Complaining is an awful habit.

It plagues the lives of millions, if not billions of people, stopping them from making progress and feeling good. Yet, unlike physical bad habits like smoking and scrolling, people usually don’t think about quitting mental bad habits like complaining. That’s bad, because real improvement does not come from changing the outside world—it’s all about changing the mind.

In this week’s letter, I will explain why complaining is terrible and how you can break free from it.

Why Complaining is Ruining Your Progress (& Happiness)

Know that problems, setbacks, dickheads… they come in the way of everyone.

You can’t avoid them.

If you are serious about self-improvement and reaching financial freedom, difficulties will be even more abundant for you. That’s what you signed up for when you decided to be different.

That’s a big rule from Stoicism you need to remember.

When something goes wrong or when someone irritates them, most people’s default reaction is complaining.

“My boss is such an asshole”, “Why is it always me who has to work overtime” and “Why you dumb kids never learn to eat without creating a mess!”

Is this right, though? Is this the best way to react when things go wrong?

If you think about it rationally, the answer is a clear HELL NO.

Complaining doesn’t solve your problems, your life doesn’t get better as a result and in addition to that, you are annoying the people around you with your endless complaints.

But chances are, even though such people are rare, you know someone who never complains.

Maybe it’s the old uncle who calls summer rain “a blessing for the crops” (when everyone else is thinking “fuck the weather, why does it have to rain just as we were about to go out”), or a friend who calms you down when “that dumbhead-school-bus-driver sees you come running but doesn’t wait for you”.

I have good news for you:

You, too, can become that kind of person!

Meet the Problem-Solver’s Mindset

This mindset is the opposite of complainer’s mindset.

A problem-solver, instead of complaining about his problems, he uses his mental resources to solve the problem.

This 3 questions filter from Mo Gawdat illustrates how this works in action:

When faced with a problem, instead of complaining about it, blaming others, or acting in other immature and irrational ways, ask yourself these 3 questions:

1) Is it true?

Most of the time, we complain about petty little things that don’t even matter.

Ask yourself, is this truly a problem? Is this really a big deal?

If it’s not, just drop it. It’s not worth complaining over it.

As you mature, more and more events start to fall into this category.

A kid will cry his heart out if he loses his toy car, but you, as a grown up, you wouldn’t care much about it.

Similarly, once you start thinking more about the real consequences of your petty little problems, you will grow emotionally mature and things like missing a bus or spilling some tea over your shirt will stop seeming like a big deal for you.

2) What can I do to solve it?

Once you stop complaining, you will realize that you actually have enough brain cells to solve your own problems.

Let’s say you come home after a long day of studying, but you still have to work on your side-hustle.

You start feeling overwhelmed. But don’t complain about it.

Instead, take on the creative challenge of problem solving and see what you can do to solve the problem. Maybe you make time for one task tomorrow morning or go to bed an hour later to finish off the task.

If you don’t complain and instead think about it, you can find a way to solve most of your problems in life.

And even if you can’t…

3) What can I do to make life better (despite the problem)?

Let’s say you really can’t solve the problem, it’s something outside of your control.

Are you then supposed to whine and complain?

Of course no.

Maybe you can’t solve the problem… but life continues and you can surely find a way to make life better despite the problem.

Say your flight is delayed and you have a 15 hours long layover at the airport. You can’t solve the problem, complaining and cursing the situation won’t help either, BUT you can find a way to make the best use of that time.

You have 15 hours to read a book, to think, or to journal.

If you make good use of that time, you can even end up being grateful for what your old self would complain about.

How to Break the Habit of Complaining

Anyone with a moment of rational thought can understand that the problem-solver’s mindset is much, much better than complaining.

But here’s the deal:

If changing our mind was as simple as understanding, then everyone would stop complaining right away. But our brains are very prone to forgetting. Adopting the problem solver’s mindset will take time and a good amount of practice.

But don’t worry, I will now show you exactly how to practice it, step by step:

1. Meditate every single day

Most of the time, we don’t even notice when we are complaining. It happens unconsciously, out of habit.

That’s why the first step to stop complaining is mindfulness.

Action Step 1:

Start meditating every day for at least 3 minutes

With meditation, you are training your brain’s ability to notice when you are thinking, talking, or doing anything. With meditation, you can make the unconscious conscious. You can notice when you are complaining and only then, you can stop.

If you need help staying consistent with meditation, you can read this letter:

2. Gratitude journaling

You might have already noticed that people who do not complain a lot are usually positive and optimistic about life.

Cultivating optimism is a topic we’ll delve into in another week, but for now, I present to you the simplest and most effective method of cultivating a positive outlook on life: gratitude journaling.

Every morning, or evening, however you prefer, write 3 to 5 things you are grateful for in your life. It can be…

• …the people you are grateful to have in your life

• …good actions others did for you

• …things that are going well in life or things you simply like to have

Do this every day, and you will train your mental muscle of seeing the good in life.

Action Step 2: 

Add gratitude journaling to your morning or evening routine and write 1-3 things you are grateful for every day.

Remember, nothing is too small to be worth being grateful for.

And don’t overthink “should I write on paper or is writing on Notion fine?” 

Both work.

3. Keep a complaining journal

This is your most powerful weapon against complaining.

You can do this on paper, but I recommend you do it on your phone so that you always have it with you. A page on a notetaking app, that’s all you need.

Action Step 3:

From now on, whenever you catch yourself complaining about something, (it may even be now—why is this dude dragging on about weird stuff like journaling), write it down on your complaining journal.

As you’ll read what you have written, the answer to the first question (is this truly something worth complaining over?) will be clear to you. You’ll either laugh it over, or if it truly is a problem that needs solving, then you put on your problem-solver hat, and see what you can do about the problem at hand.

You either solve it, or find a way to make life better despite the problem. (refer back to the 3 question framework above if you need to)

I recommend you answer these questions on the same page, right beneath the complaining you noted on your journal.

A final note…

This goes for complaining as well.

You will never be 100% free from complaining, even after decades of practice, you will still catch your mind (even your mouth) complaining instead of doing something useful. There will never be a day when you wake up and you are now someone who never complains.

It’s a constant quest to get better, to try to complain less and less.

So continue to work on yourself, Like, Subscribe, send this to a friend if you think they need it, and I will see you next week.

— Keep grinding, Nihad