Member-only story
“Complaining is finding faults. Wisdom is finding a solution.” — Ajahn Braham
I used to complain a lot. It didn’t matter what situation I was in or how good things were in the moment. I’d find something to complain about.
It was a bad quality to have. I knew complaining was an annoying trait, but it was almost like I couldn’t hear myself. I didn’t even realize how often I actually did it.
It was that ingrained within me, like a part of my personality. I think I just didn’t know what else to talk about. What did people say to each other, if not what was bothering them today, or what’d been stressing them out lately?
It’s not like I was a completely unpleasant person — I had friends, luckily, which is how I realized I needed to make a slight personality tweak.
Sometimes the ones closest to us have to wake us up to our own bad habits, make us better people.
At first, of course, my ego was hurt. I didn’t want to hear that I was doing anything wrong. I was a good person. Didn’t people care about my first-world problems and over-inflated, dramatized worries?
No, they didn’t. They don’t. And they shouldn’t have to.
People don’t thrive and grow when they’re focusing on all the negative things they can point out around…
