#31DayReset Day 21: Stop Complaining for 24 Hours

This post is Day 21 of the 2012 edition of the 31 Days to Reset Your Life Challenge. Learn more and sign up here.

As you may have noticed on Day 20: Remove Negative People from Your Life, some of us are actually addicted to complaining because it gives us an “out” from appreciating what we have. It makes us continue to seek and never be satisfied with our lives. In my own life, I’ve noticed that every time I resist the urge to complain, my body actually feels lighter, as if I just let go of a small piece of baggage. I’m convinced that complaining steals our joy, and today, I challenge you to stop complaining for 24 hours.

Most people do not realize that as they continue to find things to complain about, they disallow their own physical well-being. Many do not realize that before they were complaining about an aching body or a chronic disease, they were complaining about many other things first. It does not matter if the object of your complaint is about someone you are angry with, behavior in others that you believe is wrong, or something wrong with your own physical body. Complaining is complaining, and it disallows improvement. - Abraham

Estimated Time to Complete: 24 hours

Today’s exercise requires you to monitor your own complaints and replace them with something more productive: gratitude.

Step 1:

Take your Reset notebook around with you today and write down every instance where you complain about something. It could be as small as complaining about the weather or the way your partner leaves hair in the sink.

Example complaint: At 3:05 pm I tweeted about how much I hate the traffic in LA.

Step 2:

For each instance, write down a statement of gratitude to combat the complaint. Think about the “silver lining” in each of your complaints.

Example gratitude statement (to combat the complaint in Step1): I’m grateful that I have a reliable car that I can use to travel back and forth to work in.

Take Action and Reflect: When you’re done, please share your experience with us in the comments! Answer these three questions in your response:

1. How many times did you complain?
2. Was it difficult to go a whole day without complaining?
3. What did you do or say instead?

If you blogged about today’s assignment, please post the link in the comments so we can read it!

Want All the 31 Day Reset Exercises in One Place?

The Reset Workbook contains all 31 daily assignments in one place as well as 28 printable worksheets to supplement the material and help you complete the daily exercises. The workbook is 60 pages long and comes in an electronic, ebook format.

For those who may wish to go at their own pace, this workbook allows you to have all the assignments at your fingertips in addition to the opportunity to connect with others who are doing the 31 Day Reset program here on the blog. There are also a few bonuses, like the full version of the Life Mapping Workbook with a video training!

Buy the workbook here.

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