How can you get someone you love to change unhealthy behaviors?
Recently I received a note from a friend, a person I know to be a
genuine wellness enthusiast: “Don, I love a person who still smokes. He
knows it’s wrong and that he should quit, but he doesn’t. I want to
help him, without nagging him. What can I do?”
I wrote this woman: “Other than to make your wishes known to
your husband in a supportive fashion (without unpleasantries), there is little
else to be done to bring about changes in him that he does not desire. Substitute
a wide range of offenses against your sensibilities and assess what you would
do if these behaviors were practiced. At what point would you make changes, as
opposed to hoping for changes in someone else? For example, what if he were an
alcoholic? How much of that would you endure before leaving the situation? How
bad would it have to get? Ask the same question for all manner of habits and pay
attention to your responses. Forget about changing someone else.”
This is not to argue that such attempts do not occasionally succeed
(they do) or that it’s not a good thing for health educators, doctors, and
counselors to promote change, especially when others are interested in changing.
However, on a personal level (spouse, friend), the price in resentment and recidivism
is high. Most attempts to change someone before he or she is ready to make changes
are doomed. The energy and other costs required are out of proportion to the success
rate.
Health educators and academics promote popular constructs for change,
such as Prochaska’s “Stages of Change” model. This concept views
change as a gradual process, progressing from disinterest (“I like to smoke!”)
to an unwillingness to change (“Back off, woman!”) to precontemplation
(“I might consider it later.”) to a genuine period of contemplation
of change (“The house would smell better!”) to deciding and preparing
to make a change (“You know, honey, you may right about this—it would
improve my life, too!”).
The final steps are the action (“I've smoked my last cigarette—that’s
it!”) and the maintenance or relapse-prevention stages (“Yes, I’m
a backslider, but I mean it this time, really!”).
Those who quit smoking for good do so on their 17th attempt to quit.
So, it seems that previous failures are not really failures at all, but rather
necessary stages to gaining the self-knowledge and resolve to quit for good. In
any event, Prochaska believes people recycle through the stages of change several
times, often “relapsing” before success is finally achieved.
So, don’t play health educator with a spouse, close friend,
or family member whose good will and love you wish to maintain. People will change
when they are ready, and there may yet be stages to undergo before that time will
come.
If changing others were so easy, would 20 percent of adult Americans
still be smoking? Would 64 percent of us be overweight or obese, out of shape,
overstressed, and looking for every opportunity to elude self-responsibility by
finding cures in alcohol, prescription drugs, and other medications?
I asked my friend Bob Ludlow, former editor of a major health magazine,
what he thought of my advice to the lady who loves a smoker.
If this were my spouse, I would be sure he knew how important
the issue was to me and ask if he would think about seeking assistance from a
qualified professional.
Aldous Huxley said, “I wanted to change the world. But I have
found that the only thing one can be sure of changing is oneself.” PE
