Negativity is inevitably going to enter the waters of our workplace. When members start signing up for the complaining club, it permeates and reflects stagnation and frustration. Reaffirming someone's complaints satisfies a surface sense of compassion, but ongoing complaining mirrors a stubbornness that inhibits healing, growth, or change. In other words, humans are hardwired for empathy. "The human brain has multiple mirror neuron systems that specialize in carrying out and understanding, not just the actions of others but their intentions, the social meaning of their behavior, and their emotions." (Written by Sandra Blakeslee in a New York Times article published in 2006) In the premotor cortex, neurons respond to observations as if the observer were acting it out themselves. Mirror neurons fire in our brains when we observe another person in action. We are even hardwired to notice and reflect on the things around us. At any given time, we are reacting to our thoughts and responding to others' verbal and nonverbal cues. Something to observe is that energies are palpable- the choice to smile or not smile when we pass a colleague, how stressed we are in the moment, reducing compassion, or focusing on an abundance of gratitude. That frustrating situation occurs when we are not aware of our or another's low state of mind. Often when we are complaining, we are only looking at the surface of the issue we haven't noticed (or don't have the time to catch) that there is an ocean of context that is unseen.
In that state, we stay in one spot with those feelings instead of letting them pass. Complaining is the act of taking on the feelings of annoyance, anger, pettiness, blame. A complaint is specific to an issue and exists within the context of that issue.
We all hang out in the complaining club, but no one likes being there.Ĭomplaining is different from a complaint. Complaining might make a connection with those who reflect our frustrations, but it creates a longer distance between ourselves and the person or aspect of our jobs with which we take issue. However, nothing gets resolved in the complaining club. It is a common and familiar response, and it also creates an 'in group' between the person or people who share our complaints. That habit is complaining.Ĭomplaining can indeed be cathartic.
Many of us share an experience, and perhaps on a conscious or subconscious level, know that it is not helping us, yet we continue to participate in its habit.
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