Two are better than one, because they have a good return for their labor (Ecclesiastes 4:9).
I n 2009, the city of Huntington, West Virginia, was plagued with the title of “Fattest City in America” by the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), identifying it as the unhealthiest city in the United States.
For Steve Willis, pastor of First Baptist Church Kenova, near Huntington, the numbers were not just statistics, but lives — and deaths. He was surprised at how many funerals he officiated, especially of people who were dying young of preventable diseases caused by their unhealthy habits.
According to the CDC, Huntington was first (as in worst ) in the nation in adults who suffered from diabetes (13 percent), first in the prevalence of heart disease (22 percent), and first in the percentage of adults who had no regular form of exercise (31 percent). Nearly half of those over sixty-five had lost all of their natural teeth (first place in that category, too)! The city was first in kidney disease, vision problems, and sleeping disorders. Whether it was high blood pressure, circulation issues, or the depression that stems from such unhealthy bodies, the area was the worst in every aforementioned category.
While a few other cities came close to those percentages in some areas, no one else encroached on Huntington’s incredible 46 percent of adults who were obese (not just overweight). That’s nearly half of the adults. It was, as they say in the sporting world, a total blowout.
In those sobering statistics Pastor Willis heard God calling him to a challenging assignment: preach about health to a very unhealthy congregation. Willis says,
The transformation began with a declaration of the truth that taking care of our bodies is an act of worship. Nearly half of our congregation struggled with obesity, so [addressing this issue head-on] was one of the most difficult [sermons] I have ever delivered. But nearly a third of our congregation made a public commitment to lose at least forty pounds.
Pastor Willis was delighted at both their response and the life change that occurred.
I wasn’t ready for such a large mass of people (pun intended), but thanks to people like Elizabeth Bailey and my wife, Deanna, we put together a Daniel-like plan for our first set of accountability groups. Each group met weekly for prayer, Bible study, encouragement, and yes, exercise.
Willis believes those groups were the secret weapon in battling the obesity epidemic in the Huntington area.
When you have friends to go with you on the journey toward better health, you are more likely to succeed. Life change happens in small groups. “By creating a culture of both love and accountability, our church has seen many people revolutionize their lives, not only in the physical realm, but in their spiritual and mental lives as well,” Willis says.
Willis wrote a book, Winning the Food Fight , 1 about the experience of transforming his church, his community, even his own family. These days Huntington is no longer “number one.” The city was happy to relinquish its championship status — and in fact worked hard to do so. The statistics have changed because people came together to help each other be healthier. Willis adds,
Starting with the members of our church, we teamed up with other like-minded groups who cared about our city’s health. By implementing the principles of The Daniel Plan, we are no longer number one in any of those statistics. In fact, if the most recent studies are correct, Huntington has begun to reverse the obesity trend.
Four years later, the church has traded unhealthy habits for healthy ones, from what is served at church potluck dinners to the snacks in the children’s department. One church member even donated an acre of land for a community garden.
Most recently the church began educating the children in its preschool about the difference between real food and the processed fake foods that are typically marketed toward children. Willis reports,
These kids are now going home and teaching their parents about the importance of real food and knowing where it comes from. Perhaps the best news is that our children’s department has nearly doubled since we have instituted these nutritional changes. We’ve still got a long way to go, but it continues to amaze me that the more we get physically healthy, the more we seem to be a spiritually healthy body of Christ.
THE GIFT OF LOVING COMMUNITY
THE STORY OF PASTOR WILLIS’S CONGREGATION is inspiring. We all love the idea of being healthy — of being our best self emotionally, spiritually, and physically. The Daniel Plan offers you a clear, simple way to be your best, healthiest you.
Improving your health is possible, but doing so requires intention and effort in our daily choices. When we choose to spend time with God, to exercise, to eat healthy food, and to focus our thoughts, we take steps toward our goals in every area of life. That can be hard, especially if we’re trying to make changes to existing habits — and even tougher if we try to go it alone.
But the really good news is that God doesn’t want you to do it alone. He made you to thrive when you’re connected with others. Being engaged in community will improve your health — and not just physically. Friends can improve your emotional and spiritual health.
