"If we take judging of ourselves and others out of our lives, we will mostly be living in paradise"
Yogi Bhajan
We are taught judgement from a very young age and our society reinforces it daily. Religion, television, music, our parents, the news, etc all have their direct and indirect way of auto domesticating us to be judgmental. The judgement that we are taught is obviously not a healthy type. It is a harsh critical judgement. It's I am better than you, prettier than you, stronger than you, I have more money than you type of judgement. These types of judgments do not serve us well -at all. As a matter of fact they're at the basis of self-hate, insecurity, and self-doubt. Yet we are masters at this type of sabatoge. It has enveloped our sense of identity.
Abraham Maslow once said, "I suppose it is tempting if the only tool you have is a hammer, to treat everything as if it were a nail." He used this phrase insinuating we all have cognitive biases that we rely too much on. We need to choose the tools that we work with very carefully as most are filled with our own biases, only what we are comfortable with, only through what we have experienced. This then gets projected onto not only ourselves but to others as well.
A question I've asked for years has been, is there a compassionate judgment? Can we have a judgmental thought, look at it with compassion and let it go? Can we learn to explore different ideas before we get caught up in our own cognitive biases? It is true that if we take our time and step away from a situation that we can understand on a different level. Indeed, this is a skill that needs to be learned and practiced. Our own unresolved issues are at the core of our biases, yet there is no blueprint to help us with resolve.
The antithesis of judgement is Self-Acceptance. Where is it along our life path are we taught self-acceptance? That we are good enough? That we are beautiful, strong, perfect the way we are? To separate ourselves from others and recognize the individual value we bring to the table. Ask yourself, Do I accept myself as a whole? This is just the beginning, a platform from where to start and a springboard of helping you realize what is actually holding you back. When we don't fully accept ourselves we live in a space that becomes increasingly difficult to accept others. This becomes married to our biases and before you know it we are living in a world that is full of grief and much of that grief is sub-conscious.
This isn't a post to explain to you "how to"- before you get to that you have to become aware. This is a post to help you to simply reflect on you, what you do and how you do it. Be honest with yourself for a moment. Look inside and really explore where your judgement comes from. Are you insecure, afraid, angry, comfortable in chaos? Is judgement all you know because that's what you learned growing up and learned to protect yourself with? Stay still for just a moment and reflect on you. What comes up for you?