Our Family Challenge to Not Criticize, Condemn, or Complain
Complaining reached its peak in our house recently. Kids complaining about food, about homework, and about each other. Us complaining about kids complaining. Us complaining about work, about how busy we are and about something the other did or didn’t do.
We have a lot of happiness and love in our family, but we’d slipped into a pattern of complaining! It’s draining, unproductive, and negative. It had to stop.
So, I declared over the dinner table a few weeks ago that we’d be doing the “3 Cs Challenge.”
In Dale Carnegie’s wonderful book on influence and relationships, he says the FIRST principle is, “Don’t criticize, condemn, or complain.”
The three Cs.
I’ll explain what my family learned from following this principle. But before I do, let’s consider: Why is this the first principle in a book on influence (another word for leadership) and relationships?
Because it’s hard to work well with others when you’re focused on what is not rather than what is. In other words, if you’re paying attention to what’s missing, you miss the good that deserves attention.
The Rules for Not Criticizing, Condemning, or Complaining
On to the challenge: Appreciate the good things in your circumstances and each other and don’t comment on the bad. Every family member had three weeks to string together three, seven, or ten consecutive days of no criticism, condemnation (judging), or complaining. Each string of days earned you a meaningful amount of money that you could spend on a family meal or something useful.
It thrilled the kids to start this challenge. They thought it wouldn’t be that difficult and began immediately considering how they’d spend the money. (Although one of our kids contemplated finding ways to not be in the house for ten days so that no one would hear him when he complained!)
The only rules of the challenge were: 1) You can’t argue if we determine you’ve violated the challenge for the day, and 2) It’s ok to break the challenge if someone is being legitimately hurtful or inappropriate. (We understood that was a bit subjective.)
Overall, the kids have done surprisingly well with the challenge. They have remembered it even better than we have. They’ve each had misses where the string of consecutive days had to restart, but here’s what we’ve learned.
Four Insights for Being a Less Negative Person
1. Focusing on positives is the best way not to be negative. I smile as I write that because it’s so obvious. It’s common sense but so often not common practice. Inertia often pulls our attention to the negative, which is why I love how the apostle Paul said it in a letter to his friends in the ancient city of Philippi: “Whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things.”
2. Blaming is the root of complaining. The mental shift we’ve had to make is from blame to personal responsibility. Certainly, it’s easy to blame others for your problems: the people you live with, co-workers, institutions, or what’s on the menu. It takes more work to cultivate contentment, patience, self-control, and independence. It’s the shift from an external to an internal locus of control…from being a victim to being empowered.
3. There’s a thin line between explaining and complaining. We have found ourselves rationalizing what might sound like criticism, condemnation, or complaints by saying, “I’m just expressing my opinion…” or “I’m only explaining my perspective.”
The difference between explaining and complaining, we’ve found, is in tone and intent. If your motive is to put someone down, get your way, or soothe your own anxiety, you’re probably complaining, and it will likely sound like it (like whining). On the other hand, if you’re making an observation or statement of truth that increases awareness, you’re probably being constructive—especially if it’s communicated in a non-anxious tone.
4. It’s easy to forget about intentional behavior. In hindsight, we should have put up a poster on the wall or created some other visual reminder for daily focus and accountability. We’d forget, quietly give someone a second chance, or disagree about who was where in their progress. Intentional behavior requires cues or prompts, as James Clear beautifully outlines in Atomic Habits. Purposeful communication and connection in relationships need constant reminders.
These are just some of the insights so far. These and, oh yeah, we enjoy living with each other a lot more when we’re not breaking the 3 Cs.
Would you be up for the same challenge? Consider implementing the 3 Cs Challenge at your home or office. Just imagine the impact on families, workplaces, politics, and society if we all tried to just follow Dale Carnegie’s first principle. Just imagine how much better we’d live and work together.
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