“Share each other’s troubles and problems, and in this way obey the law of Christ” (Galatians 6:2 NLT).
The opposite is also true: Isolation injures us. Our lack of community can keep us from being the healthiest we can be. In other words, the Friends Essential is the secret sauce for all the other Essentials.
One of the reasons The Daniel Plan has already helped thousands of people to succeed in a healthier lifestyle is the fact that it is done in community. It worked in Huntington, and it will work for you.
A MEDICAL SOLUTION
Involving your friends is not just a feel-good aspect of The Daniel Plan. Research backs up the concept, showing how crucial we are for each other’s healing and success. Much of what currently ails us (and people all over the globe) is preventable, treatable, and very often curable. Even better: the cure is right next to us.
Over the next twenty years, chronic diseases such as high blood pressure, diabetes, and heart disease will cost an estimated $47 trillion to address worldwide. 2 But such diseases are preventable, since their root causes are often being overweight and having a sedentary and unhealthy lifestyle.
For decades, the medical community has tried to solve chronic disease problems with medical solutions — which makes sense, on one level. Medical problems need medical solutions, right? But no part of our life is isolated from another. Our medical travails are tied in part to our lifestyle and our emotions, such as stress and fear. What we eat and how much we move also impact our medical health. So finding a pill or treatment to combat those medical problems doesn’t always work. For years, Dr. Hyman wondered why medical science couldn’t solve what appeared to be medical problems. Then he read about the work of Dr. Paul Farmer, and Dr. Hyman’s perspective changed.
Cycling for Food and Health
In Thailand, patients with diabetes take turns pedaling an old bike that is hooked up to a generator to irrigate a community garden. 3 Exercise with teamwork helps them grow their own healthy food. This kind of model of a peer group as the catalyst for health is more effective than conventional medical intervention.
Dr. Farmer was able to successfully treat TB and AIDS — which everyone thought were untreatable in the face of extreme poverty in places like Haiti, Peru, or Rwanda. He realized that the key to treatment was not a new medication but something very simple — to rebuild community and connection in places it had broken down. 4 In other words, friends were the key. Dr. Hyman says,
Paul’s genius was his insight that the key to solving insoluble health care problems was each other — people helping people. Paul’s genius was the idea of accompanying each other to health, helping each other build back their communities with clean water, food, going to each other’s houses to make sure their sick neighbor knew how and knew when to take their medication.
Our social circles influence our health even more than our DNA. We are more likely to be overweight if our friends are, even if our parents are not. At the same time, we are more likely to exercise and eat healthy food, to not smoke or overeat, if our friends also practice healthy habits. If they’re sick, we’re more likely to be sick. If our friends have healthy habits, then we probably will.
Community has the power to change our overall health more than any doctor or clinic.
This means your friends and family may determine how successful you are with The Daniel Plan. If they’re healthy, you’re more likely to be healthy. If they are focused on their goals with a positive attitude, you will be, too. If they are living their faith, you will have built-in support.
In a study published in the New England Journal of Medicine , researchers found that one of the strongest associations in the spread of obesity are the people you spent time with. Subjects who had a friend who was obese had a 57 percent chance of also being obese. If the two individuals identified each other as being strong friends, the figure shot up to 171 percent. And this relationship held even if the subjects didn’t live in the same area. Sibling relationships also proved important. Having an obese sibling was related to a 40 percent increase in the chance of obesity. 5
In one of the longest longevity studies ever done, researchers found that health habits are contagious. 6 For example, if you spend time with people who exercise, you are more likely to exercise. If you spend time with people who eat healthy, you are more likely to eat in a healthful way. The group you associate with often determines the type of person you become.
This doesn’t mean you have to get rid of all your unhealthy family and friends. Rather, be the leader and model a new way of living.
You are not just receiving influence; you are an influencer as well. If you develop and keep healthy habits, your friends and family are more likely to develop them. Habits are contagious, which means you can have significant effect on those around you. But that may not happen overnight.
“To get really healthy, find the healthiest person you can stand and then spend as much time around him or her as possible.”
— Dr. Amen
Dr. Amen found that he and his wife, Tana, met with some initial resistance from their large extended family when they first changed their eating habits.
