Why do you whine?
- Written by Neil Patel on May 21st, 2008 |
- 10 Comments »
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Whining is something that we all do, but the question is why? When you whine nothing really happens other than you sounding like a baby. And if you sound like a baby then you are probably going to be treated like one. But seriously, why do people whine?
Over the last few weeks I have heard dozens of people whine and the most common one was:
Why doesn’t anyone fund my business idea? Trixie and Biff got venture capital funding and my idea is much better than theirs!
When you whine your problems don’t get solved because you are spending all your time whining instead of fixing. So the next time you are upset and are about to whine, do the following:
- Take all the IF’s and BUTs out of your head. It doesn’t matter if Trixie or Biff had a better outcome; this is you we are talking about and not them.
- Think about the situation and why it happened the way it did.
- If another party was involved, think about the situation from their perspective. If another party was not involved, think about the situation from a neutral perspective (I know this is hard, but you can do it).
- List out all the possible ways you can potentially change the situation to be favorable for you.
- Try and fix the situation using one of the ways you listed out. If things go your way, that’s great. If things don’t go your way or if the situation can’t be changed, then learn from it and move on.
Life is not perfect and we all whine about things (even me), but you’re more likely to succeed if you think about things from a logical perspective instead of an emotional whiny perspective.
PS: Hopefully it didn’t sound like I was whining about people whining. 
I was just about the whine about the fact I never get to be the first to respond to a post… but I didn’t! And guess what happened…. I got a chance to post first.
At least as I’m writing this no one has posted… we’ll see if someone beats me to it by the time I submit.
I do think it’s very true, and it goes back to something I read quite awhile ago that makes great sense to me. If you want better answers in life, ask yourself better questions. Basically your mind will answer your “inner voice” questions, even if on a subconscious level.. So instead of asking “Why does this always happen to me” (to which there is no real answer) your brain will make something up, like “because your an idiot”.
That self-defeating “self-talk” sets the stage for a whiny personality, and before you know it’s an ingrained habit that becomes hard to break.
Instead, ask yourself better questions… ask instead “What I can learn from this experience, and how can I enjoy the process” Ask yourself questions that have tangible answers, productive answers, that drive you to where you want to go…. not pull you further away.
Great point about being productive. If you aren’t productive things will not get better.
People who have been given the short end of the stick become whiners when nothing seems to go their way from an early age. Take my husband, the 3rd of 6 kids who was quiet and shy who’s mom sometimes forgot to fix his plate when they were kids. All his life, nothing goes right…poor poor thing! He’s thus learned to be the martyr…and I think that without that title he’d be just an ordinary guy….why would I ever want to take that away from him?
I’m one of those people that always tries to find the positive in a situation , so whiners really get to me.
I mean how hard is it to find at least one positive in the situation they are whining about?
As you already know, it isn’t that hard. The problem is their emotions are coming into play which is clouding their judgment.
Absolutely right on Neil! To be honest I used to whine about most things in life but then I realized that “you are only good as you let yourself become”.
No matter how much we whine or worry about ‘what if this happens’ or ‘what if that happens’, it boils down to what you are going to do about the situation at that moment in time and think about nothing else but a positive outcome.
Glad you don’t whine anymore. Not too many can do what you do, which is learn from your experiences.
Congrats!
It didn’t sound like you were whining about whiners with this post. I try and tell people this same thing all the time and 9 times out 10 they just stare at me like I’m crazy or they think I don’t care. There is a big difference beween thinking logically about a situation and not caring and alot of people have trouble seeing that difference.
Great post!
Sadly some people just want to whine. Have you ever met those people that no matter how big or small the problem is, they just whine.
I was raised that nobody wants to hear your problems and whining just wasn’t tolerated.
Good way to be raised. I think if more people are raised like that, hopefully future generations will not whine as much.