How to Loosen the Habit of Judgment

How to Loosen the Habit of Judgment

We all do it, it’s a natural part of our human experience…judging things and people.

Some folks will tell you that it’s ‘helpful’ and we need a certain amount of judgment in our lives in order to live them. You know, we need to judge whether something is right for us, if a situation is safe or helpful, if another person is going to be a good fit as a friend.

But let me make a case for the difference between judgment and discernment, because what I mentioned above is really discernment.

Discernment is the power to recognize things and select what is true or appropriate.  While judgments are more about forming a good/bad opinion of things.

True, it’s a slight shift in perspective but one of these is a useful tool so you choose to NOT walk out into traffic, the other is a mindset and can cause us to be unhappy as we tend to judge ourselves as being wrong, not worth enough and let’s not even get into our judgments fo others.

Judgments are super limiting for us.  They bring us a great deal of stress as the friction between what is and what we want things to be can be quite overwhelming.  The kicker is, until we understand this we continue to cause a lot of our own stress without even being aware we are doing it.

It takes us out of possibility and into stuck! If we must be ‘right’ and have already decided what that is then how can we grow? Or have experiences that teach us something new?

Add into that the painful issues of self-judgment and how it crushes self-esteem and of course with it your happiness and you can see why I’m a big fan of loosening that habit, if not working to get rid of it entirely.

Listen lovely! The thing is you are amazing, smart, creative and really quite adorable. You have the power within you already to truly create a life you feel completely in love with. However, all these heavy self-judgments keep throwing up barriers to that faster than the road work signs on the highway show up the first days of spring.

When you’re judgment your ability to see things narrow a great deal. We tend to cling to the views we have of ourselves (and others) as if it were a life line. Trust me it’s not.  Our judgments of others tends to support us in holding onto beliefs that seem to serve us – but often only serve to keep us firmly planted where we are.

We need to loosen the grip on these judgments so that we can more easily grow and manifest and create what we desire.

First thing you will need to do is shore up that awareness.  Clearly you have some level of awareness of your judgments and how it really makes you feel and act or your wouldn’t have stopped at this blog post right?  But expanding that awareness is critical to helping you shift those thoughts into thoughts that you choose.

You can’t change what you can see!

Then, ask your Self, how do you feel about your thoughts?  Ask yourself to examine them a little closer.  Where does the belief the thoughts comes from originate?  Is the thought true?  Are there other options? Does it feel good to think it?

Being mindful of accepting what is. This is true of yourself and of other. When you accept people – including yourself – as whole and perfect beings that are part of this collective we call human, you can begin to cultivate understanding. People are always showing you their truth, we often just do not want to see it or accept it.

Every person is divinely entitled to run their own race, map out their own journey and who are you to judge that?  For that matter who are you to judge your own path? You have lessons to learn and things you need to experience but this is just part of the human condition. One you chose for a reason.

Flow, ease, and acceptance are what is needed to get those things..not resistance which is what judgment really is. A resistance to what is. So far as I can tell, resisting our true natures, fighting with our selves and the world to demand it fits our view-point rarely works.

This isn’t’ to say you won’t desire to change things.  Of course, growth is change after all. But in this moment, everything is as it should be and bringing us to opportunities for that very same growth we desire.

Stop Comparing.  Comparison is like the nasty cousin of judgments.  Self-critical people tend to judge themselves by others success, even while knowing perfectly well that they really have no idea what is behind that success or even if it’s real! We often want to make our selves feel better so we do that whole judgment bit where we look down on others and judge them as wrong or bad.

And you cannot know if ANY of the is true.  Comparison will always make someone feel like crap…usually ourselves so lets ditch that shall we?  When you catch yourself comparing or using judgment this way, stop, label those thoughts and then release them and choose a new one.

Yes, it really IS that simple. Just not that easy to always get to a place where non-judgment and acceptance is your default mindset. It’s a definite practice that takes some time, but I promise you can shift that default to a point where you rarely find your self in judgment anymore.

Mind your own business! This is not said with the meaning we often use it for. It doesn’t really mean just leave me along! This is said in the literal meaning of go and take care of your own stuff and stop worrying about what others are saying, doing or thinking.  There’s a saying that says ‘what other people think of you is none of your business’. I’d say the reverse is true as well. Worry about what YOU think of you, and making YOUR life better and let the rest go.

Oddly enough my last point is to ask you to not judge the practice of being more mindful of your thoughts in this area. It is a process and one day, if you keep at it, you’ll realize suddenly how far you’ve come.

And that my dear, is a really great day!

big love,

Bonnie

ps. Have you seen the latest?  Check it out here!

 

 

 

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