A Complaint-Free Life

Positivity Increase Health

The content of the HealingT1D website is for educational and information purposes only.  It does not contain medical advice. The contents of this website are not intended to substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. Please always consult with your doctor, physician, or other qualified healthcare professional before making any adjustments to your routine or healthcare regime.  HealingT1D and all associated with it will not be held liable for any risks or issues associated with using or acting upon the information on this site.

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Summary: The author reflects on self-compassion and the detrimental nature of complaining, contrasting it with love and compassion. Inspired by Will Bowen’s “A Complaint-Free World,” she embarks on a challenging journey to eliminate complaints. Their pursuit aims for enhanced wellbeing through self-awareness and compassion practice.

As I was writing my last blog post on Self-Compassion and Kristin Neff’s book “Self-Compassion: The Proven Power of Being Kind To Yourself”,  I started mulling about what compassion and self-compassion might look like in life.   

Complaining seems to me to be the true antithesis of compassion.  When you complain about how you look in the mirror or how annoying you found someone to be, compassion cannot be present.  Compassion comes from love, complaining comes from hate (or at least dislike).  Compassion asks you to see the human and the vulnerable in yourself or the other.  Compassion requires patience and understanding, instead of judgement.  If you are sitting with compassion, you cannot have the judgement necessary to complain.

A Complaint-Free World

Self-compassion and compassion for others could be accessed through multiple routes (Kristin Neff gave many ideas in her book).  However, something I immediately thought of, when thinking about compassion, was a book I read some years ago about complaining.  The book was called “A Complaint-Free World: How to Stop Complaining and Start Enjoying the Life You Always Wanted by Will Bowen”.

In his book, Will Bowen outlines an approach to stop complaining.  He offers the challenge of 21 days without a single complaint.  You wear a bracelet on one wrist and, each time you complain, you switch it to the other wrist.  The first challenge is to get through a day without switching  the bracelet.  Then, a week.  Then, three weeks.  It sounds pretty easy in practice.  It isn’t!

My Previous Experience Of Stopping Complaining

I started trying to do the 21-day complaint-free challenge when I first read Will Bowen’s book maybe five or six years ago.  It was so impossibly hard for me at that time!  I’d get a few hours in and then be complaining again.  And, as my awareness increased, I felt like I was just getting worse and worse,  I ended up giving up, feeling doomed to failure for the rest of my life.  

Four Stages Of Competence By Martin Broadwell

Since then, I have learnt about the ‘Four Stages of Competence’ Model by Martin Broadwell.  This model states that there are four distinct stages in the learning process:

1. Unconscious Incompetence:

The learner is not aware how to do the required task and may also not be aware that they do not know how to do the task.

2. Conscious Incompetence:

The learner becomes aware that they do not know how to do the required task.  They are likely to make a lot of mistakes at this stage as the attempt to do the task.

3. Conscious Competence:

The learner learns how to do the task.  However, it still requires diligence and concentration to achieve it.  Focus and attention are required.

4. Unconscious Competence:

The skill has been mastered to such a degree that focussed concentration is no longer required to perform the task.

When I started to stop complaining, I quite quickly went from being an unconscious incompetent (not aware of just how much I was complaining) to a conscious incompetent (being aware that I was complaining all. the. time.  It was painful to realise just how negative I was.  I took this as an indication that I was failing at becoming complaint-free whereas, in fact, I was starting to progress up the stage of the learning process.  So, with this awareness, I am going into this new attempt with the realisation that I am going to go through a (hopefully not too painfully long!) patch where I am going to witness just how much I moan and complain about people and my life!  But hanging through this stage will bring me to a new place, where self-compassion, and compassion in general, will be mine.

To Inform, Not To Complain

Will Bowen, however, does assert in his book that a life without complaints should not be a life that accepts the unsatisfactory.  if you are provided with a service that isn’t up to standard, it is perfectly okay to say so.  But in a way that doesn’t turn it into a moan.  If your car wasn’t serviced on the day it was meant to be, it is okay to phone the company and point this out.  If your food at the restaurant was unappetising, informing the waiter or chef is the right thing to do.  Asking for a replacement is also okay.  But then complaining to your friends at the table about the poor quality of the restaurant or the service is where the buck stops.  That is not necessary.  Or good for your health.

Complaining Is Bad For Your Health

When you complain, your body releases more of the stress hormone cortisol.  As I have discussed in multiple previous articles (see here and here for examples), cortisol is responsible for kicking off, or at least contributing, to the fight-flight response in the body (see here for details).  This is the very mode that I believe creates Type 1 Diabetes in the body.  So reducing, or preferably eliminating, this behaviour is likely to reduce insulin resistance and therefore the amount of insulin dependence.  And that’s definitely not something to complain about!!

Putting It Into Practice

I think a non-complaint practice takes time to master.  Will Bowen came up with the idea of using a bracelet on your wrist that you switch from one wrist to the other each time you complain.  The aim is to get through a day, a week or a month without switching it.  I bought one of his bracelets for this purpose.  I like the idea of how this work sand will go and dig mine out of the cupboard so that I can use it from now.  Like any other form of practice – yoga, meditation, breathwork, even instrumental practice – I don’t anticipate it will be easy or free from mistakes.  But the learning is where the healing is.

So, dear readers, if you see me complaining in any of my future blog posts, please kindly call me out on it!  I won’t take it as a complaint from you, I promise.  It will purely take it as a gift of learning for me.

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    Picture of Natalie Leader
    Natalie Leader

    Natalie is a blogger with Type 1 Diabetes. Natalie's special gifts are questioning the status quo and being a rebel. She is using these gifts to question medical 'knowledge' and find a true cure for Type 1 Diabetes.

    The content of the HealingT1D website is for educational and information purposes only.  It does not contain medical advice. The contents of this website are not intended to substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. Please always consult with your doctor, physician, or other qualified healthcare professional before making any adjustments to your routine or healthcare regime.  HealingT1D and all associated with it will not be held liable for any risks or issues associated with using or acting upon the information on this site.

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