my house trying to get to a specific number or goal? Heck no! I don't think that's the point, either. My goal isn't a number of steps; it's simply to counteract the sedentary nature of my job to keep my body performing at its best.

As I write this, my wrist is buzzing, saying, "Let's move!" — reminding me to get up, work my legs a little bit, and use this time to walk away from the computer. Armed with data, a new perspective on my everyday life, and a shiny new fitness tracker, I'm ready to make moves — literally and figuratively — to keep myself active, even in small ways.