Who is to judge?

Is it possible to be truly objective in our judgments?

Being a big fan of little experiments I decided to do one yesterday –

How many times in the course of a day do I judge or witness any form of judgment?

And so before I reveal my findings to you…please pause for a minute and try to guess the answer.

Even though I intentionally tried to withhold my own judgments I was both shocked and amazed to realize that it didn’t take much for me to pass judgments; in fact…before leaving home I had already passed 4 and witnessed another 7 judgments – all being made before the breakfast was over ;)

Coming to the office I noticed things were accelerating at an even faster pace. It was as though judgments were flying around like swallows; to the point that I was actually challenged to simply capture every time I witnessed yet another form of judgment. I was astonished as to how quick we are to label everything and everyone as good or bad, right or wrong, this or that..!

At 4 pm I stopped counting.

Enough is enough.

In the course of a pretty normal day I recorded 72 judgments! I even noticed a slight headache appearing as I tried to conclude: Who are we to judge so quickly? Is there a single objective truth?

Somebody’s job was eroded today.
Bad news? Feel sorry for him? Who knows? Maybe this person will finally decide to pursue his dream job. Perhaps an opportunity beyond what he might have dreamed of is waiting for him just around the corner… A year down the road this person may refer to this moment as a lucky day.

Somebody else was promoted today.
Good news, you would say, congratulations! Or not? Who knows? Maybe the new position will have them sacrifice their personal life and this guy ends up perhaps richer but unhappy… After all, he may regret the day he accepted the promotion.

I actually don’t believe there is any such thing as a single objective truth. In my opinion, there are many individual views made by various people at different points intime…leading to an endless variety of “the truth”.

Can we relax our judgment tendency and accept this as a possibility? If there are many versions of the truth… what is the value of any judgment? I’d say there is a better way of spending our precious time.

If you judge people, you have no time to love them.
Mother Tereza

Who is the judge, anyways? Is it God, society or perhaps your mother ?

Or might it be us who will be the ultimate judge of our life when its days are over? If you knew for sure that the only judge will be You and therefore it is all up to you – how would it change the way you act right now? Wouldit re-frame the way you view life? What choices would you make? What would this moment be an opportunity for?

So I stopped counting the judgments around me and instead focused on what I believed was the best possible next step in front of me.

I noticed how many viable options we have in each moment if we withhold judging too quickly. It is only from the long-term (and perhaps even life-long!) perspective that anything can be judged anyways. I enjoy hearing other people’s versions of “the truth”; and focusing on something I don’t like can trigger motivation to change that. True inspiration though only comes to me when I put my attention on what really matters to me and what I have control over. Instead of seeking the “one truth” I better focus on creating one I prefer, and that usually means respecting other people’s “truths” while minding my own attitude and opportunities for action.

By doing what we feel inspired to, we inspire others to do what inspires them.

What are your observations?

How many times have You judged or witnessed any form of judgment today?

I am curious to hear your experiences and find out more about your own truth

Share your comments below…

With love,

Jana