This means that when embarking on a quest to make healthy changes in your own life, it’s helpful to take note of your group’s social structure: the hobbies of your friends and family, diet patterns, sleeping habits, etc.
But healthy social structures certainly don’t fall out of the sky and into your lap—they’re developed, cultivated, and, ideally, passed on from generation to generation. What do you do when you’re the first of your friends and family to actively seek out a healthier lifestyle? You can’t be expected to drop your group of friends and reinvent an entirely different social structure. Caide may have been raised by a health-conscious family, but she’s ultimately responsible for maintaining her wholesome philosophy. How did she do it?
“I think that if you were to do it on your own, it would take a long time to adapt because of all the temptations that can distract you from what you want to do. You have to switch your entire mindset.“
And if she wanted to bring a junk food-loving friend into her lifestyle, how would she go about changing their mindset?
“I would just…be a little pushy at the grocery store and say something like, ‘Hey, you need to buy this!’ And maybe, by introducing the mere idea of substituting veggies for potato chips, it could, little by little, turn their minds towards healthier options. I think a lot of unhealthy people don’t even realize that there’s a better and delicious way to eat, so even introducing different options at the grocery store could eventually change their lifestyle.”
Maybe you’re lucky enough to be surrounded by people who prefer chickpeas to chicken and soy milk to soda. But if you’re not, you are still absolutely capable of initiating change in your life and in the lives of your loved ones.
It’s your life so do something about it. If you’re craving that group of like-minded and health-conscious friends, do something about that too. If your friends are less partial to healthful living, make yourself the social facilitator of the group and nudge them in the right direction by offering them a taste of your black bean burger, or by visiting the local farmers’ market rather than the supermarket. Introduce them to the fresh-feeling, mouth-watering, invigorating, and stabilizing community of wellness. Just, well, be a friend.
(Submitted by Betty Dean. Written by Sarah Woo. Used by permission from www.LifeandHealth.org. Courtesy of LifeSpring – Resources for Hope and Healing Stuart, VA.)
