No Complaints Bracelet: An Ode to Complaining
Posted: Thursday, April 12, 2007 11:24 AM by Jaclyn Levin
(Today Producer Stephanie Becker was assigned to blog about wearing the “No Complaints” purple rubber bracelet and her attempt at not complaining for 21 days. The bracelets gained national attention after NBC’s George Lewis reported on the Missouri Pastor who challenged his entire congregation to bite their tongue. Each failure requires the holder to switch the band to the other wrist. Below is her final blog of this cycle.)
(From Stephanie Becker, TODAY Producer)
If the road to happiness is paved with good intentions then I am half way to Antarctica. Unfortunately good intentions are apparently not good enough for a just reward. I have failed miserably in my attempt not to complain for 21-days. But with every violation I have dutifully rotated my purple bracelet: right wrist, left, right, left, in accordance with the rules set by Pastor Will Bowen. He promises a better mental attitude and an official “Certificate of Happiness” for being complaint-free for three straight weeks… the length of time he says is needed to break bad habits. No time outs. No alternate routes. No detours on this boulevard to bliss. Trying alone doesn’t qualify. By my honest account I’ve only gone as long as 36 hours of non-complaining compliance.
While I was in the death throes of my attempt, Pastor Bowen made a coveted appearance on Oprah. I can’t help but wonder how disappointed the audience was when learning that their parting gift was not a car or a bushel of cool cosmetics, but a purple rubber bracelet. Sure they all applauded. But I haven’t seen one up for sale on eBay yet, the sure sign of the real value of an Oprah goodie.
On the show, Reverend Bowen answered a question I’d posed in my last blog: when is a complaint a complaint or just a question or a fact? He said when there’s energy involved it’s a complaint. So, if you say to the guy standing next to you in the elevator, “My, it’s hot today,” that’s a fact. But, if you say, “It’s so dang hot my elbow creases are shvitzing beads of sweat the size of boulders!” that qualifies as a complaint. Even if you’re attempting to flirt by engaging in some playful banter with the cutie from the 5th floor who is probably wondering why your purple rubber bracelet is sliding down the waterfall of perspiration cascading down your arm from a combination of heat and embarrassment. The pastor might label that a complaint. In reality it was nothing more than a mortifying humiliation. Especially when I met his girlfriend. Swizzle stick! Eat something! I hate her.
I am not alone. The bracelet’s website lists only 25 people in what I’ll call “The Hall of Happiness.” They are the handful of folks recognized making the 21 days stretch. For the rest of the 4 million of us who requested bracelets and didn’t make the team, I say this: There is safety in numbers. All those who believe complaining is an excellent mental safety valve, we’re meeting on the highway northbound at 5PM. Wave hello. With all your fingers please. We’ll show them whose boss.
Reporter George Lewis (left) whose story on the Today Show gave the bracelet movement its first big exposure has been much more successful, 14 straight days. “What tripped me up was parking lot rage. When a woman raced ahead of me to get a spot at the Trader Joe’s parking lot, I lost it and had to switch the bracelet.” George claims he felt better after not grumbling for 2 weeks. I didn’t notice any difference between the before George and after. He’s still at it trying to earn that Happiness Certificate. Personally, I have all the important documents I’ll ever want. My birth certificate and my divorce decree. I’m quite content to wait for my death certificate.
And it’s not like it’s a crime to complain. In fact while crime doesn’t pay, complaining does. Take my buddy Ron. He’s made it his calling to bellyache about poor service and has been richly rewarded with sunglasses, faucet parts, and a virtual blizzard of coupons for stuff his wife says she’ll never use. I once got 2 AA batteries for a flashlight.
Usually my complaints fall on deaf ears. Although that’s not where everyone else’s have fallen in the last three weeks. Like a maestro cringing to a screeching sour note in the string section, my ears are now fully attuned to the fine whines of those around me. (Mixed metaphors are best served with grammatical humble pie.) Topping the list: the job and weight and plumbers and traffic and weight and boyfriends and girlfriends and ex-husbands and wives and weight.
I asked my shrink about any detrimental side effects of whine-free living. (FYI: I’m a native New Yorker, so I wear lots of black and see a shrink. You have to; it’s in the handbook.) Typically when I asked her what she thought, she asked me what I thought.
Then I turned to a higher authority. Linda Lord Jenkins. She’s the Vice President of the United States Ombudsman Association. She gets paid to listen to complaints and says they have a beneficial effect. Sometimes she can settle a matter by simply hearing out the complainant. She also gave me some expert advice. Be specific. Like the time she had a beef about her supermarket’s bologna. The chain carried it but her local store didn’t. She hit them with detailed information, without personal criticism or hyperbole. She got what she wanted and that’s no baloney. Or rather it is.
I began this 21-day experiment in attitude adjustment by confessing that I was the Today Show staffer most likely to fail. I lived up to expectations. I’m not even sure cutting down on whining made me a happier person. Frankly, I think the opposite. I started biting my nails again, chewed gum until my jaw ached and broke out with acne like a teenager in heat. I need the safety valve of a good rant. But, I haven’t given up on my bracelet yet. It’s resting for a bit on my new pink Buddha. The guy at the store said this Buddha represents good luck with money. It may be. My tax return arrived. I’m going to replace the rubber bracelet with a gold one. I’m certainly not complaining now.
