#148: Transforming Your Life: The Journey from Complaints to Power - Episode 2
Sep 26, 2023
Thor Challgren
Ever found yourself caught in the traffic, complaining about how it's ruining your day? What if I told you that you can transform your life by simply changing the way you react to such situations?
In this episode, I continue to break down my experience in "No Complaining Week." I just completed this week in "Mental Muscle," a spiritual boot camp experience I've done multiple times. "No Complaining Week" happens in the second week of "Mental Muscle."
Drawing from this experience, I delve into the negative power of complaining, and how it strips us of our power to take control of our lives.
This episode is an exploration of the causes and consequences of complaining, with a focus on making positive changes to our habits.
I share my personal experiences and the questions I ask myself when I notice a complaint brewing, inspired by the teachings of Dr. James Mellon and the wisdom of Wayne Dyer and Eckhart Tolle.
We'll also examine the underlying beliefs that often provoke our complaints.
As always, thanks for listening!
You can find Dr. James Mellon's book, "Mental Muscle", here on Amazon: https://a.co/d/2Eo6s4y
Ever found yourself caught in the traffic, complaining about how it's ruining your day? What if I told you that you can transform your life by simply changing the way you react to such situations?
In this episode, I continue to break down my experience in "No Complaining Week." I just completed this week in "Mental Muscle," a spiritual boot camp experience I've done multiple times. "No Complaining Week" happens in the second week of "Mental Muscle."
Drawing from this experience, I delve into the negative power of complaining, and how it strips us of our power to take control of our lives.
This episode is an exploration of the causes and consequences of complaining, with a focus on making positive changes to our habits.
I share my personal experiences and the questions I ask myself when I notice a complaint brewing, inspired by the teachings of Dr. James Mellon and the wisdom of Wayne Dyer and Eckhart Tolle.
We'll also examine the underlying beliefs that often provoke our complaints.
As always, thanks for listening!
You can find Dr. James Mellon's book, "Mental Muscle", here on Amazon: https://a.co/d/2Eo6s4y
Success author Wayne Dyer said acceptance means no complaining and happiness means no complaining about the things over which you can do nothing. Today I'm in the second episode of my series on no complaining. Welcome to Every Day, a New Thought. I'm Thor Challgren, and every day I bring you a new thought, a new perspective. This week I'm talking about no complaining because I've just finished no complaining week in mental muscle 16 weeks of spiritual boot camp. This is a program I've done many times and I'm probably now at least, in my fifth go-around of this program. It's 16 weeks where every single week you have a specific direction and each one of them builds on the other one. And in week two, which I've just completed, the whole week is about no complaining. I'll put a link to mental muscle which is available at Amazon. I'll put that in the show description below.
Thor Challgren:
Yesterday I introduced the series and asked you to think about in your life over the last 24 hours, pay attention to when you complain and why you complain and what might be behind it. I'll just cite a couple of words from Dr James Mellon where he talks about the directives for the entire week, but I'm gonna pose these to you to think about over the last 24 hours to look at when do you complain, why do you complain and what are you avoiding in the moment. Because that's really the point of this is to become aware of why we're complaining and to pull it back to look at the reasons why we might be complaining. One of the things I think is interesting is this book and this whole program is put together in a sequential way. It's not an accident that no complaining is literally in the very beginning of the program, because it's kind of foundational in a spiritual development perspective to get you to see how much power you have when you take control of your mind. And often when we're complaining, we're not using our mind, we're not using our thoughts creatively, effectively and with power, and so when you're actively looking at am I complaining about things, you're beginning to take back power. So how did it go for you in the last 24 hours? Did you notice that there are times when you are more likely to complain about things than others?
Thor Challgren:
I'll give you my own definition that I've sort of evolved over time about what I would consider to be a complaint, and it has changed over time. I think the first time I did mental muscle years ago, I probably was a bigger complainer than I am now. Now I'm sort of having to fine tune it more. But here's my own personal definition of how I've applied, and I'll give you an example. In the beginning what I would think about was I'd catch myself and go, oh, that probably was a complaint, and then I would immediately ask myself can I do something to change it? You know, I opened with that quote from Wayne Dyer where he said acceptance means no complaining and happiness means no complaining about the things over which you can do nothing. I get what he's saying and for me my own definition has become that there's a lot that I maybe used to think that I couldn't do anything about now, and now I am much more likely to go.
Thor Challgren:
Is that true? Is it really true that I can't do anything about it? I Would look at something like maybe I get on the highway in the morning to drive somewhere and there's traffic and and maybe I used to complain about that night immediately ask myself Could I have done something about that? And maybe most of us would say, no, you can't. You just, if you're gonna drive at rush hour, you're going to encounter traffic. But is it really true that I couldn't do anything, because maybe I could have gotten up earlier and driven before there was traffic and just plan my day so that maybe when I get to the place I'm going, I bring with me work or whatever I need to do. So In that instance I could have made a choice not to drive at that time and, and so if I decide to drive at that time, guess what? I kind of can't complain about that. So I find now for myself that the first question that I ask is can I do something about it? So that's what I'm gonna encourage you to think about Is, as you reflect this week in no complaining week is, if you find yourself complaining, the very first thing you should ask yourself is is there anything I can do about it?
Thor Challgren:
And if there is, make a decision that you will make that change and if not, maybe ask yourself why am I complaining? That's the part of the point of the work this weekend in mental muscle, and the book goes into a lot more detail about no complaining week. So I highly recommend that you look at the book, go on Amazon, check it out, but Back it up. Ask when I complain, what beliefs do I have about myself that maybe are being uncovered by this belief, by this complaint? Is it that maybe I think I don't have power? Is it maybe that there's something unresolved in this situation, in this relationship? And rather than actually taking on the challenge, taking on the resolution, I'm backing up and just sort of bitching about it, fetching about it and saying, oh, you know, that's the way it always is. So tomorrow I'm gonna dive into a few of the questions that often will come up when people go what is this a complaint or is this a complaint? Talk more about that tomorrow and also maybe fine tune your own definition of it. I'm gonna close with a quote from Eckhart tolay, who wrote the power of now, and he said see if you can catch yourself complaining in either speech or thought about a situation you find yourself in, what other people do or say, your surroundings, your life situation, even the weather.
Thor Challgren:
To complain is always non acceptance of what is. It invariably carries an unconscious negative charge. When you complain, you make yourself into a victim. When you speak out, you are in your power. So change the situation by taking action or by speaking out if necessary or possible. Leave the situation or accept it. All else is madness. That's the show for today. I hope you enjoyed this. If you're watching on YouTube, please hit like and subscribe to the show. If you're listening to the podcast, please like or subscribe to the show on your favorite podcast app until tomorrow. Thanks for listening.