It’s that moment when you’re in the office and the first thing you do is complain about waking up in the morning, about the number of emails, or about the hot coffee that didn’t come the way you wanted it. Suddenly, you realize you’ve whined to half the world, but your day just seems like… a continuous chain of complaints. If you find yourself doing this often, it might be time to ask yourself, “Am I whining too much?”

Read more: I Just Divorced: How To Handle It?

Let’s face it: we all have our moments, the days when a smile is harder to find and tiredness or frustration can come out in the form of a grumble. However, if whining is becoming the norm rather than the exception, it may be time to look at some telltale signs that something is amiss.

1. The first thing you say is a complaint

If the first thing you do when you wake up or immediately after the first minute of talking to someone is to complain about something (the weather, work, traffic, food), maybe it’s time to think about it a little more. Complaining can become an automatic reaction and rob you of your energy before you even start the day in a positive mood.

2. You constantly feel “wronged”

Do you feel that everyone around you is luckier or that your work is not recognized? If you often feel like “life is unfair” or that the universe has something personal against you, then whining may be your natural antidote to that frustration. The constant sense of injustice can make you complain about things that are not really that tragic.

3. Others react with “Oh, not again”

If your friends, family, or coworkers start rolling their eyes every time you start complaining, you might be a little over the top. Moaning often becomes boring and tiresome when repeated. If people around you seem to avoid you or avoid conversations to avoid hearing complaints, it might be time to ask yourself if you’ve crossed the line of “healthy” complaining and become involved in whining for no reason.

4. You prefer to talk about the bad than the good

Another sign is when the conversation always revolves around the negative: “The weather is bad”, “Work is driving me crazy”, “The day is bad”. If you struggle to find something positive to say, or if all the nice things seem meaningless in the face of life’s adversities, complaining may have become your first instinct. If the “here and now” imagines a series of disappointments and you can’t focus even on the small happy things, stopping complaining can help you find happiness in the small moments again.

5. Complaining replaces resolution

If complaining has become the “salt and pepper” of every conversation rather than a necessary expression, you may begin to notice that you are not trying to find solutions to your problems, but only analyzing them at the level of complaints. When you see something negative, you don’t even bother to find a solution or try to change it, you just “blame” it on others. This is one of the biggest signs that whining has become a habit of convenience, rather than being the trigger for action.

6. Moaning has become a companion to loneliness

How many times have you made the choice to close yourself off and only talk about the negatives because you thought that sharing your frustrations is the only thing you can do to get rid of the burdensome feeling of bloatedness you feel? If whining is replacing real, meaningful conversations, and if this attitude makes you feel more alone than it brings you closer to others, then maybe it’s time to look into it.

The key to breaking the whining cycle is not to suppress your feelings or pretend everything is perfect when it isn’t. However, if you recognize that whining has become an automatic reaction for no reason, then you have already taken the first step towards change. Try to focus on the positive, recognize the value of the solution instead of constantly referring to the problem, and don’t forget to smile at the little things in life. If you do, you might discover that nagging isn’t as necessary as you think!