How To Tell Someone To Stop Complaining: The Best 5 Ways Ever!

An Introduction

Do you like it when someone constantly keeps complaining about everything that is going wrong in their lives? Of course not! But do you still have to tolerate them only because you do not know how to tell someone to stop complaining? You will not be facing this problem after reading this blog because it will cover all relevant points in detail. It is a difficult job but not an impossible one. So, let us begin the journey to silence a chronic complainer naturally!

We all know that complaints are annoying because of their inherent negativity. But listening to the criticisms aimed at you is even worse. Complaints never make you happy or improve you but only take you in the wrong direction. That is to say, they irritate, pressurize and burden you, which keeps pulling you down. Actual problems or constructive criticisms are always welcome but not tiresome, unnecessary, and avoidable complaints! Life is too short for complaints, and most certainly, you need to get a move-on.

So, you need to find a way to silence those complaints and find peace within yourself. But do you know how to respond when someone complains? Are you confused about how to tell someone to stop complaining? 

It is a million-dollar question which we will look into in the coming paragraphs. Before knowing how to tell someone to stop complaining, first, you need to understand the concept & background of complaints. You have to study & have a grasp over the psychology of a chronic complainer. You also have to ensure that you are not a chronic complainer yourself. It’s because if you are one of them then you cannot stop others from complaining.

So, let us begin by seeing what makes people become chronic complainers.

 Why Do People Keep Complaining About Everything?

It is trendy to desire peace, acceptance, & gratitude but they require constant effort, dedication, and commitment. It is also easy wanting to give up your habit of complaining. But when life gets tough, it gets most people most of the time. It tricks them into cursing their fate & complaining about everything around them. And it takes them further away from what they want from life. So, to protect people from their own complaining nature, you need to know how to tell someone to stop complaining. However, you first need to know why people complain so much. Some of the most common reasons why people turn to complaints are:

 1) Having No Or Little Of What One Needs/Wants 

Having ‘scarce’ resources is the root cause of complaining because it fuels distress. Let us take the example of money. Poor people always complain about their lives because they lack money. They tell stories about how god, government, or anyone else does not care about them. To be honest, they have every reason to be unhappy with their lives. It is because, a life without necessities is not only difficult to live but feels almost like hell. Maybe the people around them are responsible for their condition in a big way.

But the problem with a complaint is that it does not solve anything because it’s a trap. It traps you in a vicious circle of the same issue you have been complaining about. Complaints become excuses to remain stuck in situations. An excuse cannot pull you out of any trouble. Moreover, it will push you deeper into it. So, even if no one is willing to help you, you got to stop complaining and start taking the responsibility of achieving what you want.

Responsibility does not guarantee success. It just reduces the chances of failure. You may still fail. This means, one has to be determined enough not to become a complainer at any cost. You should be happy & proud of yourself for giving it your best shot. And with the hope of cracking through hardships the next time, you should keep trying again and again till you finally succeed.

But at no point should you choose the easy way of complaining about everything and blaming others for your failure. And only when you don’t complain, would you learn how to tell someone to stop complaining. It is how you make this world a better place to live!

The second reason why people complain is the longing for progress & growth.

2) Desire To Have More Of What One Already Has

People may have an adequate amount of resources but they want to have more. Wanting more is neither a crime nor a bad thing. It may look like being greedy, but it is justified. Everyone has the right to secure themselves with some extra resources. 

Moreover, it is a natural urge within every human being to have more of everything good he has. So, everyone is entitled to work towards having more of what they want. An economically middle or higher-class person may decide to secure his future further by earning some extra bucks.

But suppose that he fails to do so, or worse, while trying to earn more, his income slips down further. What should he do now? Crib, criticize, and complaint about it? If he does, he will be inviting more bad fortunes into his life. He should be aware that he could have been in a much worse situation than he currently finds himself in. Similarly, he should also realize that he can be in a much better position in the future if he starts working harder. 

To get more of anything in life, you have to take more risk. If it pays off, great, but if it does not, you got to learn from it and keep moving ahead with lots of hope, positivity and without any complaints. 

But when things go wrong, most people fail to resist complaining and become chronic complainers. If you are one of them, then you first need to learn to stop yourself from complaining. People learn from what you do and not what you say to them. Knowing how to tell someone to stop complaining is useful only when you have stopped complaining yourself. Gandhiji once said, “Be the change you want to see in the world.”

So, you must see the significance of choosing not to be a chronic complainer.

