Getting ready for my online summer courses which requires a lot of new psychology videos.
Including video discussions on health, wellness, and personal empowerment.
Similar to in person college classes, the goal is to stimulate active discussions and open communication.
For example:
Discussion Topic
What happened when I quit drinking?
Watch this short video on my own experience with peer pressure, alcohol, and behaviour change and answer the questions below.
Reflection Questions
- How has peer pressure influenced your life decisions?
- Have you experienced unexpected push back from friends and relatives when you made a significant health change? If so, how did you handle it?
- In what ways have your peers and community sabotaged your health and wellness choices?
- In what ways have your peers and community supported your health and wellness choices?
- What strategies help you stay committed to positive lifestyle decisions?
Empowering
Conversations ⇔ Change
I also encourage use of this video and reflection questions as an opportunity to talk openly with friends and family about the powerful impact of social influence on substance use. Open conversations empower youth to think for themselves and in turn, reduces their susceptibility to coercion.
Watch Psychology Video → Click Here
Thriving Under Pressure 
I quit drinking at the time I decided to have babies too – 1982 (wow!). Know just what you mean about push back. I have also made choices concerning my diet that I still get push back about. You are right that it is about the other.
I love hearing about your experiences too VJ! 1982 for you and 2005 for me. Seems like yesterday!
Combined examples of why it’s always worth following your heart and inner calling.
Good Vibes on the inside. ☀️💞
Society certainly doesn’t support that choice, as you know. Shows how strong we are.
Yes!!! Excellent point VJ. It had built an inner strength in us that is especially helpful right now.
#WeGotThis 🙌🙌
Exactly! One must do our best to be at our highest authentic self.
And as long as we stay focused on our “whys” the sounds of their dissenting opinions get quieter and quieter.. until all you hear is the quiet feeling of good health & inner peace. Wishing you that and more all weekend long! 🌷
Nothing happens if you quit drinking when you are an addict.
Excellent point! They are just happy that you are getting healthy. The distinction between social drinking versus alcoholism is a critical distinction here. I will bring this point into our class discussions. Thank you for this.
You’re welcome.😊
I never drank and it took a long time for peers to realise they couldn’t change my mind. They eventually let it go!
Wonderful example of staying true to yourself. The friends that respected your values stuck around. The ones that didn’t moved on.. … oh well… 😉
Which is why following your heart versus following the crowd is so important. No cheering squad required. You finally feel all the good vibes on the inside. ☀️💞
Exactly on all counts! Be our own cheering squad! X
Amen!
Doctor Andrea:
When I quit drinking in 1987 it was an absolute necessity, as I was a raging drunkard with one DWI already, and children at home watching their drunken father pass out on the floor. Enough about how terrible I was when drinking.
When I decided to quit, I developed an iron will.
I read and heard about prisoners of war in horrid POW camps. It was war, and no holds were barred for some countries when it came to deprivation, torture and inhuman treatment.
These ordinary people forced into heroism told themselves, and one another, that “they can’t take our minds. Starve me, cut me, leave me in the pit. But inside my head I will resist and persist and persevere. Nigh unto death, I will not give them the satisfaction of breaking me.”
If these people can stare up the business end of a firearm and cleave to their iron wills, certainly the temptations and lack of understanding and even scoffing of others about my sobriety would be a walk in the park.
Sobriety itself was just one tangential reward. To have committed to something with conviction and allow no other to “take my mind” was a powerful lesson and a faith-builder in myself. When it came time to quit smoking cigarettes, I was ready. I stopped and started, failed a couple of times. But I brought my iron will, and now I am alcohol- and tobacco-free.
Here’s the way I view “peer pressure”.
When Ryan was quite young, maybe seven or eight, his brothers told him to pee on the electric fence. If you’re not aware, an electric fence sends out a pulse of electricity every few seconds, and it’ has a kick to it. It will make you recoil and retract your hand and say yikes!
To me, every person with something to say about my convictions is just another brother taunting me to pee on the electric fence.
Seek peace,
Paz