Movember is quickly coming to a close as today is officially the last day!  It is almost time to mow this Mo!

This is also the final blog posting for our series linking Movember and health literacy to the sacred 7 Grandfather Teachings.  The 7th and final sacred Grandfather Teaching is Truth:

Debwewin—Truth: Truth is to know all of these things. Speak the truth. Do not deceive yourself or others.

It’s all about accountability. People need to be accountable to themselves first.  I like this teaching because it explains that.  Most people believe that we have to be truthful to others.  But what about ourselves?

The same goes with health literacy.  People need to know that it’s OK not to know something.  But it’s also important to hold ourselves accountable to our actions.  For example, the word “can’t.”  People like to say things like: “I can’t lose 10 pounds.  I can’t quit smoking.  I can’t eat a balanced diet.”  What if people changed the word to “won’t.”  People might be saying: “I won’t lose 10 pounds.  I won’t quit smoking.  I won’t eat a balanced diet.”  By using the word “won’t” we are giving ourselves a choice.  People don’t like the word “won’t” because at the end of the day people want to make healthy lifestyle changes.  So what if every time we use the word “can’t” we replace it with “I don’t know how.”

“I don’t know how to lose 10 pounds.  I don’t know how to quit smoking.  I don’t know how to eat a balanced diet.”

Simply by changing these simple words around, we can be truthful to ourselves, remove the barriers and allow ourselves to learn more about health literacy.  Let’s be accountable to ourselves first and learn from all 7 Grandfather Teachings.

On behalf of the Good Learning Anywhere team and Sioux Hudson Literacy Council, we would like to thank you for all your support for Movember 2011.  It’s been a great experience, we’ve promoted a lot of health literacy awareness for our learners, and we made some new connections as well.