pity and play the role of the victim. Mutually supportive unhappy people then reinforce this victim status and endorse the victim’s justification for unhealthy and sometimes unethical destructive action – for example, ‘Oh you poor thing. That’s so unfair. You deserve to take some action to self- harm (e.g., get drunk, take drugs, or other reckless behaviour) and/or to take retaliatory action (e.g., insert any ideas for revenge).’ The problem with this is that the results of such destructive action feed back into the person’s self- image and further reinforce the negative pattern – hence, yes, making it more likely to happen again.
people like to be right; so those in the club will not want you to leave and will most likely actively agitate to encourage you to stay or, if not, will be there to call out, ‘I told you so’, at the first sign of any setback along your new path.
“If you don’t like something, change it. If you can’t change it, change your attitude. Don’t complain.” Maya Angelou
In his book, “A complaint free world – how to stop complaining and start enjoying the life you always wanted”, Will Bowen draws on change theory that says that in creating a change in our lives we progress through four
“If you don’t like something, change it. If you can’t change it, change your attitude. Don’t complain.” Maya Angelou
In contrast, happy people feel the weight of dissatisfaction and then use it to move into constructive action. Note the key distinction here between being a victim and being a creator – blame gets you nowhere, it simply disempowers you. Robert Kennedy said, “There are those that look at things the way they are, and ask why? I dream of things that never were and ask why not?” See the difference? It doesn’t mean you won’t fail at what you do or have setbacks along the way, but shifting the context shifts the meaning of the events. So, if you are in the club, how do you get out of it? Remember of course that
stages: Unconscious Incompetence; Conscious Incompetence; Conscious Competence; Unconscious Competence. What this means is that at the beginning we don’t even realise how much we actually complain. The first challenge then is to become aware of our incompetence and Bowen proposes a rather challenging but fun experiment. The challenge is to be complaint free for 21 days and awareness is raised by wearing a wrist band which must be shifted to the other wrist any time you become aware of your complaining. Sounds simple – but before you make that judgement try it – and yes, if you
shift the wrist band, then you start at day one again. Bowen himself says when he started he moved his bracelet so much he broke three of them before he made it to 21 days.
“A mind stretched to a new idea never shrinks back to its original dimensions.” Oliver Wendell Holmes
And so here’s the kicker from playing this little game, if you re-read the neuro science stuff at the start of this article, you will realise that if you can make it to 21 days, then you will have rewired your brain and will naturally show up complaint free. And by doing so you will subconsciously influence those around you in a positive way. n
Connect with other readers & comment on this article at
www.livingnow.com.au
A.C. Ping is an existential philosopher whose work focuses on the key question of ‘How are you creating your reality?’ His current research
draws on the inter-disciplinary fields of moral philosophy, criminology, social psychology and neuro-cognitive science to address the question of ‘Why good people do bad things?’
REFERENCES Wlassoff, W. “Complaining and the brain – how bad karma is created”, Brain Blogger, July 28th 2016. Bowen, W. “A complaint free world – How to stop complaining and enjoy the life you always wanted”, Doubleday, 2007. Layard, R. “Happiness: Lessons from a new science”, Penguin UK, 2011.
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