Funny ha ha.

A young monk joined an order that required total silence. At his discretion, the abbot could allow any monk to speak. It was nearly five years before the abbot approached the novice monk and said, "You may speak two words." Choosing his words carefully, the monk said, "Hard bed." With genuine concern, the abbot said, "I'm sorry your bed isn't comfortable. We'll see if we can get you another one."

Around his tenth year in the monastery, the abbot came to the young monk and said, "You may say two more words." "Cold food," the monk said. "We'll see what we can do," the abbot said.

On the monk's fifteenth anniversary, the abbot said again, "You may now speak two words." "I quit," the monk said. "It's probably for the best," replied the abbot. "You've done nothing but gripe since you got here."

From A Complaint-Free World, Will Bowen

1. I had a massage for the first time yesterday.

2. I gave up caffeine. Again.

3. Four-day work week!

"Get off the complain train!"

Those pearls of wisdom are brought to you by the author of The No Complaining Rule: Positive Ways to deal with Negativity at Work. Jon Gordon urges you to, instead, get on the energy bus (coincidentally the name of another book he has written).

The No Complaining Rule tells the fictitious story of Hope (oh, how I love metaphorical, virtue names... ) who works at a big company named EZ Tech. Hope's life is about as shitty as it could possibly be: Her husband left her earlier in the year for another woman, her teenage daughter is always aggrieved over something, and she is awaiting some tests to find out if she has breast cancer, which runs in her family. To top it off, poor Hope is faced with a daily barrage of complaints at work, where she is the VP of human resources -- where HER JOB is to deal with employee complaints. But Hope has just had enough. She comes in to work late every day, she's got a crap attitude, and the security guard (whose name she doesn't even know) tells her how she's made his life crap, too, because her smile used to be the best part of his whole day and now he never gets to see it.

Everything comes to a head for Hope when her company is faced with a PR nightmare and she is tasked with coming up with a plan for how to rehabilitate the company culture. Hope finds inspiration from a plucky nurse who tells her to suck it up and stop complaining about everything. (I mean, she is there to get blood work done to potentially confirm that she has life-threatening cancer, but what the fuck? She just needs to get over that shit and stop whining.) Hope takes the new no-complaints message back to the company big wigs, and she is heralded as the genius who will lead the company out of its negativity and poor profits.

Aside from the terrible writing and the oversimplification, the book did have a few good points to make. For example, the book encourages a solution-oriented approach to complaining. Since there will be times when you need to (and should) complain, you should take the opportunity to find a way to change that situation. The approach sees complaining as a symptom of what's wrong with your life; if you're complaining about it, you're not happy about it. So what can you change to make you happy about it?

"If we pay attention to our thoughts, words, and complaints, we will learn a lot about what we don't want and don't like. We can then use what we don't want and don't like as a catalyst to help us determine what we do want and do like."

In a work environment, this principle is used to make employees present solutions for problems that they find within the company.

Generally, I support this idea. While I might complain about things like bad drivers or annoying people I meet without any thought to changing those things, my attitude towards larger problems -- like being unhappy in a work situation or in a friendship, for example -- has always been "What can I do about it?" That hasn't stopped me from complaining about those situations in the process, but I do always keep my thoughts focused on how I can change that situation and make it better.

The book also endorses the "finding the positive" technique, which I think is complete nonsense. This idea encourages you to think of situations not in terms of "have to" but "get to." In other words, I shouldn't think that I "have to" run in order to lose weight, but that I "get to" run because I have legs and I'm healthy. The second aspect of this is to find the "but." In other words, I shouldn't complain when my car breaks down or I get a flat tire, but I should think about how lucky I am to have a car. Or when I'm annoyed that I'm waiting in traffic for an hour, I should focus on the fact that I'm lucky to have a job to drive to in the traffic.

Sure, these are petty scenarios, and I shouldn't become consumed by complaining about them. But taking the "it could be worse" point of view is meaningless to me. It could ALWAYS be worse. Discomfort, inconvenience, and pain are all relative. It's better to find ways to attribute value to things in your life based on your own standards and circumstances. No, I don't feel lucky just to have a job to drive to in traffic, but I do try to keep the situation in perspective by noting that there's nothing I can do about how fast or slow cars or moving, and that no matter how annoyed I get, I won't move any faster. And then I try to focus on things like listening to good music or thinking about my day or watching the people around me.

The book also offers suggestions for things to do instead of complain. I was surprised to see that I already do many of them.

