A recent experience made me think of this irony. I’ll get to that experience in a bit. But isn’t this true?
Want to change (lose) weight, you gotta eat well consistently…do cardio consistently. Want to change (gain) muscle, you gotta eat more protein consistently…hit the weights more consistently. Want to change (improve) your test scores on the SATs or the LSATs or any test, you gotta study more consistently.
Change requires consistency. And the same is the case in the advocacy world, when it comes to shifting paradigms…getting society to look at & approach topics differently.
Ok so back to the experience…& I’ve shared this before a few yrs ago, but it’s worth repeating. As I was pulling out of my 2.5 yrs of hell, & considering entering the advocacy/nonprofit space, I looked at what Prince Harry had done (this was before all the controversy w the Royals & the recent stuff w ppl questioning his motives).
This was back when the fam was together – & Harry shared his MH struggles (when not many celebs had). He did it vulnerably. He did it w detail. He talked abt life experiences (loss of his mom, experiencing it in front of the public). All that great advocacy work, from arguably the biggest “celeb” in the UK, & yet a yr after his initial share, the UK rose to a 30yr high in suicides/& terrible MH trends.
The BIGGEST stars in the world, individually, can share their stories (GaGa, Osaka, Bieber), but when the media treats them as one-offs, & themes aren’t threaded together – to CONSISTENTLY educate, change can’t happen.
It’s why we’ve been working for 3yrs on building alliances: celebs, athletes, integrative docs, practitioners, CEOs, bc for change to happen, we need consistent msgs to appear many diff places. Themes from one story to the next.
What warms my heart, & is an example of the above: consistent themes & working together. Two “celebs” in Lehner & Fleury piggybacking off each other on Twitter – to hammer home the same theme w consistency: I struggle too, here’s how, Same Here. You can find their posts on twitter.
You are our partners in this. You can make a huge impact too. Consistency. Let’s do this!