I have five sisters, a brother, living parents, and twenty-one nieces and nephews. When Tana and I first decided to get really healthy years ago, many in my own family thought it was very odd and even made fun of us. I explained why it was important to us to start feeding our brains and bodies in a healthy way.
Dr. Amen’s extended family frequently gathered together for meals, which caused noticeable tension when he and Tana insisted on eating differently than the rest of the family. But the two of them supported each other in their new lifestyle. Dr. Amen says:
Over time, members of our family started coming to us for help. One of my nephews who had been morbidly obese was one of those who asked us for help and ended up making radical changes. When Tana and I took the lead on health and persisted in the face of criticism and initial protests, everyone benefited.
LOVE AND HEALTH
Major breakthroughs in recent years have significantly altered the way we as Americans care for our health. While we have known for a while that lifestyle can cause health problems (smoking can cause cancer, lack of exercise or excess weight contributes to heart disease), the idea that the reverse is also true — that lifestyle can reverse health problems — is new.
Dr. Dean Ornish discovered four steps to reverse heart disease:
Exercise regularly.
Eat a plant-based diet.
Reduce your stress.
Find love and community support.
In 1977, Dr. Ornish studied the effectiveness of these lifestyle behaviors in men and women with severe heart disease. Dr. Ornish quickly realized that the fourth component was powerfully meaningful for the participants.
Since then, he embarked on a quest to find the deeper answers about the very things that are best for our health and well-being. He realized that just knowing what to do is only part of the solution. He ultimately discovered that there is something deeper that enhances motivation and our ability to naturally choose healthy behaviors—and he incorporated this essential concept into his program for reversing heart disease.
“So now I am giving you a new commandment: Love each other. Just as I have loved you, you should love each other. Your love for one another will prove to the world that you are my disciples” (John 13:34 – 35 NLT).
This Harvard-trained physician discovered that it is relationships that ultimately impact our motivation to exercise and eat healthy. It is love that transforms our health, fitness, and lives more than anything else. He wrote:
Medicine today seems to focus primarily on the physical and mechanistic: drugs and surgery, genes and germs, microbes and molecules. I am not aware of any other factor in medicine — not diet, not smoking, not exercise, not stress, not genetics, not drugs, not surgery — that has a greater impact on our quality of life, inci dence of illness, and premature death from all causes than love and intimacy! Love and intimacy are at the root of what makes us sick and what makes us well, what causes sadness and what brings us happiness, what makes us suffer and what leads to healing. If a new drug had the same impact, virtually every doctor in the country would be recommending it for his or her patients. 7
LIFE CHANGE
Our experience at Saddleback confirms Dr. Ornish’s research. When we introduced The Daniel Plan, more than 15,000 people joined us that first year, eager to find friends who could help them. They worked their way through the curriculum, but each group had its own focus and flavor. There was no doubt: Groups were indeed the “secret sauce” of The Daniel Plan, the piece that made this plan succeed where other diet and exercise plans failed. It shouldn’t have surprised us, of course. We believe life change happens in community.
Set a Fitness Date
Find a workout buddy with similar interests. Think about friends, family members, or members of your church who may have similar interests to you, and give them a call and set a date to plan your fitness together. You can even post your interests on Facebook or Twitter to see who responds. Or work out with a family member. Set a weekly date — before the week begins — with your spouse, child, or parent to participate in a fun fitness activity together.
One group of women not only met to study and pray together, but once a week would also shop together for healthy food. They would go back to one woman’s house and cook in bulk, making a big batch of turkey chili or healthy chicken salad. They would divide up the food and each take home a few premade meals. They had a great time shopping and cooking together, and the conversations as they did so encouraged them even more.
Other support came more organically as people at an exercise class or a Bible study would talk about healthy lunch ideas or give each other tips on juicing, trade recipes, or just encourage each other.
Another Daniel Plan participant lost 45 pounds and radically changed all of her health habits. As she got healthy, her husband, who weighed 300 pounds, at first was resistant to change. But as he saw his wife’s success, he joined her in changing his lifestyle. He eventually lost 75 pounds.
