Out Of Nowhere: Another 122 Pounds Gone!!!

It is often sad and frustrating to see and watch people who desperately need to do something about their diet and health, but who just can't or won't make the slightest effort.

I have tried many ways of approaching these people and hope to one day learn the best way to do so, without turning them off or driving them away.    But my experience in this matter mirrors my lifetime of experience in other areas of life:  You can't change people who aren't ready to change themselves.  

With this mindset my main focus is to plant seeds everywhere I go.  Everybody I talk to, every conversation I have, every situation I'm in, I try to be planting seeds of thought in people's minds in hopes that they'll think on them and stir themselves into action.   Then when I see a seed that is starting to sprout, I rush to it and give it some water!   But not too much, lest I drown it and kill it!   A little water, a little nurture, and soon a seed can be growing on it's own!

This is the best way to change people's lives, in my opinion.  And it's the only one that I've found that actually works.   I hear others who have become disillusioned  in their own attempts to change people, and have convinced themselves that it's impossible and just not worth the effort.   I think these people focus too much on trying to win converts.  On preaching too hard.  If they see someone with a spark of interest they rush to them and overload them with so much information it scares them away.   And in the end they sit by themselves in their own little world having convinced nobody to join them.    They should try backing off the hard sell and focus on planting seeds, and focus on not killing the seeds that sprout by overwatering or overfeeding them.

But there is one drawback to my approach.  Often, you never get to see the results of the lives you've influenced because you're not around when the seed starts to grow, and even though you're the one who planted it, you never knew what became of it!!

And then sometimes you're blessed!   This whole blog post is about such a time!!    I had a woman approach me before church this past Sunday and she was so excited to tell me that her entire family was focussing on eating better and losing weight, and that between them all they'd already lost 122 pounds!

Whoo Hoo!!   122 pounds!!    I hadn't even known that this lady and her family had taken anything I'd said to heart, or that they were making any efforts to change their health.   I had no clue until she came up to tell me!!

This reminds me of a woman I talked to about a year ago... She was also excited to tell me about the changes her and her husband had made and their improvement in health....   and I had NEVER even talked to this woman before!   She had merely overheard a conversation I had with someone else, went home, did some research, and started making changes based on what she overheard me tell someone else!!

This is how planting seeds works.   You hit people with too much information and it scares them away.   But if you plant little seeds of information they can think on by themselves, you never know what'll come of it!!

Plant seeds!    Plant lots of them!!   You never know which ones will sprout and will be amazed at how many do!

-Ray    aka   Norm