I’m tired of complaining and hearing others’ complain — it saddens me all the time. Though I know it’s possible to stop, but sometimes it’s damn hard especially when you’re bombarded with adversities or when you’re surrounded with negative people.

I wonder what would happen if everyone stops complaining and choose to respond mindfully to every bad situation. I wish we could learn this trait faster.

I don’t know when. Maybe someday, I’ll find a solution and I’ll share it here. But for now, here are my few reminders to myself and to everyone who always complain:

If you feel bad about something, recognize it. And if you can, remove that certain thing that makes you feel bad.

If you don’t like your environment, leave that environment, but if you can’t, create your own instead.

If you think you’re underpaid, then quit your job and find a better company (but please, plan your transition carefully).

If you feel you don’t have time for your family, then work less and spend more quality time with them.

If you’re in a toxic relationship and you already did everything to resolve it, then you and your partner don’t deserve together. Accept and move on. The world doesn’t stop there.

If you feel unhappy, stuck, and empty with your community, religion, or any organization you belong with, reflect and challenge your beliefs. Maybe it’s time to quit and start exploring. Maybe it’s time to seek and follow your own path and honor your calling. Maybe, just maybe, it’s time to do something different.

I may be in a better situation or maybe worse than yours, it doesn’t matter. As long as you know that you have a choice — you always have a choice — you’ll be okay.

Notice this: If you’ve been unhappy with your current situation for a very long time and still you don’t get yourself out there, then that’s your choice.

It simply means you accepted your situation. Whether it’s negative or positive, I don’t know. Maybe you think that’s how life works and you have to live with it.

I admire your guts. Seriously. But why keep complaining? Why can’t you stop spreading negativity? Did you know that every time you complain, you become a burden not only for yourself, but everyone else around you?

So for everyone’s sake, stop complaining.

Instead, make something.

“Complaining is expressing ungratitude towards what God has dealt to you. And what life he deals out is what he intended and wanted. By complaining we hack away and destroy a small part of the larger whole.” — Marcus Aurelius