Complaining

One of the things I loathe the most about most homemaker groups or memes or humor is the intrinsic complaining. We complain about our people, our work, our lives, our situations. We complain that our husbands don’t do enough or appreciate us. We complain that our children ruin everything and inhibit us from excelling. We complain about cooking, cleaning, and the laundry. We complain about our homes, yards, gardens, or lack thereof. We complain about each other.  Complain, whine, murmur, over and over and over.

I loathe it in groups and I loathe it in my own soul.

Honestly, it gets wearisome.

This is why I strive so hard to have a heart of delight in our labors. This is why I look for the magic in our work. This is why I do all that I do in articles, prompts, and quotes. I know how much complaining resides in my heart. Resides. As in lives there. As in, has routines and habits. Complaining lives quite comfortably in my heart and I hate it.

Hate. Hate is how we fight the complaining. We learn to hate it.

But why? What’s so bad about a little complaining?

It destroys:

·        Us: Complaining destroys us. Complaining is like injecting poison into our souls every day. We don’t build up a resistance to it like we would to iocaine powder. No, we rot our souls more and more every day. One complaint doesn’t just sit there, it breeds. Today we complain about dishes, tomorrow about dishes and laundry, and the day after about dishes, laundry, and cleaning. One complaint breeds into many. And what do the noxious fumes that spread through us do? They destroy the ability to see good. Complaints breed an inability to appreciate any good. Can we stop for a moment to ponder on that nightmare? No good. Never any good. That should terrify us. Do we see the poison?

Once we are saturated with this deadly gas, we start to feel the weight of it. It becomes a burden so heavy that we no longer move forward. We start to live in a private hell of constantly being overwhelmed. Complaining only highlights trouble and when that trouble is all in the spotlight the rest of the blessings sit in darkness. This freezes us. We become sour and inactive. How can we stand against such encumbrances as constant dirty dishes, imperfect husbands, sin-filled churches, and messy toddlers?

·        Our Homes: Once complaining has chained us, it oozes out of our hearts and into our homes. They become yellow and discolored. Instead of being sunlit places of growth and production, they become places of putrid rot. It won’t be seen on our walls, but it will stain everything. Dinner is no longer a time when souls knit together, but a time when everyone endures Mom’s whining. Husbands find other things to do. Children flee to bedrooms or a friend's house. No one is good enough to be home. Home is no longer good. We are the heart of our homes and if our hearts are moldy our homes will be too.

·        Our People: Complaining has spread from our hearts into our tending, and from there, it settles like mustard gas across our people. No longer do we love our men; we belittle and berate them for every little thing. They don’t say thank you right if they say it at all. They drop their clothes on the floor. They don’t help enough. They shave in the freshly cleaned bathroom. They only notice mistakes. They don’t like dinner. They don’t like the decorating. They don’t think the house is clean. We may never say the words, but they run like a litany through our heads. They become a habit. They are always there on repeat one.

We do the same to our children. They don’t learn. They are dirty. They don’t listen. I’ve told them a thousand times. How can they not learn to use a tissue? How did they get this much dirt through the front door and into their bedroom? Why are their toys everywhere? Why can’t they do the dishes? Why do they fight all the time? Bicker, bicker, bicker. All you can see and hear are the faults of little people.

Complaining floods forth from our hearts into our churches. Everything and everyone is always wrong and only we, the complainers, are doing right and good. If everyone else would just do what they should, everything would be fine. But so and so is an idiot. So and so has no sense of decoration. So and so can’t serve her way out of a wet paper bag, and so and so does nothing. Let’s not even talk about that last sermon.

Complain, complain, complain.

Complaining will rot our souls, ruin our homes, and destroy our relationships with our husbands, our children, and our churches.

If you aren’t pleading in your heart for help right now, please start back at the top of the article. I have desperately tried not to pull any punches because I need these kind-blows myself. I need to be reminded that complaining isn’t some little sin, but a destructive monster that I often willingly allow into my heart and home. I may guard against disease, financial ruin, and even thieves and murderers, all the while opening the door to a nightmare I treasure in my own heart. If you don’t see the wickedness of this act, I beg you to pray for eyes to see it.

How do we stop complaining?

We must see it for the destructive force it is. We must open our eyes to the horror that we have grown in our own hearts. We must plead for the ability to see our complaining and hate it. This is hard. There is nothing harder in the world than seeing our own sin and feeling the ugly weight of it. It can break our souls, and it can bring us back to Christ and His work. The breaking can be healing. So, dear HearthKeepers, light a candle and peer into the darkness. Hold a lantern high and see the rot.

And get to cleaning.

This is us, right? We’re women. We clean. We go to work in horrible spaces with our hair tied up and hot soapy water, right? Well, here is the dirtiest place we could possibly tackle: our hearts.

We must take note of every complaint and start replacing it. This work is exhausting at first. We will spend more time in our own heads than ever before. Notice the complaining and replace it. Pull a weed and plant a seed. Pull a weed and plant a seed. For every single complaint ripped from our souls, plant a seed of thankfulness. Dishes in the sink? Be thankful for the dish, the food, and the person who used it, even if we must correct our children. More laundry? Be thankful for clothes to wear in abundance. Dirty floors, doors, and windows? We have a home with windows! Our floors aren’t dirt. We have shelters and good ones at that. Husbands who don’t say thank you enough or help out enough? Have we considered not looking at ourselves but at them? Are they working many long hours? Are we simply thankful for all they do for the family? Are we noticing them or only ourselves?

Pull those complaining weeds and plant seeds of thankfulness.

We must demand of ourselves that we won’t complain anymore.

As we replant our gardens, we will find delight. It will sprout up in sweet roses, bright sunflowers, delicate pansies, and brave dandelions. Fruit will start to weigh down branches and our homes will flourish. Husbands will willingly return from work. Children will grow into strong adults. Warmth will fill our spaces no matter the state of the space. Guarding and gardening our hearts, with violence if necessary, will produce order and wonder.

Side Note: Some of you may be wondering about genuine complaints. My only advice is what they teach you in the business world: if you come with a complaint also come with a solution. That’s it. 99.9% of the time a complaint is only a complaint, not an actual problem. So, if you’re tempted to turn a complaint into a legitimate problem, then you also need to present a legitimate solution that doesn’t involve a new husband, new church, new children, and burning your home down to collect the insurance money. If you aren’t sure how to fix the problem, get help. Get help from your husband, your knitting circle, pastors, trusted advisors. But, be willing to do something about it. If you just want to vent, then you’re probably complaining. Remember, men are fixers. If you see a problem and you can’t find a solution take it to the man you married who would love to fix something, anything for you. A real problem has a solution. Complaints don’t.

Fellow HearthKeepers, we must buy into the absolute magic and joy of what we do. Yes, it is hard, unceasing, messy, constant work. Yes, it is often unseen and unsung. None of that excuses us. We have no right to complain when we have homes to tend, husbands to love, children to raise, and faithful churches to attend. God is good and He does good. We must grab onto that truth and let it saturate our very being with golden light. If we do that, the work stays hard, yes, but the work becomes good. All of the work takes on a cozy beauty if we look at what the Lord has done and where He has placed us and embrace it.

Complaining is ultimately a lack of trust and unbelief. It says we don’t think God is kind, loving, or good, and that He made a mistake. Do we really believe that? Do our complaints show that we do? Is this who we want to be as HearthKeepers? Is this the environment we want to foster? Is this the knitting circle we want to form?

Let’s grab that broom and start cleaning. Let’s man our shield walls and plant our gardens! Let’s light the way back home for our daughters and our generation by singing the praises of what we do, not complaining about the difficulties of it.