Often, the most loving thing you can do for your spouse is to get healthy yourself. This woman showed her husband, by her brave example, that a better life is possible if you do the right things, which in this case ultimately encouraged her husband and her children to get healthier as well.
A Pastor’s Family
“The fight for good nutrition was never more real to me than when I watched my kindergarten-aged son struggle with adapting to his physician-prescribed, mind-altering drugs.
“Lucas had been having discipline problems in school, would frequently struggle with the ability to focus on tasks at hand, and found himself well below grade level in many academic areas. Though his mother was an elementary school teacher who worked with him incessantly, his test scores remained in the bottom 50th percentile.
“So we did what many parents feel forced to do. We placed him on the ADD/ADHD medications that would keep him calm in school, but seemed to stunt his personality and growth in other areas. For his sake, my wife, Deanna, wanted to make radical changes to our family’s diet, but I resisted due to my everlasting longing for pizza, French fries, and syrup-laden ice cream. After months of watching our formerly energetic son become totally lethargic and emotionally disconnected, I relented and told my wife, ‘Do what you have to do.’
“She implemented the principles of The Daniel Plan in our home right away. Within just three months, our son was completely changed. He was off his medications, the discipline problems had ceased, and his test scores jumped from C’s to A’s. The change was nothing short of miraculous.
“If you are in the early stages of making the necessary changes for your family, stay the course and fight the good fight. I won’t tell you it was an easy sell to replace all the sugary cereals and junk food with healthier options. At first our older children just chose not to eat as much and leave some food on their plates. Eventually their tastes changed, as did mine, and I can honestly say that now I’d rather have a good dish of grilled vegetables than a greasy hamburger any day!
“The good news is that today our teenage daughter is all about cooking healthy food for our family. She recently attended a summer camp, and of all the fun free-time activities, she signed up for the healthy cooking class.
“As for Lucas, the one who once struggled behaviorally and academically, years later he remains an A student in math and consistently scores above the 90th percentile in nearly every category.
“As a pastor and father, I have to wonder: How many other children are in the same boat as my son? How many other children have the ability to be top mathematicians, scientists, poets, musicians, or athletes, but are being robbed of those capabilities due to an unhealthy diet? This is more than a health issue; it is a social justice issue. Millions of our children are not reaching their God-given potential because we, as adults, won’t take the steps necessary to get them the nutrition they need. For the church, this problem has to be seen as a moral issue. For the sake of our children and our nation’s future, we have to do better.”
— Pastor Steve Willis
THE FOUNDATION
ONE DAY JESUS was having a lively debate with a bunch of religious leaders, people who defined their faith by rule-keeping. They asked him, “Which is the greatest commandment in the Law?” (See Matthew 22:36 – 40.)
Jesus’ answer was radical in that culture, even more than it would be for us today. They were expecting to hear about rules and the law or to stump Jesus by asking him to pick one of hundreds of religious laws. Instead, Jesus pointed them toward grace, contrasting it with the demands of the law. He essentially told them, “It’s not about rules at all; it’s about relationships. Life is all about love. It’s not about accomplishment. It’s not about acquisition. It’s not about popularity, power, or prestige. It’s about love. It’s about relationships.”
If you want to have lasting change in your life, then you must fill your life with love. That’s why The Daniel Plan success depends on having friends to walk beside you — because love is the only thing that can change the unchangeable. It’s the most powerful force in the world. Love invigorates, revitalizes, and renews.
Love is the most irresistible force in the universe because God is love. And that love is available and accessible to every human being. We don’t need to earn it, only embrace it. The Bible doesn’t say God has love; it says he is love. Love is the core of his very nature. God’s love heals what cannot otherwise be healed. God’s love uplifts. It strengthens.
You can summarize all of life in two sentences: “Love God with all your heart, and love your neighbor as yourself” (see Matthew 22:37, 39).
BETTER TOGETHER
There’s a wonderful word in the original language of the New Testament that is used to describe the community of the early church: koinonia . It is most often translated fellowship , a word we sometimes tend to use as a synonym for socializing, perhaps with our church friends.
