Mindfulness Mondays 38: Letting Go of Judgment
February 15, 2010 by dr. lam
Don’t we all have a little Simon Cowell in us? How good does it feel to be judged ourselves? Not great, right? We oftentimes judge others by their words, actions, and deeds. When they do not conform to our narrow worldview, we stand in judgment over that person owing to our superior position. We use religion, politics, education, age, gender, race, looks, etc. to get in our way, and simply put we judge.
We rely on labels to help reduce that other individual in our eyes to a stereotype: Black, Woman, Muslim, Child, Retarded, Nerdy, etc. We hide behind these stereotypes because they are easy and make us feel good about ourselves. But do they? We should feel bad if we start to label and judge another individual because we have no right to do so. Simon Cowell may be fun for American Idol, but he is no fun if you are one or if you are with one.
Remember in The 4 Agreements, “we judge others by their action, and we judge ourselves by our intention.” Oh, Bob did that because he was being hurtful (judging action). Oh, I never meant to cause harm because I am a good person (judging intention). We are so full of moral superiority that we have to exercise it daily just so that we can feel good about ourselves. ”I would not hang out with Susan because she just does not know when to shut up.”
When are we filled with judging? How do we judge? This week catch yourself judging someone else and begin the process of letting that go. When we let go of judging, we can connect with people that we thought we never could because of our preconceived judgments that got in our way.
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2 Responses to “Mindfulness Mondays 38: Letting Go of Judgment”
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Very good point!!! I liked your noting the point that we typically judge another by his/her actions but that we judge ourselves by our intention. Interesting observation and true. I think we also tend to attach a motive to another when we judge.
Not only do we judge someone’s actions and attach a motive, but I’ve ironically found that when we typically judge another, it is because we do not understand them. We do not understand that person or thinking but ironically we think we do. We do not understand how someone can think a certain way or act a certain way and so we make as simple an explanation as we can comprehend and tag that person as such, “That person is just rebellious,” “That person is blindly following some dead belief and needs to hold on to a crutch in life,” “That person is weird,” “He’s ignoring me,” etc. I’ve found that in reality in life, that “simple” explanation of judgment that we often attach to a person or way of thinking when we do not understand, is not the true perspective of the other at all, and by quickly judging as we often do, we hinder ourselves from truly understanding the other’s perspective, and when we judge another in such a simple way, we are keeping ourselves from gaining a richer view of others and the world. That person is not “just rebellious” but probably has other reasons behind his/her thinking; that “religious” person may have more substantiating his/her beliefs than what one simplifies; that person may not be weird but have a progressive and intriguing viewpoint if someone cared to take the time to listen; he may not be ignoring you but just be occupied in something else for a time….just some examples. I’ve found that when we allow ourselves to understand the true perspective of another, of whom at first we might be tempted to judge, we will achieve a level of understanding for the other person; even if we do not see eye-to-eye on that person’s perspective, we will understand that person’s way of thinking and perspective. When we free ourselves of judgment of another and strive for understanding outside of our frame of perspective when we feel we do not understand someone, we enrich our well-roundedness—we gain understanding and a rich view of more than just our perspective and can positively influence others more effectively or grow in our own awareness. Just my viewpoint…lol
couldn’t have said it better myself. nice new gravatar!