Complainers Kill Neurons! How to save yourself from this menace.

"That pain you feel listening to complainers? It's real enough to peel away neurons from your brain and render it pretty much useless, reports Inc."

[That pain you feel reading ridiculous made-up articles about the brain? It's real enough to peel away neurons from your brain and render it pretty much useless, reports The Neurocritic.]

That's the worst piece of fiction I've read about the brain in quite some time. So I thought I'd complain about it. Read at your own risk!

Complainers Damage Neurons in the Brain

Entrepreneur Trevor Blake offers tips to save yourself

By Neal Colgrass, Newser Staff
Posted Aug 25, 2012 4:56 PM CDT

(Newser) – That pain you feel listening to complainers? It's real enough to peel away neurons from your brain and render it pretty much useless, reports Inc. "The brain works more like a muscle than we thought," says Trevor Blake, an entrepreneur who wrote Three Simple Steps: A Map to Success in Business and Life. "So if you're pinned in a corner for too long listening to someone being negative, you're more likely to behave that way as well."

The Neurocomplainer

Where to begin? With the distortion of scientific results beyond recognition in order to sell books? The use of such hyperbolic language? Or perhaps reliance on a business magazine as a primary source for neuroscience news. Oh but it gets worse...

But he offers tips for coping:

• Get Away. Complainers are like chain-smokers who emit dangerous second-hand smoke, so simply move away from them.
• Ask for a Fix. If you're cornered, suggest that the complainer find a solution. But most will just walk off because they "don't want a solution; they just want you to join in the indignity of the whole thing," says Blake.
• Protect Yourself. When they just won't stop, delve into your bag of mental self-defense tricks. Imagining a protective, giant bell jar or invisibility cloak might work—or, like Blake, you could see yourself on a far-away island. "I could smile at them and nod in all the right places and meanwhile take myself for a walk on my private beach."

[Save me from Mr. Blake!]


Negative people are toxic, so let's abandon them. It doesn't matter if they're depressed about the foreclosure of their home or upset about being downsized due to corporate malfeasance or venting after being the target of yet another racist / sexist / homophobic insult or angry that their insurance company won't cover that critical medical procedure after all. Instead, ask them to fix the structural inequalities in society and then just move away from them.

[How to protect yourself from my complaining sarcastic blog posts: "Imagining a protective, giant bell jar or invisibility cloak might work."]


Surely the original Inc. article can't be that absurd! I'll let you be the judge...

Listening to Complainers Is Bad for Your Brain

. . .

Even worse, being exposed to too much complaining can actually make you dumb. Research shows that exposure to 30 minutes or more of negativity--including viewing such material on TV--actually peels away neurons in the brain's hippocampus.¹ "That's the part of your brain you need for problem solving," he says. "Basically, it turns your brain to mush."

[30 seconds of exposure to Mr. Blake's book will basically turn your brain to mush.]


Speaking of Three Simple Steps (which -- in an amazing coincidence -- was published on August 23, 2012), there's something wrong with this picture...

While this item is available from other marketplace sellers on this page, it is not currently offered by Amazon.com because customers have told us there may be something wrong with our inventory of the item, the way we are shipping it, or the way it's described here.

Newser link via @TheNeuroScience.

Footnote

¹ The hippocampus is critical for memory, not problem solving.

Brainsicle Sticker, only $3.00 from EdgarsStupid.