How do you break the pattern of complaining or being in persistent complaint?
The first thing to do is to realise you have a complaint about something.
For example, if your partner leaves the tap off the toothpaste in the morning (every morning!) and it bugs you – that’s a persistent complaint.
Or maybe you might be unhappy about your colleague who is not contributing to the team efforts – that’s a complaint.
Or possibly you’re unhappy about the weather and moan all day long about it – that’s a complaint!
We often don’t notice that we are moaning about something and that can lead us to an unproductive way of being. It may seem justified and even legitimate about what we are complaining about, but it does have steep costs. The benefits of complaining are many and there is an advantage or benefit that we receive that reinforces this pattern of behaviour in us.
By being able to recognise this pattern of behaviour, we then have the choice of interrupting this cycle and dissolving it, so it no longer exists and we become free from our complaints.
It will lead to a much higher level of happiness, self expression, satisfaction and fulfilment in our lives.
By complaining, there is a Benefit or a Payoff:
In your own eyes you get to be right
The feeling of righteousness is powerful
It’s giving you a crutch to lean on
You get to blame someone else or something else
You become a victim
You don’t have to accept any responsibility
There is a certain satisfaction we get when we complain
You can justify your complaint
By being in constant complaint about something or someone, this is what it’s costing you:
List of Costs in your life:
It’s costing your freedom of self expression
Your ability to live life to the full
Your enjoyment of the other person
It’s costing you your ability to move forward in your life
It costs a lot of negative energy thinking about it
It pushes people away from you
Things to do to help you to stop complaining:
– Recognise that you have a complaint or persistent complaint
– Do not complain to anyone else other than the person who can change or make a difference to the problem
– When confronting them, don’t moan at them or be aggressive in your request, always be courteous and calm
– Have a solution in mind that would work for you
– Be ready to compromise to a point where it alleviates the problem
– If you find yourself complaining about something that can’t be changed, then try to accept it, or change your situation somehow and turn it into a positive
So when you catch yourself complaining about something, weigh up the benefits against the costs, you will find that it’s costing you very much more.
Start imagining a life without complaints and being positive so you can start to become fully self expressed and living the life you want and love right now!
Maria Allegria