people who are, for one reason or another, wallowing in regrets about their own life choices whilst imagining that everyone else has it easier than they do.
Granted some people do have it tough, sometimes through limited opportunities and sometimes because fate seems to have dealt them a particularly cruel hand. Ironically though, these people are usually too busy dealing with whatever life has thrown their way to spare any time for a pity party. No, the moaners tend to be people who, in the grand scheme of things, have nothing to complain about. However, they are somehow harbouring under the illusion that they deserve to be happy and successful all
of the time and any feelings of discontent cause them to lash out in bitter disappointment.
The truth is nobody is happy all of the time. In fact, we are lucky if we are happy some of the time and, frankly, I’ll settle for not being in abject misery. Those of us with any sense, learn early on that life is a series of ups and downs. When you are doing well and things are going your way, make the most of every single moment because it’s a slippery slope back down again and, sure as eggs are eggs, at some point you will be skidding and sliding your way back down.
The moaners of the world tend not to see this and carry around with them an air of wronged bitterness that makes me want to slap them. Only today I had someone say to me, “But it’s alright for you, you don’t work.” Fair enough I am not currently working but I will run out of money soon enough and have to go back. This person has the same options that I have. She could take the risk of not getting another job or knowing that, when the time comes, she will be in the worst possible conditions because, let’s face it, anything worth having is taken up by permanent workers. Workers who, like this woman, enjoy the security of day to day familiarity and knowing they will have a pay cheque at the end of every month. It’s all about choices. Both of these options come with their pros and cons but please don’t start complaining once you have made your choice.
Another ‘but it’s alright for you’ I get a lot centres around children. I don’t have any. That’s my choice but all of the people I know who are parents made their choices also. None of them were teenage mothers who made a mistake and had to live with the consequences. No, we are talking about intelligent women, some of whom were well into their thirties when they decided to give birth. How then can they say, without a trace of self awareness that they didn’t know how hard it would be? How could they not
know? I find looking after myself complex enough so God only knows how hard it is looking after a small child.
The thing that particularly annoys me though is the way they turn something joyful into a chore. Like I said, I don’t have children but I like them. They’re funny, weird and enormously entertaining and yet, whenever I point this out to parents, I can’t tell you the
number of times I get the grumpy assertion that I don’t have them full time as a response. That’s my choice and I have to live with it. Maybe when I’m older I’ll regret not having had kids and grandkids. Mine is always going to be a quiet and solitary old age but one thing’s for sure; you won’t hear me whining about it.
There are other types of moaners, the ones who seem to feed on anxiety and who seem to have a black cloud permanently overhead. Their favourite ‘but it’s alright for you’ stems from the assumption that if you are not bleating about your anxieties morning, noon and night then it’s because you don’t have any. The truth is we are all anxious; the world can be a big, bad, scary place. Yet again though it’s all about choices, we can allow our fears to cripple us or we can find ways of ignoring them and getting on with life. Whoever said that a problem shared is a problem halved was delusional. In my experience a problem shared is a problem quadrupled. The minute you give credence to your fears by talking about them,they spread like wildfire.
I’m sorry if I sound harsh but I am doing this for the good of mankind. We have to stamp out this bleating tradition and try counting our blessings instead. Life is no easier for anybody else, we are all just trying to find our way the best we can. And if I ever utter the words, ‘but it’s alright for you’, then please, do me a favour, and bludgeon me to death.