Eight or Higher. Why it’s a Toxic Attitude

I don’t watch a lot of comedies, but one of my favourites is How I Met Your Mother (HIMYM for short). One of the reasons why I like the series is because it’s more than just a comedy. It had romance, sadness and reflections on life. One take on relationships, specifically involving friendships was the idea of “eight or higher”, which was something introduced in the season 7 finale The Magician’s Code: Part 2.

As Marshall and Lily welcome their new son into the world, and try to get adjusted, Ted, who is the main character of the series, seeks advice from them about the latest girl he’s into. They respond with, “eight or higher bro”. Basically suggesting that if it’s not a really significant problem that he’s got like meeting with his ex, who is bailing on her own wedding (which happens in the episode), then they don’t want to hear about it. This concept comes to a head in the 4th episode of season 8 called Who Wants to Be a Godparent. Ted, Robin and Barney get fed up with not being able to open up to Marshall and Lily about their lives, unless it’s an eight or higher. Marshall and Lily realize that even though their priorities are different, and they have a different life now, because of the baby, they still want to be there, and engage in the lives of their close friends.

Unfortunately the eight or higher rule exists in society today, even though it’s not stated as such. The easiest way to see it, is when someone tells you not to complain. Now I get that listening to someone complain is not always something you want to hear. Maybe you’re busy or not in the mood to listen to someone else’s problems. Maybe you don’t think that their problems are really problems, or that they are just complaining about the same things over and over again. Here’s the thing though. I feel that everyone needs someone to complain to, to vent to, to let out their frustrations with. The best types of people are those who can turn your frustrations into something funny, or those who can trade complaints with you. If someone can confide in you and feel good after complaining to you, they are more willing to talk about things that are an eight or higher.

The other way to see the eight or higher rule in society is when you hear people say to be grateful, and that other people have it worse than you. While I have never tried to count my blessings as they say, I don’t believe that it takes away your problems or make them see less of an issue. Being grateful doesn’t pay the bills or motivate you to lose weight. However, the more important part of the statement at the beginning of this paragraph is the concept that other people have it worse than you. Yes, there are people who have it worse than you, but why does it need to be a competition to see who has things worse than you? Yes, you may be sitting in a decent apartment reading this, with food in your fridge while there are homeless drug addicts living on the street freezing and having not eaten all day. However there are other people who have it better than you in a material sense. There are people who have a happy family, a large house or enough money in their bank account that they never have to worry. But guess what. Those people also have problems, which brings me to one of the more important parts of this blog post.

Everyone has problems, no matter your class, race, religion, or sexual orientation. When you start comparing how you have it better than other people, you are only seeing the material side of things. If problems were only based on having food, clothes and shelter, then wealthy celebrities and people who have had success in a specific field, wouldn’t commit suicide. You wouldn’t have comedians like Robin Williams killing himself, and no comedian who had any financial success would continue to complain about things as part of their stand-up routine. Everyone will face challenges in life, and it’s important to understand that your challenges, are not always going to be the same challenges others face. What may seem easy for you, might be a problem for someone else. For example, you might be an outgoing, social butterfly, while your friend is shy and doesn’t have many friends. So going out and talking with others is not a problem for you, but for your friend, it can be an a frightening experience that stresses them out. However, you might be someone who is afraid of settling down with one person, while your friend knows that when they meet the right person, they want to spend the rest of their life with that person.

Now I am not a psychologist, but having someone who will listen to your problems, is important in the prevention of suicide. I have heard that people who commit suicide or had suicide attempts don’t feel like anyone gets them. They feel no one would understand what they are going through. These feelings don’t come from nothing. At least I don’t think so. What I believe happens is they try to open up to people and get shut down. Sometimes it’s by telling someone “to get over it”, or “just move on”. Both those phrases show ignorance, an attitude of thinking it’s just that simple and show that they are not interested in working through what’s bothering them. Then there’s the people who take the approach of one-upmanship. People who say at least it’s not as bad as whatever, or people who start things off with “you think that’s bad?”. In both situations their goal is to compare your situation to someone else’s situation. Trying to compete to see who has it worse, in my opinion, translates to, “You don’t have a real problem here. You’re just making a big deal out of nothing. Other people would be happy to be where you are”.

You also get people who just don’t want to hear you complain about anything or feel that the result of your complaining would be to confront the issue that’s bothering you and are annoyed when you continue to complain a lot. To me, complaining is something natural. It’s a way to release what we can’t say in the situation that’s being complained about, or it’s a way to let go of the negativity surrounding that situation. I think it’s better to release that negativity than to bottle it up, until something causes you to snap, and result in a regretful situation that you can’t undo.

It’s definitely risky, from an emotional perspective because you may find that you don’t have a lot of people to turn to in your life that allow you to vent and allow you to get to a good place. It makes it worse when for one reason or another, they are not in your life for a significant period of time. You want to find someone who will allow you to vent. Someone who can trade complaints with you, or someone/something you and another person can mutually complain about. If you and the other person, or people can find a way to turn your complaining into something you can laugh at, or you can turn your negative feelings into laughing or mocking the person (the subject of your complaint) or situation, that’s also good.

The best person in general, is someone who will just listen to you, without judgement. Someone who will acknowledge that you are going through a challenge and listen to you vent. As someone who has been that to my older cousin, I get that sometimes you may not necessarily want to listen, especially when it’s over a message (like text or Facebook messenger). Sometimes it means giving up time you would have done something else or staying up way later than you should be up, just to be there for that person. Sometimes it’s going for a drive or a walk, so that they can tell you what’s going on, or how they are feeling. I will gladly give up that time, because I know how it feels when you don’t have many people who you can talk to, who will understand, who will listen. I can count on one hand how many people I have that I feel I can open up and talk to freely. If you don’t have someone like that in your life, talk to a psychologist. Someone who can be objective, and only wants to help you. Or you can always do your best to live your life, pursue your happiness and believe that the right people will come into your life, at the right time. Like I said, we all have our challenges, and maybe finding a group of people who will support you, and love you, is your challenge.

I will leave you with a few things to think about when you want to complain or vent. One thing is to see if anything positive happened that day, before the situation or after it. The second thing, especially if the complaint is success/goal oriented. Ask yourself are you making progress. Are you moving in the right direction. And ask yourself are you better now than you were in the past.