One of my all-time favorite characters on Saturday Night Live was Debbie Downer. Comedian Rachel Dratch played this fictional character in several SNL skits, and she was hilarious.
The formula for these spoofs was always the same, Debbie would interrupt a cheerful social gathering conversation with her negative opinion. She would then turn to the camera with a familiar frown as a muted trombone made a “wah-wah” sound.
This character turned out to be popular enough to become part of modern slang. Today people use the phrase Debbie Downer to describe someone who damps the cheerfulness of a gathering with their negative news or opinions.
Debbie Downer begets more negativity
If you understand anything about the Law of Attraction, then you know of this Quantum Physics based theory that contends emitted energy will attract the same energy in return. Therefore, Debbie Downer’s negativity will attract more things for her to feel negative about. Similarly, repetitive complaining will attract things for you to complain about.
It is hard to explain why so many like to complain about things. I understand why I do it, complaining allows me to make myself the victim. It is my way of telling others that someone has wronged me so I can motivate them to give me their sympathy or help. Pissing and moaning about things keeps me from learning the lesson contained in the experience and allows me to designate responsibility to someone else.
Changing life’s course
I am not saying that all complaining is unnecessary. For example, it is important to expose the abusive behavior of others. However, it is healthy for us to check and see if complaining is our standard operating procedure about life. One clue might be that you don’t have many friends, no one likes Debbie Downer except other Debbie Downers. Together, we Debbie Downers can find an endless list of things to complain about, but we drive many people away.
Remember this about the Law of Attraction. If you want to feel better about life, learn to be grateful. This happens when you accept things as they are and stop judging them as good and bad. You become grateful when you see every experience is helping to form a better you, they all have value, so you have no reason to feel sorry for yourself.
If constant complaining brings you more things to gripe about, then imagine what repetitive gratitude will do for you. It will attract more things for you to be thankful about. Living in a state of gratitude works well for me. I can look at my life in its entirety and be grateful for it. Admittedly, I don’t do this 100% of the time, but anymore it doesn’t take me long to turn to gratitude to help me feel calm, even blissful. This is a habit worth forming.
You have a choice about the kind of life you have. Make it a good one.
Photo by Nathan Dumlao on Unsplash
