How to Stop Complaining: The SEAL Officer Method

2024 Author: Malcolm Clapton | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 03:44

Whining will not help you cope with difficulties, but discipline does.

You probably have plans, goals, dreams that you are trying hard to achieve. Do you get upset when you can't do it? If so, I want to share with you a short but important idea.

I got it from the book Discipline Is Freedom by retired SEAL officer Joko Willink. The idea is very simple: Complaining about circumstances when things don't go the way you want them to is useless. However, the author does not give advice like “do not complain”: he understands that we need something more to really change our own behavior.

I don't know if you've tried before to start avoiding complaints once and for all. Every time I tried to do it myself, I didn't really succeed. And I realized that you can't get rid of this tendency in a day.

If you want to stop complaining, you must change your habits.

If everything is bad and you are frustrated and keep whining, try focusing on the positive things you can find in the situation. How to do it? Say good to yourself when something goes wrong.

Mission canceled? Okay, let's concentrate on another one.
Didn't get a promotion? Okay, there will be more time for self-improvement.
Were you not given funds? Okay, that company owes you now.
Didn't get a job? Good. Gain experience, make a resume.
Did you get hurt? Good. And so it was time to take a break from training.
Have you been beaten? Good. Better in training than street fighting.
Lost? Good. Learning from mistakes.
Sudden problems? Good. We have a chance to come up with a way out.

Do you get the idea? Benefits can be reaped from every nuisance. Just train yourself to think that way, and over time, you will completely change your thinking.

Several years ago, I decided to stop complaining once and for all. As is usually advised, I started small. And at first everything went well. Who cares if it's raining today? Or that you broke your favorite coffee mug? You buy yourself a new one! It's easy not to worry about trifles.

But when something more serious happens, you immediately forget about the promise to yourself “not to complain”. And this is already a problem. Therefore, your resilience is determined not by indifference to small problems, but by your ability to cope with large ones. How do you hold up when a big setback befalls you? Are you still complaining? Or have you trained your mind enough to focus on the positive?

It took me about two years to learn this. Before, when something went wrong in my personal life or business, I would start whining - at least mentally. But now that things go wrong, I see it as a challenge. All thanks to the method formulated by Joko.

When X (bad thing) happens, do Y (good, helpful, positive action).

This, of course, does not appeal to the Nobel theory. I am not pretending that this method is the best that has been invented since the invention of the wheel. I just found this exercise very helpful. I've read dozens of books on positive thinking, but none of them worked - until Jocko's.

So don't give up and just keep moving forward. When you do this, you won't even have time to complain.