1. Let go of things that are beyond your control (see, my approach to traffic jams is part of the literature).

2. Meditate to reduce stress and to boost positive energy. (Tried that.)

3. Instead of complaining about other people, find the positive in them and praise their good qualities. NOT my strong suit. Other people are the biggest source of my complaints.

4. Focus on your successes and accomplishments to generate a lot of positive thinking about your daily life. Meh.

5. Practice gratitude. This suggestion actually includes noting THREE THINGS that you are grateful for or happy about each day. What do you know? I am a fucking happiness GENIUS!

What are your suggestions for "getting off the complain train?"

1. Chris got a part-time job. We are on our way to riches!

2. I went to see the fertility doctor again today, and I am starting a new course of medicine. The doctor presented the plan, and Chris said, "Question: Will it make our babies superheroes?" The doctor dead panned back: "Yes. If you're the parents."

3. We are going to Boston next week!

Living for today...

Tonight, I attended a workshop at Duke Integrative Medicine called "An Evening of Mindfulness" with Dr. Jeffrey Brantley. The Duke Integrative Medicine Center is a mecca for hippies and other new-age types -- offering acupuncture, massage, yoga, meditation and other feel-good services. And underneath my cranky exterior, general misanthropy and on-again, off-again flirtations of becoming a lawyer or some other corporate type, I really am a big hippie at heart. I'm happy in a flowy patchwork skirt and a ring of tiny bells around my ankle. And I once had an intense black-light phase.

All that is to say that I could live at Duke Integrative Medicine and be very happy. I was first introduced to their services when my friend Jen bought me a "half-day experience" there after I had the miscarriage in October. I went for yoga, lunch, acupuncture (in which the acupuncturist unwittingly doubled as my therapist for the next hour) and some peaceful alone time (which they specifically cater to by offering several "reflecting" rooms, usually populated by trickling streams and rock formations).

Tonight, I attended the free workshop, which promised to offer tips for mindfulness to help reduce stress and anxiety. The center offers a more comprehensive, eight-week course on Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction (MBSR), and the workshop was a bit of a sales pitch to take the (very expensive) course. However, I did find the workshop to be very interesting, and it offered some valuable insights.

The premise behind the method is that you learn to focus on the present moment by focusing on your breathing or sounds around you, and you learn to let go of the nagging thoughts that can create anxiety. That includes the constant negative self-talk -- the inner critic. You learn to focus on the present instead of constantly rehashing events from the past or worrying about what might happen in the future. And once you're able to live more fully in the present, and learn to accept things as they are without judgment and criticism, you'll be better able to accept yourself and become less critical of those around you. And you'll be better able to control your reactions to situations.

This speaks to me. My inner critic is always at 11. And my mind is always racing. I am always thinking about not only what I have to do now, in the next few minutes, but what I have to do after that and then what I have to do after that and then what I have to do after that. And all the while, I'm still thinking about what I'm going to get accomplished over the weekend, by the end of the week, by the end of the month, by the end of the year, by the time I'm 35, by the time I'm 50, by the time I'm 80 and so on and so on. I am always questioning, always evaluating the ends and means of my days. Is this time well spent? Even if this is something I'd rather not be doing now, is it something that will add value to my life later? It's exhausting. But establishing that control is the only way I know to actually feel better in some ways about my life. It's an endless loop.

I'm also hesitant when it comes to meditation and other "mind control." I want something that will help NOW. Closing my eyes and listening to my breath doesn't calm me down so much as it puts me to sleep. It's like my body's way of rebelling. If I try to drag my mind kicking and screaming into the happy zone, it's like, "Nah. Peace."

Just as I was starting to warm up to the speaker and was starting to think, "Well, maybe I do feel a bit lighter after those two minutes of stillness..." he started asking the audience questions about how they deal with stress and what affect it has on their bodies, and I heard a familiar shrill voice ring out from the crowd. Old and creaky and laced with saccharine and hypocrisy. It's a voice that I heard whine to me every day about everyone who misunderstood her and just made her life so miserable when I was working as a temp a little over a year ago. It was the voice that made me wonder, "Shit, what am I going to do if they offer me the job?? I CAN'T listen to this every day." Sherry (not her real name) came into the office (the one that only she and I shared -- extra cozy comfort time) and complained to me about our boss, about all the co-workers who were out to get her, about her landlady who was so unfair because she wanted to charge her for breaking the lease early, about her son who never called, and about anything and everything that reminded her about how aggrieved she was. And when she wasn't complaining, she was always trying to convince me about how smart and cultured she was, telling me stories about great jobs she had had, or obscure books she had read. I hated her. The only way I had to cope with her was to literally not look at her when she spoke (hoping that keeping my back to her and typing away would make her think I was too busy to talk -- it didn't) and to respond to the things she said with things like "hmmm" or "mm--mm--mmo" (a mumbled "I dunno") or the occasional "huh."

