Crow’s Feet: Life As We Age

“The longer I live, the more beautiful life becomes.” (Frank Lloyd Wright) Non-fiction pieces, personal essays and occasional poems that explore how we feel about how we age and offer tips for getting the most out of life.

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I Am Breaking the Complaining Habit

Beth Nash Bruno
Crow’s Feet: Life As We Age
6 min readJan 10, 2025

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I don’t love summer, but there is this. Photo by Beth Bruno

As I have gotten older, I have tried to train myself not to complain. There is nothing worse than being around someone who complains all the time, and who complains about the same things, ad nauseum. When I spend time with people like this I come away exhausted and feeling depleted.

While I am certainly no saint, and still have moments when I whine and complain about things I have no control over, I am getting better about catching myself. The thing about complaining is that if you can change what you are complaining about, the energy you put into complaining could be better used to change things.

But if you can’t change what you are complaining about, then you are totally wasting your time complaining because it won’t change a damn thing. You are better served to figure out a way to make peace with whatever it is that doesn’t suit you.

My mother hated winter. She complained about it every year, always the same, and her complaints never changed the fact that winter does indeed come, no matter what we do. Short of moving to Florida in the winter, there’s not much you can do about it if you live in the Northern hemisphere. But there are ways to make it more tolerable. Unforunately, Mom was so busy complaining…

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Crow’s Feet: Life As We Age
Crow’s Feet: Life As We Age

Published in Crow’s Feet: Life As We Age

“The longer I live, the more beautiful life becomes.” (Frank Lloyd Wright) Non-fiction pieces, personal essays and occasional poems that explore how we feel about how we age and offer tips for getting the most out of life.

Beth Nash Bruno
Beth Nash Bruno

Written by Beth Nash Bruno

Human learning to be human. Writing in hopes of getting there.

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