“I just need to vent.” We have all heard those words from a friend or family member. As a matter of fact, most of us have said them on more than one occasion. I know I have. Sometimes life (or more accurately, the people in your life) can frustrate you to the point that you need to vent or you might explode. I get it. But you need to stop. Seriously. Complaining, especially the kind followed by no action to fix the problem, is an epidemic today. It seems like everyone today is a “keyboard activist.” They have opinions and complaints about everything while they are behind the keyboard. But in the real world, they do nothing about it. Here are 3 reasons why you don’t want to be “that person.” 1. The World Doesn’t Care: It’s not that the world is full of un-caring people. That’s not what I am saying. But each of us has our own burden to bear. Most of the time, we don’t need to carry yours too. This is especially true if your complaint is trivial (and often it is). 2. It Creates a Mental Pattern: The science behind this is simple. When you do things over and over, it creates a pathway in your brain. This makes is easier to repeat the behavior automatically. This is how habits are formed and how you become “excellent” at certain behaviors. This is why it’s important to be mindful of your patterns. It can become a habit. Do you really want to be the person who habitually complains? 3. Most Have It Worse: There is a term called “First World Problems.” It’s based on this simple concept. We complain about things that are comical when compared to the rest of the world. The fact is, most of our problems are barely that at all. I am reminded of a friend’s story about “worst jobs.” We all went around the table telling our story about the worst job we had had in our lives. All of us telling the story with great detail about something we had hated doing. Then we came to him. “I was in the military in the desert. We had Porta-Potties there and could not leave the ‘remains’ in country. So we had to dispose of them. This was done by adding diesel fuel to the mixture of feces and urine. But you could not just leave them to burn, otherwise it would settle. So for three weeks, I had to stir this mixture of diesel fuel, feces and urine in the desert (average temperature 126 degrees). I still remember that smell.” Wow. I am sure there are worse jobs than that. But I have not had one. So for today, I will not complain about mine.
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