Complaining has become this country's national sport

If the urge to complain gets too much, remember ...

How many times have you bumped into a friend at the supermarket or on the street and the conversation has gone something like this:

"How are you?"

"Can't complain ... how about you?"

"Can't complain either."

And then you both do. Be it about the weather, the kids, the boss or even the time it is taking to get through the checkout, there is always something to complain about. And if there's not, we'll find something, and then call it "venting" instead, as if that somehow makes it cooler.

Complaining has become a national sport in New Zealand and, whether we realise it or not, most of us are playing the game. Rather too well.

As a child, I was brought up to actively avoid what we as a family called the "Three Cs". These were criticising, condemning and - the biggie - complaining.

While some people put a picture of Miss Piggy on their fridge to discourage bad eating habits, for many years instead I had a big sign that simply said "CCC" on it as a reminder to stay positive.

Somewhere along the way, the sign got lost and the three Cs crept back into my life like an insidious cold fog just before dawn.

Like most bad habits, complaining starts off as something innocuous and, by the time you realise, it has become a major negative factor in your life - the patterns are established and incredibly hard to break.

Driving home recently, I caught the tail-end of a radio interview with an American man who launched a campaign to eliminate complaining by encouraging participants to wear a rubber band on one wrist and swap it to the other one every time a complaint slipped out. The goal was to go 21 days without needing to swap the band and start over.

Of course given that complaining is often an undiagnosed, ingrained condition, this is easier said than done. But right there at the traffic lights, I decided to attempt it.

The strange thing was that although the long-term goal was increased happiness, I felt the effect of my decision immediately. Three days on and despite a number of habitual slips, the buzz of being positive is still going strong.

Instead of letting small irritations become big issues, I'm ignoring them and, amazingly, I'm finding that my fiance's failure to hang out the washing or empty the dishwasher is no longer a catalyst for the domestic edition of WWIII.

Yesterday, I got caught in a queue at the carwash for 20 minutes and discovered that saying nothing about the experience got me out the other side in exactly the same length of time as it would have had I griped and moaned about the wait.

The reality is that there are so many complaints in life, and so few results.

Although there is always place for pointing out the steak isn't cooked and could they please throw it back on the grill, a whinge without action is as useful as a screen door on a submarine.

Admittedly, being the goody-two-shoes who won't engage in a bit of harmless bitchin' and moaning "because it doesn't lead to happiness and inner fulfilment" won't score you an invite to the Christmas party, it is worth remembering that life does follow our thoughts, and naturally our thoughts follow our words.

The question is can I control those words long enough to get through 21 days before the rubber band breaks from overuse? And given I may go through labour in this time, can I grin and bear it, or will I just give up and ping my partner in the eye with the rubber band when he reminds me halfway through a contraction that I wasn't going to complain again?