But koinonia means far more than mere socializing or even gathering in a small group. It means love, intimacy, and joyful participation, deep communion with one another — putting others’ needs before your own. It’s a radical level of friendship and community, similar to that of the early church, described in Acts 2:42 – 47 and elsewhere. It implies a deep commitment, not out of obligation, but out of genuine and joyful love for one another.
God’s vision for you is that you would experience koinonia .
Set the Pace for Someone Else
“Leading up to her third marathon, my wife had a simple plan: find her pacer and stay close to him no matter what. Most marathon organizations provide the runners with all sorts of tools and techniques to help them through the grueling course — perhaps most notably, pacers.
“A pacer is a man or woman capable of finishing the race at an exact time. Kevin ran through the finish line at 3:35 — just what he was asked to do. Now, Kevin didn’t know who was counting on his pace. All he knew was that someone would be relying on his experience, strength, and endurance to help him or her along their way toward the goal.
“In our daily pursuit of spiritual and physical stewardship, we all need pacesetters: People whom God places in our lives to help us stay the course. Not only that, but God may, in fact, bless us with the privilege of being that for someone else. Like Kevin, we may or may not know who, but someone is depending on us to know the way and show the way.”
— Jimmy Pena, exercise physiologist and founder of Prayfit.com
“We are many parts of one body, and we all belong to each other” (Romans 12:5 NLT). God designed us to grow spiritually within a supportive community. The same is true if we want to grow healthier.
BAN LONELINESS
Researchers tell us that lack of relationship significantly affects our physical and mental health in several ways. 8 When we are lonely, it can cause us to lose focus, struggle in our faith, give up on our fitness goals, and even miss out on fellowship around a food table.
Feelings of loneliness and being disconnected from community can . . .
Increase the likelihood of engaging in unhealthy, selfdestructive coping behaviors such as being inactive, smoking, drinking in excess, and overeating.
Decrease the likelihood that we will make healthy lifestyle choices that are life enhancing, such as exercising, goal-setting, spending time with friends, reading our Bible, or praying.
Increase the likelihood of premature disease and death from all causes by 200 – 500 percent!
Keep us from fully experiencing the joy of everyday life. 9
Find a Club
Join a walking, jogging, or hiking group. If walking or running is your gig, check out all the resources in your community related to walking or jogging clubs. A great resource is your local YMCA, Sierra Club, and gyms in your area. Some restaurants even host weekly running clubs. Usually fitness facilities in your area will offer free walking and/or jogging clubs. If you can’t find any in your area, think about starting your own.
However, when we support each other, we increase one another’s potential in every area of life. In fact, the word support carries the idea of strengthening one another — to help one another become more capable of facing the challenges of living for Christ and the challenges of health. As Philippians 1:30 tells us, “We are in this together” (NLT).
When you connect with a loving community of friends, you will be better able to cope with things like fatigue, fear, frustration, and failure. You will be better able to handle depression and despair and, most important, not have to walk through them alone.
A WAKE-UP CALL
A member at Saddleback, Debra Miller, appeared to be “fine.” No one knew the pain she was hiding. She needed sleeping pills at night, excess caffeine during the day, and pain pills to help her manage back pain. She would get out of breath climbing stairs, but figured that was what happened to everyone in their forties. Yet, being ever the enthusiastic volunteer, she decided to lead a Daniel Plan group. She was not overweight, but even so, as she changed her eating habits, she began to feel a bit better. Still, she knew something wasn’t right. “I still felt like I was dying inside, and I still hadn’t stopped the medications,” she admits.
She finally got a blood test, which revealed how sick she really was: She was profoundly anemic and had bleeding ulcers. The doctors sent her directly to the emergency room for a blood transfusion.
That emergency room visit was a wake-up call, which inspired her to get serious about her Daniel Plan group — which has been an integral part of staying healthy long-term. She decided she wouldn’t lead alone. So she and her friend Claudia became co-leaders. Their group took several immediate actions, such as changing the snacks they served at group from cookies and cakes to fruit, vegetables, and nuts. Beyond dietary changes, they cooked together, hiked together, and supported each other.
“To do something alone is really difficult,” Debra says. “We are all in it together, because together we are better, all the way around.”
