Tuesday, December 13, 2016

How Complaining Rewires Your Brain

From HackSpirit:
Are you a complainer? Do you sometimes feel like anything you do can be complained about? Complaining feels good, like how smoking and eating chocolate feel good. It lets us vent our negativity. Although we know it’s not necessarily good for us but we do it anyway as a guilty pleasure.

Researchers have found that not only does complaining express our negativity, it rewires the brain to focus more on negative ideas. Is this a good thing? Not if you want to be a grumpy old lady that nobody likes. The neurons in your brain start branching out to each other when behaviors have been repeated. So the more you complain the more likely it becomes easier to complain, and you won’t even realize you’re doing it. Soon enough complaining will become your default behavior, making the bonds between the neurons more permanent. As scientists often say, “Neurons that fire together, wire together”. (Read more.)
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