Why You Should Stop Complaining & Start Taking Things In Your Stride

Before we begin exploring how to tell someone to stop complaining, let us see what is on the other side of complaints. What do you forgo when you start complaining too much? You need to realize it so that you do not become a chronic complainer yourself. And when you can see it, you can show it to others and easily make them stop complaining. 

So, what do we gain if we don’t complain or stop complaining instantly?

1)Inner Peace

Inner Peace is a basic need to do anything well. To sit alone and enjoy your company, you need peace. Peace fills you with hope, positivity, and efficiency. But when you choose to complain about even a single thing, it gradually spreads to every other area of your life. Complaining takes away your peace and hands you discontent & sorrow. It makes you irresponsible & dependent on the mercy of others. It takes away your freedom by taking away your inner peace. So, never trade your inner peace for the ‘license’ to complain.

2) Acceptance

You can solve any problem with ease once you accept it’s there! But there is a lot more to acceptance. It gives you the strength to pull yourself out of troubles and helps you create your path in life. When you accept things, you can change them. Complaining takes away this power from you. When you complain, you may enjoy being a rebel at that moment, but it costs you dearly. It makes you an angry incapable person who no longer has the strength to fix his issues. To be a responsible, able, and intelligent person, choose acceptance over complaints!

3) Gratitude

Life is a gift. You should be grateful for everything you are bestowed upon by god. When gratitude exists within you, your consciousness enters everything in this universe! It opens your way to achieving anything you may desire in life. But as soon as you start complaining about every small thing, negativity envelopes your life. It doesn’t let you come out, preventing you from expressing yourself freely. And when you are not free, you cannot have what you want from life!

Be thankful for everything you have instead of complaining about everything you don’t!

4) Freedom

Your freedom is precious. When you feel free, everything is within your reach. Freedom keeps your mind and body open, keeping you ready for any challenge or opportunity. It helps you feel light, pleasant, and blissful within yourself. Also, freedom makes you reach your very soul!

But when you start to complain about something, you disrupt the gift of freedom and get enslaved. You no more have the liberty to keep yourself unaffected by things. The thing you complain about starts controlling you. And you become compulsive and incapable of choosing not to complain or get angry. It’s not a good situation to be in. 

Your actions should be within your choices and your control. If you can’t see the preciousness of your freedom, at least see its value. And when you do, you won’t ever complain again! And when you have stopped complaining, you can learn how to tell someone to stop complaining, and start helping others!

Complaining not only strips you of your inner peace, acceptance, gratitude, and freedom. It also creates unnecessary & preventable troubles in your life and the lives of the people around you. 

Consequences of Being A Chronic Complainer – Why is Complaining Bad?

When you adopt a complaining attitude, it has significant repercussions for you. Complaints affect you deeply, both spiritually & physically.

How Complaining Affects You

Being a chronic complainer replaces inner peace, acceptance, and gratitude with stress, anger, and jealousy. Complaining generates unrest within you and destabilizes your mind. It creates uncertainty and fear, which in turn creates anger & jealousy. It makes you compare yourself more to others which in turn increases your complaints even more.

Complaining and blaming makes you irresponsible and dependent on others for your success. It reduces your ability to achieve your goals and makes you fearful of setting new ones. When achievements & success dry up, discontent, sadness, and frustration start building within you. It takes a heavy toll on both your happiness quotient and the overall quality of your life.

Nobody wants to be around a chronic complainer. The primary reason for this is not a lack of success. But it is the drought of happiness inside the person that repels people. When there is a drought of joy within you, it’s natural for people to start deserting you! 

So, if you want to be happy and full of life, you should empty that tank full of complaints within yourself. Fill it with the wisdom and knowledge about how to tell someone to stop complaining. It will save you from becoming a chronic complainer. And it will also help you prepare yourself to wipe complaints of other people’s lives.

A chronic complainer punishes himself alright, but he doesn’t spare even his loved ones, acquaintances, or strangers. He passes on his misery to everyone around him. There are many bad influences that chronic complainers sprinkle on others.

How Complaining Affects Others

Chronic complainers transfer their negativity and negative attitude to people around them. These people either become chronic complainers themselves or start staying confused, sad, and easily irritable for no visible reason. It’s the energy and vibes they caught from the chronic complainer. It reduces their ability to stay productive & hence the quality of life they live. So, entertaining chronic complainers may make things worse for you.