COMMITMENT REQUIRED
Staying in honest, deep relationships is not always easy. It requires commitment. But the flip side is a wonderful gift: When you commit to a few friends or a small group, the people in that group will also commit to you to help you make real and lasting changes. The apostle Paul said, “Your faith will help me, and my faith will help you” (Romans 1:12 NCV).
Commitment is countercultural, and for some of us, it is counterintuitive. We don’t want obligations. But commitment is what makes a small group successful because the group members know that they can depend on one another through good and bad times.
If we pretend that everything is fine and we have no real burdens, we will feel lonely and isolated. It’s when we’re open about our burdens (our weaknesses and struggles) that we find healing and comfort. We find that we are better able to focus and stay mentally and emotionally healthy. We find we are not alone in our struggles to stay on track with our goals. We breathe a sigh of relief, because the doubts and temptations that try to get us off track in our faith are not unique. Others face the same struggles.
The Bible says openness is a significant step toward healing and wholeness: “Make this your common practice: Confess your sins [faults] to each other and pray for each other so that you can live together whole and healed” (James 5:16 MSG).
We must be brave enough to be authentic — to admit our issues and accept the weaknesses of others. We need to create a community where every member feels accepted and is not afraid to ask for help.
“Encourage one another and build each other up” (1 Thessalonians 5:11).
The Bible says, “Therefore, as God’s chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience” (Colossians 3:12). Nowhere in that list does it say to give advice or offer quick, cosmetic help. Rather, it points us to understand and be gentle with the pain of others.
While every group is unique, we support each other by doing the following:
1. Love each other. Treat each other with humbleness and patience, no matter where each of you is on the journey. Love accepts us where we’re at, but expects us to grow. And love doesn’t just mean warm feelings; sometimes it means bringing a hot meal or helping someone with tasks they couldn’t do alone.
2. Listen to each other. Admit your weaknesses and struggles, your progress and successes. Then listen to your friends as they share the same. Listening means fully engaging, noticing not just verbal, but nonverbal, clues about how someone feels. It is not merely waiting for your turn to talk.
The fellowship of suffering is the deepest, most intense level of fellowship. It’s where we enter into each other’s pain and grief and carry each other’s burdens. It is during times of deep crisis, grief, and doubt that we need each other most. When circumstances crush us to the point that our faith falters, that’s when we really need committed and sympathetic friends. We need a small group of friends to have faith in God for us and to pull us through. “If one part suffers, every part suffers with it; if one part is honored, every part rejoices with it” (1 Corinthians 12:26). In a small group, the body of Christ is real and tangible, even when God seems distant.
Ease the Challenge
Working out with a friend can actually make exercise more effective and less difficult. Researchers from Oxford University discovered that when individuals exercise together they release more “happy hormones” (endorphins) than when they work out alone. Researchers also found that working out in a group decreased feelings of pain and discomfort during exercise. 10
3. Learn from each other. Share what works and what doesn’t. Tell each other about what you have tried in faith, food, fitness, and focus. Talk about what you’re learning. You can learn from anyone, so don’t assume that someone younger or less experienced can’t teach you something.
4. Liberate each other by showing each other grace. Increase your encouragement and support when others make mistakes or hit a rut on their journey. When people know they’re loved when they face setbacks, your group becomes a safe place where people feel free.
Someone in your group may be wondering, “Am I strange for feeling this way? Am I goofy? Am I mixed up?” You can encourage and affirm that person when you say, “No, you’re not weird. You’re just acting like the rest of us. We’ve all been there.” Or “I understand what you’re going through, and what you feel is neither strange nor crazy.”
My Post-College Team
“As a collegiate athlete, I loved to work out with my team. After graduation, I recruited a group of my old football buddies and friends to meet on a regular basis at the gym. Every morning I’d meet my friends, and we’d get a great workout together: pushing, spotting, encouraging, just like the old days. We did this for years, and our fitness levels were nearly as good as when we were in our playing days.
“Eventually my workout friends and I got married, had kids, and moved away. I found my fitness levels slowly eroding. I still exercised but now by myself.