Sherry was the perfect example of what constant complaining does to a person -- and everyone around that person.

I heard her voice and whipped around in shock. I wanted to jump out of my chair, point at her, and scream "Imposter! She's a dirty, lying hypocrite! Don't listen to her! Don't empathize with her! And, what more, she has robbed me of my moment of mindfulness!"

Alas, my brief mindfulness training kept me from doing so, and I was able to keep my attention on the lecture -- being mindful not to ever shift my gaze to the right and inadvertently make eye contact, and being careful to get up as soon as the lecture was over and leave without looking back.

I was able to slip out without making contact -- and I managed to buy one of the presenter's books while doing so. Maybe there is something to this mindfulness after all....

1. I heard a very inspiring lecture over the weekend that made me feel like great things are possible.

2. I got to spend time with some very good friends over the weekend.

3. Cookies and burritos -- no matter what they do to the waist line, they are good for the soul.

Just do it.

I was driving home from the gym tonight, and the John Tesh show came on the radio. "Intelligence for Your Life," you know. The schtick of this show is that Tesh presents short tidbits about various subjects in the vein of "Did you know....?" The segment I heard tonight was about negative thinking and stress. He actually said the following: "People who are cynical feel more stress. They're more suspicious, and they're mistrustful of others." He noted that negative thinking creates stress, which leads to higher blood pressure and depression. He also noted that negative people have fewer friends, which also leads to depression. The bit was followed -- appropriately -- by "Walking on Sunshine."

I was in the car by myself, and I laughed long and hard as I listened. "Yes! Yes, that's it! Just think positively! Just do it! Unless you want to die early a miserable and friendless reject, then you better get your mind right, and you better do it now."

Well, that was enough for me. Today is a whole new day. I will never be distrustful of another person. I will cast out all doubts and wield a mental machete against any creeping sarcasm, cynicism, or passivity.

I'm a driver; I'm a winner. Things are gonna change, I can feel it.




1. I love singing*, and I do it often. I sang the shit out of "Walking on Sunshine."

2. The word "busking." I'm a huge word nerd, and some words just tickle the shit out of me. That's one of them.

3. I've lost four pounds. Supermodelsuperstardom here I come!!

*Endorsement of singing does not imply quality of said singing.

New strategy

It seems that I have adopted the policy "If you can't say anything nice..." My week has been less cluttered by complaints, but I'm not sure if it's because my new complaint-free ideology has started to sink in or because I've just been unusually quiet the last week or so. Stress has been high (remember that whole can't-have-a-baby-and-now-we're-broke predicament I described?), and my usual strategy for that is to hunker down and work my way through it. As a result, I've been more focused on the big picture and have been less bothered by the day-to-day trivialities that usually occupy my complaints.

Though I have been complaining less, I can't say that my attitude has improved much. But I guess that's like a smoker saying that, gee, these past two weeks of running haven't done much to improve my fitness. I know it will take some time, and I know that simply eliminating complaints won't be enough. But it will be a start.

It has been suggested that I should do more than focus on reducing negativity. That instead of making myself an empty vessel and waiting for the flood of optimism and good humor to fill me (because it's just been waiting to get in), that I should find ways to fill myself with more positive thoughts.

Looking for the positive has been an exercise in futility in the past. Friends have tried this tactic many times, and I slam down every "what about...?" with a crushing dose of unfiltered reality. For me, looking for the positive in most situations has been akin to saying, "This homelessness is not so bad. I mean, you've only been robbed twice this week -- that's an all-time low -- and you were first in line at the soup kitchen last night." Not much consolation.

But I guess it's all in the spirit of the blog. Maybe focusing on the positive enough will drown out the negative. Or maybe it's just working two sides of the same problem (diet and exercise). I will become the Stuart Smalley of my life.

In that spirit, I will start listing three things each day that make me happy. It could be something about my life or myself, or it could just be something that I like and that makes me laugh.

1. My cat and I had a most productive cuddle session.




2. I found out that I have a free pass to a swanky (expensive) fundraising dinner because I'm on the board.


3. I discovered this song (which was most apropos):