Time is a valuable factor in one’s creativity, productivity, and progress in life. But giving importance to chronic complainers or their complaints wastes a lot of precious time of people. This is when they don’t react to the complaints. When they do react, it is also a wastage of their valuable energy, which they could have utilized elsewhere. Paying attention to a chronic complainer renders people mentally exhausted and physically helpless.

The impact of chronic complainers on people doesn’t stop here. The negativity, time & energy wastage, and the consequent exhaustion doesn’t help their mental and material growth. They fail to improve in their personal or professional areas and hence as a person. 

Even listening to complaints cripples you as a person. So, you can imagine how dangerous & harmful complaining is to a chronic complainer!

Hence, you should neither listen to complaints nor complain yourself! But to do the former, you have to do the latter first. Become a complaint warrior to become eligible to learn how to tell someone to stop complaining.

So, here are some quick hacks on how to stop complaining:

• Take the responsibility of your life on your shoulders.
• Stop expecting too much from people.
• Manage and control your anger because anger triggers complaints.
• Be determined to set things right when they go wrong.
• Work hard and become mentally strong and self-dependent.
• Help others instead of expecting help from them.
• Stop being negative and adopt positive ways of life.
• Increase your tolerance levels regarding people & situations.
• Manage stress better by doing things you like and staying close to Nature.
• Be thankful for whatever you have and value the people around you.
• Be OK and just fine even during the worst moments of life. Accomplish this by practicing stability & balance.
• Invest in your abilities and skills so that you can achieve what you want from life.

Also, go through this amazing video that tells how to stop complaining.

Following these pointers will help you protect yourself from becoming a chronic complainer. But you will still meet other people who are chronic complainers. So, you need to know how to deal with them by knowing how to tell someone to stop complaining.

How To Tell Someone To Stop Complaining?

Now that you know everything in detail about complaints, complainers, and how you can avoid becoming a complainer, you are finally ready to know and learn how to tell someone to stop complaining. So let’s begin!

Let us divide the people you will meet into two categories: 

• Stranger/Acquaintance, & 
• Friends/Family. 

The first type of people is not very close or related to you. Your well-being is attached to theirs. But the second type of people are people who are your loved ones. They are the people whom you care about deeply. Your well-being is connected, correlated, and intricately intertwined with them. The strategy to deal with both kinds of people is different. We will explore all possible ways of dealing with both of them. Let’s start with strangers/acquaintances.

How To Tell Someone To Stop Complaining (Strangers/Acquaintances)

1) Ignore, Avoid & Move On

Recognizing a chronic complainer among people is not difficult. The signs of a chronic complainer are pretty much visible. He keeps complaining whenever you see him. He keeps cursing himself, his life, god, people, and everything around and related to him.

If a stranger, acquaintance, or a person who isn’t related to you, is a chronic complainer, what do you do? 

You can avoid him and keep doing what’s important to you. After all, you are neither responsible for what he does nor obligated to help him out. You can easily ignore his habit of complaining about everything. You probably have to stay around him for an hour a day which you can easily manage. It may not be the best response to the whining, but it may still be an effective one for you.

If you choose to ignore the chronic complainer and move on, you don’t need to know how to tell someone to stop complaining. But it is neither a wise nor an easy choice to exercise this option!

2) Help The Chronic Complainer

You always have the option to walk away from a chronic complainer. But what if you value every minute you spend? Or what if you get disturbed by his constant whining and lose focus on what you are doing? What if you are simply someone who can’t see others in pain and want to help them? Or worse, what if the complaint involves you?

In these cases, you will have to intervene. You cannot turn a blind eye on the complaining man. You need to help him out because you know how to stop complaining. And because you very well know how to tell someone to stop complaining! So how do we do this?

Nobody likes a person who keeps complaining. Everybody deserts him. Nobody tries to listen to him, console him, or suggest a way out of his problems. His biggest regret is that he is lonely, and nobody wants to listen to him or understand him. So, his complaints are just a way to get attention. Listen to him intently, and see what happens.

Listening to him itself may be enough to stop his complaints. But if the problem is deep and he still keeps complaining, try to understand his agony. Start, and keep nodding to whatever he says. It doesn’t matter if you notice that the problem lies in him. A person who always complains about pain must be deeply hurt. So, you need to be compassionate with him. Your nod might be enough for him to feel vindicated, better & obliged to change himself for the better.

If understanding and nodding don’t help, you should appreciate him and his efforts. Tell him the positive things you see in him. Make him believe that he has done well and he can do even better. Show faith in him and give him hope. Keep smiling while you talk to him.