“I became determined to find another group of like-minded friends to support my fitness — and it was one of the best moves I ever made. We discovered we all have a love for mountain biking. Now we meet every Friday morning and ride together, getting a long great workout, enjoying the outdoors, and usually spending an additional bit of time grabbing a cup of coffee or breakfast and sharing life together.
“I also discovered four additional blessings in recruiting my new team of fitness buddies. My wife, my daughter, and our two dogs are now on my team. My wife loves to walk and hike — almost as much as our dogs do — so we faithfully walk at least once a day, sometimes twice. This gives my wife and me an opportunity to talk, laugh, and pray together.
“I also work out with my daughter, who is a high school soccer player. We run stairs and perform a boot camp–style weight-training program three times a week. Working out with her challenges me to push myself to keep up with her sixteenyear-old fitness level. I always leave exhausted, but invigorated and so thankful for the time I have with my daughter.”
— Exercise Physiologist Sean Foy
Take a step to create community or deepen the one you already have with family, friends, neighbors, or work associates.
THE KEY IS FRIENDSHIPS
Solange Montoya, Joan England, Heidi Jacobsen, Wendy Lopez, and April O’Neil were part of a small group that went through The Daniel Plan together, and they definitely found that accountability and encouragement in their group.
Wendy had tried The Daniel Plan on her own, but without friends, she says, “I wasn’t able to complete it. I just kind of gave up. This time around, I think, for me the key point was the friendships.”
Her friends agree. To make sure they were faithful about attending exercise class, they would attend together and text each other reminders.
Solange says, “I’d be home and I’d be trying to come up with every excuse in the book why I shouldn’t go to exercise class. Then my phone would ring, and it’d be Wendy, letting me know she’d meet me at class. Okay, she’s waiting for me. I need to go, and if I didn’t get that text, it would be so much easier for me to just sit on the couch and not go.” The accountability helped both of them, because the person sending the text realized that meant she had to show up as well!
Accountability also helped the group with Focus, Faith, and Food Essentials. Wendy said,
Being able to have someone pray for you when you’re feeling at your lowest, when you’re ready to pull in somewhere and grab a cheeseburger, and you know that you can text and say, “Hey, pray for me. Tell me to stop and turn around.” That was huge for me. I’ve tried other diets where I would lose weight in ten days. But this is a life change. It’s forever. You learn how to change your eating habits and your friendships.
Whether you are trying to move forward with your mental health (focus), grow spiritually (faith), make better choices when it comes to what you eat (food), or stay committed to an exercise program (fitness), community gives you the support people need. Knowing you’re not alone, that others are cheering you on, keeps you motivated. Giving that same support to others gives you joy and a sense of purpose.
CREATING COMMUNITY
So how can you find that life-changing community that is so important to success on The Daniel Plan? It’s not hard, but you do have to seek it out. A great place to start looking, of course, is your church. You’re likely to find other people you already know who want to embrace the Faith Essential, which is such an integral part of lifelong health.
The Daniel Plan is flexible. Each group can do what works for them. There’s no “wrong” way to have a Daniel Plan group; any step you take is a good one. Perhaps you volunteer in a ministry at your church — would some of your fellow volunteers want to be in a group with you? Or maybe you are already in a small group or a Bible study — would they want to go through The Daniel Plan together?
But don’t limit your quest for community to just your church. In fact, often we connect around a shared interest: we have golfing buddies, a book club, a moms group, co-workers. Parents who have children of similar ages will build friendships that start on the sidelines of kids’ soccer games or as they volunteer in their children’s school.
Why not also find others online? Join an online virtual group. Did you know that you can even experience the expertise, training, motivation, and instruction of a “real time” fitness instructor via your home or office computer? All you will need is a web cam. For convenience, simplicity, and cost, this type of group allows you to connect virtually, but in the comfort and privacy of your own home or office.
Begin by asking God to bring the right people together. Trust that he will lead you as you seek out community. But don’t just sit back and wait for the phone to ring. Earnestly begin to look for like-minded friends who might join you on the journey to a healthier you. Be bold in inviting others, keep your eyes open, even in unexpected places. For example:
Are the people you work with interested in getting more fit and healthy? You might invite some of your co-workers to meet over lunch once a week as a Daniel Plan group. You could even eat together regularly (encouraging one another to make healthy choices), use your lunch hour to walk, or meet at the gym before or after work.
