The Social Vegetarian

Lifestyle alterations are the hardest ones to make and one of the toughest lifestyle changes that anyone can make voluntarily is to become a vegetarian. Frequently individuals find it easier to be part of a support group when making lifestyle alterations; think of Alcoholics Anonymous, Weight Watchers or giving up smoking. Joining a support group can help the beginner vegetarian too.

The benefits of being a member of such a support group are manifold, yet some of them are encouragement, advice and friendship. You may not need the friendship, but you may like to socialize with other vegetarians so that you can see how they cope with eating out and in essence just fitting into a society designed by and for meat-eaters.

However, whether you intend giving up your old friends or not, you may find yourself gravitating away from them after a time quite naturally. Remember the old expression: 'Birds of a feather flock together'? This is quite normal.

You will have concerns substituting something else for meat; you will be worried that your diet is lacking in some mineral; you will be wondering which restaurants serve real vegetarian food and lots more.

Your newly discovered support group friends will become a immense source of encouragement and advice in this field. You might not like the concept of a 'vegetarian support group', but you could just as easily join a vegetarian dining club or vegetarian cookery class, the effect will work out the same - you will learn and you will create new acquaintances.

If you have difficulty locating such a group by the regular methods of your local Yellow Pages and an Internet search, try going to the local community centre, where there might be yoga classes - a couple of the attendees will be vegetarians that you can ask. Or go to you local health food shop and ask there Likewise you could ask at a martial arts club or a Hindu Indian restaurant. If all else fails, you could start your own club.

If you organize your own club, find a sympathetic bar or restaurant that will cook your meal suggestions for that night at a reasonable cost. After a time, I am sure you could build up a nice little club of twenty individuals and the landlord may let you have your own room to dine in once a month like the Masons.

If you think that this is too much in the early days, you could simply set up a blog. A blog is an interactive website, where you and others can post relevant knowledge. If you keep the name of the blog relevant to your town and vegetarianism, you should find that other people looking as you once did will find you, whereas you found no one. Once you have built up a group of local, on line vegetarian sympathizers, you could suggest meeting once a month in the flesh and take the dining notion from there. An advertisement in the local paper would help too.

Owen Jones, the writer of this article writes on a number of topics, but is currently involved with quick vegetarian recipes. If you want to know more or check out some fantastic offers, please go to our website at Vegetarian Sandwich Recipes.