TRENDING
I can’t find matching shoes THEY GOT THE WEATHER WRONG AGAIN!
THIS COMPUTER IS SLOOOW
THESE JEANS My pillow’s too soft MAKE ME LOOK FAT!
I HATE QUEUES!
WE ARE A NATION Trust my flight to be OF WHINGERS T H A T ’ S N O T W H A T I O R D E R E D delayed
HE’S Why does my boss get to decide? I WON’T EAT IT IF THERE’S SUGAR IN IT NOT HOT The music’s There’s too many I’M TOO ENOUGH terrible to choose from! TIRED FOR ME
We’re the lucky country – but you certainly wouldn’t know it. Cassie White asks how we became the land of bitchers and moaners
(WWW.POSITIVEPSYCHOLOGYINSTITUTE.COM.AU)
M
Y MUM recently bought me two pairs of sass & bide jeans. They’re really similar and it’s hard to decide which ones to wear. I can’t tell you what a battle that is. She also got me the gorgeous (and expensive) geometric sequin and beaded skirt – but now I have to hunt for shoes to match, which is really annoying… That’s right, my designer gifts have caused enough angst that I’m whingeing about them. I realise how ridiculous that is…yet I’m not alone. Yep, we are a country of complainers. And I don’t mean serious expressions of grief – I’m talkin’ self-indulgent, middle-class beefs. “First-world problems”, “white whines” – however you dress it up, the truth is, our penchant for a good old rant has reached epic proportions. A Choice survey has detailed a long list of our favourite complaints, documenting everything from inaccurate weather forecasts to slow internet connection and long checkout queues. I’ll spare you the details, but it isn’t pretty – we find fault with pretty much everything. And women
are more easily irritated than men. Most of the time we have enough insight to know we’re grumbling about something silly, so why do we do it anyway? Michael Hines, psychologist at the Positive Psychology Institute, says evolution has hard-wired us to focus on the negative: “When survival and reproduction were the main goals in life, it had more value for us to pay greater attention to possible dangers as opposed to rewards,” he says. But we don’t sleep in caves and hunt for our food anymore. Instead, we live in an age of hotel pillow menus and drive-thru coffee. Dr Hines says we now pick fights with life because it can serve as a distraction from deeper issues. “Many people aren’t as happy or fulfilled in life as they’d like to be and that can manifest as whingeing or complaining,” he explains. “A lot of us spend time and energy pursuing happiness and life satisfaction down the wrong roads. We want material possessions and fame and fortune at the expense of meaning,
IT’S NOT FAIR
purpose and better relationships.” Point taken. He suggests an easy way to shift focus is to keep a daily gratitude diary, where you consciously focus on everything that’s going well and what you’re grateful for. Learning to meditate will help you live in the moment, rather than worrying about past problems – or imagining future ones. “Being mindful in everyday life will quiet the ‘monkey mind’ that’s always talking away – the voice behind your whinges,” he says. So next time you catch yourself mid-moan, gauge how big the problem really is by asking yourself if you’ll even remember it a week/month/year from now. “Often we catastrophise and think things are far worse than what they actually are,” says Dr Hines. As for my wardrobe woes, the real issue behind my bratty gripes is I don’t feel comfortable with Mum spending so much money on me. I need to have an honest chat with her about it, but in the meantime, I’m going to start being grateful for my free designer clothes.
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