Perhaps you have a few neighbors who would want to go through this book or The Daniel Plan Video Study and Study Guide with you. If you are in a neighborhood book club or Bunco group, perhaps that group of friends might be interested in learning how to live a healthier lifestyle.
Are you in a sports league such as a bowling or softball league? Why not build on the community you already have around physical activity, and be intentional about the other Essentials in The Daniel Plan?
If you have young children, get to know the parents of their classmates at school or the neighbor children they play with. You might even want to do a “family-style” Daniel Plan group, where you gather for a healthy meal and talk about how to build habits of a healthy lifestyle with your kids.
Find eight (or so) people whom you would love to get to know better or deepen your relationship with. Invite them to start a dinner (or breakfast or weekend lunch) club. Meet for a healthy meal once or twice a month. Rotate from house to house. Schedule the get-togethers as potlucks, and challenge everyone to choose healthy, nutritious recipes to share. At each dinner, plan to talk about food, health, or community. Tell success stories and open up about your challenges. You will leave nourished.
A BOND THAT HEALS
There is power in community, so just keep looking for friends to join you on your way to a healthier life. Don’t give up on it; reach out to others you think might be lonely or needing inspiration. Ecclesiastes 4:9 – 12 reminds us:
Two are better than one, because they have a good return for their labor: If either of them falls down, one can help the other up. But pity anyone who falls and has no one to help them up. Also, if two lie down together, they will keep warm. But how can one keep warm alone? Though one may be overpowered, two can defend themselves. A cord of three strands is not quickly broken.
That cord of three strands is referring to you, God, and the other person. It ties together the Faith and Friends Essentials — the two components that make The Daniel Plan unique from any other health plan. Having God and friends with you as you make changes in your food, fitness, and focus habits is what makes all the difference.
Invite some friends to do The Daniel Plan Video Study and Study Guide together. Go to danielplan.com to register your group and get started.
Of course, it is quite possible for you to do The Daniel Plan alone — for a short time. But if you want to sustain a healthy lifestyle for the long-term, and if you want to have fun doing it as well, grab a few friends.
Community, when you embrace it, doesn’t just help you succeed in your goals. It can bring you joy. Through deep relationships with others, you get to live in the love that God wants to give you. When you are surrounded by others who are just as committed to loving their neighbor as you are, then guess what: You’re the recipient of that love as well as a giver of it.
As 1 John 4:12 says, “No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us.”
Reflect and Take a Step . . .
Don’t try to do The Daniel Plan by yourself. Get a buddy or get a few friends together. We want you to experience how friendship makes all the difference in getting healthy — in body, mind, and spirit.
Ready to Get Started?
Thousands of people have now experienced the life-changing benefits of The Daniel Plan lifestyle. We have been inundated with stories of transformation. Participants not only feel better, but they are also able to finally lose weight and keep it off, discover greater energy, sleep better, get off medications, and minimize chronic illnesses. Are you ready to get started?
Although each person is in a different place with health, we encourage everyone to start with a few basics.
Use The Daniel Plan Journal ( pages 21–26 ) to assess yourself in each of the five Essentials.
Know your health numbers: height, weight, BMI, blood pressure, waist and hips measurements, and activity level. Record them in The Daniel Plan Journal or a journal app you prefer to use.
Write down your motivation—or your one word—for better health, and post it where you can see it every day.
Set SMART goals, and share them with a friend. Commit these goals to the Lord.
Add real, whole foods to your meals, aiming to increase your vegetable intake.
Begin the Daniel Strong 40-Day Fitness Challenge (steps in chapter 9 ).
Design your journey toward better health based on your preferences and the pace that makes the most sense for your life right now. Over time, the Essentials—faith, food, fitness, focus, and friends—will hold up your life, enliven your body, enrich your mind, and fill your heart.
For a practical, pocket-size 40-day guide to integrating the Daniel Plan Essentials into your everyday life, use The Daniel Plan Jumpstart Guide.
