It seems so easy to cast a judging eye, doesn’t it? When I think of a judgy person, I might conjure up an image of an uppity woman putting her nose up at the plumber fixing her water heater or the passerby in the restaurant she’s eating at. But then I’m no better because I’m making a judgment about a stranger I don’t even know. Ugh! I find myself judging people and when I do, I have to stop myself because I know better. However, that wasn’t always the case for me. Now, when I feel the judgy thoughts coming on, I tell myself, “Everyone deserves to be happy and if that makes them happy, so be it!”  I don’t want to be judged, so why am I doing it to someone else?

We’re not all born to be judges or critics, we learned the behavior from our caretakers, family, friends, church, community, and even television because anything can influence a young mind in big enough doses.

So, the answer to recognizing it and changing our thoughts and behavior lies in our past. When we were children, we absorbed everything from our environment. Whether we lived with our birth parents, family, or others, what the adults believed and valued became our beliefs. So, if your father was a Pittsburgh Steelers fan, then chances are you’d follow suit and be a fan, too. Not always, but usually.

But there’s a dark side to that absorbed belief system. When parents or caregivers show children (because a child’s brain is like a sponge and picks up everything they hear or see) that they are racist or homophobic, or share their political viewpoints, most of the time, (not all), children will adopt the same beliefs. These beliefs become so engrained that as young and older adults we do and say things without thinking about it. It has become part of the fabric of our lives and we don’t know any better to change it.

That is until someone challenges us and our way of thinking. And that’s what happened to me.

That’s great but how do we change this way of thinking? We can’t blame the past forever.

 

How to Stop Judging

I heard this story about a man who got onto a subway car with his two young children. The children were rowdy and annoyed the other people on the train so much that a woman spoke up and said to the man, “What kind of father are you that you let your children act up like that?”  The man replied that they were on their way home from the hospital after leaving his wife, and their mother who had just passed away and he didn’t have the strength to discipline them.  All of a sudden the annoyance the other riders felt turned into sympathy and compassion. No longer were the children being a nuisance to the train car, the people now felt sorry for them.

We can believe we know everything about everybody and cast judgment but we truly don’t know what some people are going through.

Maybe the girl with purple hair that checked you out at the grocery store doesn’t get any attention from her parents.

Maybe the guy who is riding in the motorized chair at Target who doesn’t seem to look like he is injured or has an ailment is recuperating from knee surgery, and even though he got the brace off, today just wasn’t a good day for him to walk and he needed to buy food for his elderly parents.

Or maybe the middle-aged woman waiting tables has a Ph.D. and can’t find a job and needs to earn money to pay the bills.  Would you ever suspect that or would you just see her as a server who is beneath you because you are educated and have a comfy career?

Maybe you just don’t care and that is perfectly okay too.

But if you want to be that person who doesn’t judge people here’s some advice I learned:

Focus on the positive instead of the negatives.

I know it’s easy to write that but it’s true and it works. So if you want to complain about the lady in front of you at the store for taking so long,  flip it to think that maybe she’s lonely and that the cashier is her only connection to another person.

Put love in your heart.

When you focus on love, just thinking loving thoughts, you naturally do not judge. It just goes hand in hand.

Think – how do I know what they are going through?

Having this conscious thought stops you from gravitating towards wanting to judge someone.

Realize that we are all just trying to live our lives the best way we can.

Putting ourselves in the same boat as others leaves no room for judgment since we are all just trying to live life the best way we know how.

Focus on your own weaknesses and imperfections.

Taking your thoughts back to yourself and realizing that you are not perfect, and have no right to judge others, makes a huge impact on whether or not you think it’s okay to judge.

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To sum this up, just remember we are all in this life together and we are doing the best we can. The last thing anyone wants is to feel like they are not good enough or there is something wrong with them because they don’t fit into your “square” box when they have always been “round.” Lighten up and just go with the flow. Entertain your mind with good things like a good book or music, or a video game, whatever you like, just make it constructive instead of destructive. We go around this life once, so make it a good one.

Peace and love,

Francesca