Stop Bitching, Start Living!

"Some people seem to go through life standing at the complaint counter" 
~Fred Propp Jr.

Complainers are like insect repellents! They create strong impression about themselves with people they talk to, and they are effective in doing their repelling job well! Psychologists say that's the biggest reason why people should change this behavior. Oh yes, there is no dearth of complainers around us, colleague bitching about the boss, neighbor whining about the weather, friend kvetching about the state of politics...expressing helplessness is a common tendency of ineffective people.

 

Getting rid of learned helplessness and whining behavior can be quite liberating, empowering. And the good news is, it can be unlearned. Change is easier for some people than others because not all complainers are the same. I feel there are 3 types of complainers:

1. Habitual Kvetchers suffer from existential angst perhaps - they are stuck in the ditch of their mindless complaining, unable to get out. It takes persistent effort can change themselves.
2. Infected/secondary complainers - complaining is contagious yes, and these folks are like vampires and start their own rant once infected. They may be complaining to gain a common ground with their peers, to get closer to the others. They might be able to overcome this attitude quicker than Habitual Kvetchers.
3. Genuine complainers: The folks have a genuine reason to complain but chances are they end up complaining to the wrong person, in a wrong manner at wrong place. 

How to Change?

• Become aware: ask yourself: "Am I a complainer?" and be honest with your answer - if you are and your answer is "yes" you have just won half the battle!
• Toll Gate: Next time you are about to complain, just stop yourself - try a joke instead or just don't say anything till you have something positive to say.
• Recruit help: entrust a close friend or colleague to alert you when you start - in a subtle way (by blinking at you for instance!)
• Record & Reward: keep a log of your attempts to complain, successes and failures. Reward yourself as you succeed.

Got to Complain?

When you NEED to complain, complain by all means, but make it legitimate. Here is how:

• make sure you are complaining to the right person
• don't blame briefly describe what happened 
• how that effects you and 
• what exactly you want as a possible solution to the problem (don't complain if she has a different solution)
• focus on the problem not people

If you are in the company of a complainer, anticipate situations and subtly avoid those situations. Try helping complainers, most of all, don't get influenced into complaining yourself.

What do you think? Sound it off! click 'reactions' (below)

Habit #4 - I-M-C Syndrome

Inspiration, Motivation and Collaboration are means for achieving ends i.e. vision or mission. Failure to use these powerful tools undermines a leader’s ability to achieve goals/mission as he becomes solely dependent on his position and power to make people do what he wants them to do. People follow because they don’t have a choice and that is bad leadership.

This could happen because of four reasons:

1. Not believing in capacity of people to raise to the occasion, team members are seen either achievers or non-achievers.

Mindless vs. Happiness

Seth (Nicholas Cage): What's that like? What's it taste like? Describe it like Hemingway.
Maggie (Meg Ryan): Well, it tastes like a pear. You don't know what a pear tastes like?
Seth: I don't know what a pear tastes like to YOU.
Maggie: Sweet, juicy, soft on your tongue, grainy like sugary sand that dissolves in your mouth. How's that?
Seth: It's perfect.

~ City of Angles (1998) 

Just when elevator doors are about to close, two other people entered the elevator. I smiled at one of them and greeted, "Hello!" He scowled, as if offended and turned away.

All of us have our own experience being mindless ourselves and mindless behavior of others. Locking ourselves out of house, cars, forgetfulness, daydreaming, callous behavior on roads, in offices... It is estimated that people spend nearly half the time thinking about something other than what they are doing, and that is what results in mindlessness...doing something and thinking about something else.

Mindlessness is a coping mechanism, coping with stress and anxiety of decision making, coping with information explosion, pressures of modern life like unpleasantness of driving through a messy traffic jam, having to take decisions under pressure and so on. It is the way our mind protects itself from overload – like tripping mechanism of a fuse, by distracting us from work at hand. In that case, why bother? Mindlessness is not a simple annoyance, there is direct positive correlation with stress levels. More mindless one is more stress one is carrying and consequently less happy one will be deep inside, less one will enjoy life or work or whatever that they are doing, at the moment.

If we want to be aware and happy, here are the symptoms to watch for: worrying about future, day dream of yester years, too inflexible or too flexible with rules (especially those set by oneself), beliefs, ethics, norms, processes (eg. open and blatant disrespect to traffic rules and admiring crooks etc.)

Mindfulness on the other hand means being open minded, empathetic, aware, being in the present, non-judgmental and non-reactive. The memorable scene from the movie City of Angels portrays this idea. Maggie Rice goes out to fetch some more pears after that never returns (becomes an angel)!

What are your thoughts and experiences?

Litter Begets Litter

“We must dare to think about unthinkable things
because when things become unthinkable,
thinking stops and action becomes mindless.”
--J. William Fulbright

Littering is universal  phenomenon (we have had enough of those bashing Indians' littering habits).The US for example owes $11 billion to litter cleanup costs(kab.org and others), many other societies suffer from this menace too! But the questions that haunt us are:

Why people litter? How to prevent it?

I think people litter to dispose things they don't need. If there is a better way to do that, people need to be told about it explicitly. But, anti-litter campaigns spend more time complaining than finding interesting ways of telling people not to litter or perhaps thank folks for not littering. Setting causal relation (littering makes the place littered and untidy) and giving positive reinforcement can be surprisingly effective. Have you seen the ad for encouraging blood donation? The little girl thanks a stranger for donating blood - when the stranger says he never donated blood, she just tells him to do so in future. Now, that's a darn simple and memorable communication.

Sometimes our frustration makes us ignore the easiest and the most effective of solutions.

Change in such collective habits occur when habits of a critical number of people change. And then, clean places repel littering behaviour of others.

While commuting in Delhi metro, people hold the urge to litter and wait till get out of the metro station. Clean stations of the metro subconsciously discourages littering.

Cleaner the surroundings, less people are likely to litter. So lets cleanup, not complain.!