This Blog is written as a thank you to my daughter in law who helped me with a dilemma I had recently.
I was speaking to her about the expression ‘Practice what you Preach’, when I hear it I feel I am about to be dictated to by someone who is preaching to me about how things SHOULD be done, which often falls on deaf ears as no one really wants to be told what to do.
Over my lifetime I have come across many people who ‘talk the talk’ but don’t actually ‘walk the walk’.
I once met a surgeon who was a heart specialist and spoke to patients about reducing their weight, increasing their exercise, not smoking and reducing there process food intake.
We sat chatting at a social event and I noticed he smoked was overweight and often eat high fat processed foods, he said to me ‘I know I should do the actions I tell my patients to do, but If I am honest I don’t actually do them myself’
That day stuck in my mind and my dilemma was how can I help people change without preaching to people?
As my daughter in law pondered, she said ‘Sandra just say I practise what I teach’ Wow how simple was that, I felt really humbled because I don’t have all the answers to improve your Health, but the actions I take have dramatically improved my own health and that is the example I want to show to the world.
It reminded me of an expression I used to say to my sons ‘don’t do what I do, do what I tell you’ ( luckily that is no longer the truth and I have made amends to them as that is not a great role model to be).
So if you want to be a real influencer remember what Gandhi once said…
‘Be the change you want to see in the world’ and let that be your influence.