Social pressure can crop up at the most difficult times.
When you have something in your life that requires a lot of focus, it can be very distracting to have to deal with obligations that can put you within feet of temptation.
Do you keep fasting? How do you get through events while fasting?
Here are some things to keep in mind.
You’ll Have to Make a Sacrifice
It seems a bit sad to have to say so, but the reality is that you probably shouldn’t go to all of the functions that you’ve been invited to out of pressure.
Is the progress that you’ve experienced worth the time that you’ve spent? You might just have started, so what can you do?
The answer is to make more space and time in your life for the fast.
In many cases, you choose some social functions over others. There will be some activities with friends where just drinking water isn’t actually a big deal.
With others, where food and drinks are involved, maybe you just adjust your fasting and eating window that day, or decide to skip fasting for a day of fun.
Choose Wisely
Once you have determined what is motivating you, it’s a good time to think seriously about what functions you know you’ll have to attend.
These fall more into the category of the big stuff like weddings and birthdays.
It’s never a good idea to pass on something that could damage your relationships with others or cause you to miss out on something important in your life.
Intermittent fasting is there to help you, not to control your every action
Limiting how much external control others have over you can also be a really good thing.
This is often true for a lot of people.
More time spent developing yourself can be a more than worthy reason to take your time and invest it into yourself and the things that you really want to do.
Take Some Time to Make Adjustments
The easiest way to handle social obligations is to adjust your fasting on those days, especially when you can plan ahead.
If you typically begin eating around 1pm, but your friends want you to go to brunch at 11am and will begin eating at 11:30, then you can simple start fasting a couple hours earlier the night before, allowing you to get your full fast in and enjoy brunch without having to stress about it.
At the end of the day, it is about making choices, and deciding what is more important to you at any given time.
