I have recently started a practice of listening to The Daily Stoic podcast. Today’s has sparked a challenge for me and I have decided it would be fun to invite others in on the challenge.
Fun for me.😉
30 Days of No Complaining.
The premise is that you take something like a beaded bracelet (could be a rubber band) and start it off on one arm. Every time you notice yourself complaining you move the bracelet to the other arm. The goal is to get through the day with it on the same arm – never having to take it off.
I once heard the phrase “behind every complaint is a request”. It was a perspective that helped me immensely when I was a manager of people who had endless complaints and/or client executive taking in customers’ complaints on multi-million-dollar programs I was running for them. It was so easy to get defensive and take the complaint personally. But when I reframed the complaint to a request – or let myself get curious with the person on what was the underlying request – then so much more positive momentum was gained.
I just never thought about applying this principle to my own internal mindset. Duh!
Now I’m the first person to honour emotions like anger, frustration, sadness, disappointment, etc. I encourage my clients to not just ignore these emotions and put on a brave face. I find when you can sit with these emotions in a healthy way (ask me how) then I often get more clarity about what is really important.
But I never thought about the wasted energy I was spending on innocent “complaints” versus just saying what I need (dare what I want) at this moment.
So for the next 30 days, I’m going to challenge myself to do just that. Hold the complaints. Pile on the requests.
I’d love you to join me and share how it’s going for you. Successes and failures.
Full Disclosure – in the next 30 days I will be completing a home renovation (with my husband who seems to have a different decision-making process than me), moving from our rental into an incomplete renovation (by choice), living with my two 21-year-old boys who let’s just say do not value cleanliness the same way I do, dog sitting for a big golden retriever who as lovely as he is has a lot of hair that he seems to leave behind AND trying to get my ass back into my regular workout routine. So, I’m probably doomed to fail. But who doesn’t love a good shit show.🙂