When you offer help to somebody, it’s a big statement. It makes the other person feel good about themselves. They start to believe that they can attract all the goodness out there. They feel that they do deserve good people. Consequently, offering help sometimes serves as a big respite for many chronic complainers. Compassion lightens their mind and enlightens their soul. They do not have any other choice but to give up their complaining ways!

Repeat The Process If Required

Complimenting the chronic complainer and offering him help might be more than enough to turn his thoughts around. But if the complaints persist, you need to understand that the problem is still a bigger one. You need to repeat the whole process and hope that the chronic complainer will give up complaining.

It’s how we can help a stranger/acquaintance who is a chronic complainer and bring our knowledge of how to tell someone to stop complaining to full use.

Dealing with a chronic complainer who is family, friend, or a dear one, is a lot different. It’s because it needs you to use more emotions, love & feelings.

How To Tell Someone To Stop Complaining (Family/Friend)

When the chronic complainer is your family or friend, it’s a different ball game altogether. Here you don’t have the option of ignoring or walking away. You are under a self-imposed obligation to set things in order. It’s because you love & adore the person. Also, if the chronic complainer doesn’t mend his ways, you will have to pay dearly for the reasons told earlier. Living with a chronic complainer who is family, is a tricky affair. You have to make him stop complaining to save your family, literally! And this puts a lot of pressure upon you. 

So, how do you turn the chronic complainer in the family into a happy person naturally?

Do Not Take Any Pressure

First, and the most important thing, is not to take the added pressure that comes with family. If you take it as an obligation, it will make things even more difficult. So, you have to take this case as you did the previous one while dealing with a stranger/acquaintance. You have to do it voluntarily and not as an imposition or compulsion!

Follow Stranger/Acquaintance Case Steps

The second thing to be done is the same as you did with the stranger/acquaintance. So, follow the same five steps here. The only extra card you have with you is that of emotions. You have to utilize it to your advantage so as to heal the chronic complainer within the family! How?

Activate Your Emotional Intelligence

Suppose you employed the five steps enlisted in the case of stranger/acquaintance, but they did not produce results. The possibility of this happening is quite high. It’s because those steps work well, only when you do not know the person very well and he also does not know much about you. Talking to a stranger and being able to gel with him produces confidence and hope in you. But this may not work in the case of a family member. So, you will have to activate and use your emotional intelligence in this case!

Express Your Love

When you find the person complaining all the time, take them to a quiet place. Sit down with them and express your love for them. Tell them how much you love them and that you can’t see them suffer like this. Explain to them how you feel for them when you see them complaining. Tell them how complaining all the time is ruining their relationships with people. Offer them your full support and ask them to mend their complaining ways. Your love might achieve what nothing else could achieve. Love & emotions have great power! It is what family is all about.

But people in the family may not care about themselves. Generally, people are careless about their well-being in the family. But they cannot see their family members in pain. And you are so going to use this trick! 

Explain Your Plight

Tell the chronic complainer that the negativity in his complaints affects your mind. It makes you sad, depressed, and annoyed because of the negativity involved in the complaints. You don’t feel like doing critical things which affect your performance at work. Show them that you are being troubled by their complaints in many ways. To sum up, show them that their complaints are pushing you towards a dark future.

When they realize their actions are causing harm to someone they love, they will change. It may be a gradual improvement, but that’s all that is needed. With time, the chronic complainer’s mind, thoughts & attitude would change for the best!

So, it is how you can apply your knowledge about ‘how to tell someone to stop complaining’ and turn a chronic complainer into a blissful human being!

The Conclusion

There is certainly a lot of hope when we try to change a chronic complainer into the best version of himself. The things that we need to keep in mind while trying to do this are:

• Understanding the concept of complaints.
• Knowing yourself well, as a result, refusing to become a chronic complainer.
• Studying the chronic complainer’s psychology, hence, treating him with compassion.
• Judiciously utilizing your emotional intelligence to get the job done.

One important thing to be kept in mind is never to be rude to someone who is complaining. Do not ask someone bluntly to stop complaining either. It will make one even more adamant and grumbling. You have to do the job smartly. Remember that you have to solve the issue and not aggravate it. You don’t have to impose your expertise on ‘how to tell someone to stop complaining’, but execute it naturally. So, be a calming influence and the torch-bearer for the chronic complainer, and he will follow you towards inner peace & freedom!