Health: That's What Friends Are For

Professor J,

I have no doubt that you and your MD friend are more than perfectly capable of changing the world if you team up. A billion people is a pretty good start!

I like your idea of National Social week. I nominate you to be in charge of that. But don't you just know there would be that one person in every office who would still show up so he could say "Well, I'm just so busy." I think our culture has created a lot of people who don't know how to relax, spend time alone, observe nature, listen, or think deeply.

One great thing about your idea would be that the socializing would be the point. December has become a time some of us dread because you don't get out of doing much and other things like shopping, socializing, decorating, travel, and entertaining are added. Everyone is still expected to show up at work and school even though as you point out little gets done because there are so many distractions. I get tired just thinking about the holidays. That's really sad. I don't know about men but more and more women I know dread the holiday season. It's exhausting.

Is this NSW you have in mind going to mean more cooking, cleaning, and planning? Can we make it in summer so it's low maintenance? If you can get this rolling then you can start working on implementing a siesta! :)

Good luck trying to get companies who resent having to give new parents time off to get to know their newborns, time off to hang out with friends. Our culture seems incapable of doing some of the things we most desperately need.

But you are definitely onto just how important those social connections are. I recently read that a new study shows that people who are isolated are less physically healthy and researchers were surprised to learn that it was true no matter the age of the participant in the study. They were also surprised to learn that people who don't have feelings of loneliness and enjoy being by themselves were just as susceptible to the negative effects of isolation as extroverts who crave lots of associations.

Read an article about the benefit of social networks here.

I have a friend who is a pharmacist who is peeved that her doctor never asks about her stress level or her diet. We can add inquiring about friendships and membership in organizations to the list of things the medical community needs to be addressing if they want to treat the whole person and not just address symptoms and write prescriptions.

I can't help thinking that someone who's opposed to your idea is going to say that you are promoting National Socialist Week or something. :) I wonder if people would get behind National Goof Off With Your Friends Week? Maybe take a lesson from the Italians and have a Joy of Doing Nothing Week.

I think you may be on to something!