20 Things I Learned in My 20's - Lesson 11: Judgement

Lesson 11: Judgement

Judgement Framework

“This is right,” and “That’s wrong,” - these two statements roll off the tongue of my thought patterns as I go about life. Like a courtroom judge with a gavel, my mind automatically passes judgement on the right-ness of what occurs around me.

In its own way, this method is how my mind protects itself, but is it actually protecting me?

The judgments are determined by a set of conditions that define my identity as it was bestowed upon me, whether by default, happenstance, or deliberately. These labels - liberal, college-educated, Asian-American, female, spiritual student, etc. - define the parameters of my beliefs about how the world should work.

Then, when something occurs that doesn’t jive with how the world should work according to a liberal, college-educated, Asian-American female in the East Coast of the USA, my mind jumps to, “That’s wrong.” To a person who challenges the validity of my identity, both my mind and mouth say, “You’re wrong.”

Self-Judgement

Sometimes I am able to separate myself from the judging and become aware of my mind making a judgement. Then I make myself wrong for having done so. Because, as someone working on developing her higher self, why can’t I just get it right?

The fun cycle of judgement never ends.

The judging of others and things external is nothing new to me. I know I am a judgey bitch. What is newly rising to the surface of my realization is how often I attach right vs. wrong to just about anything and how incapacitating that is.

For example, through reflection I may understand where I act out of fear rather than love. But what I do next with that information, is make a judgement call, a right/wrong determination that says I fucked up. And like a neurotic child, I beat myself up over the incorrect answer on a test.

Twisting Awareness

It’s not fun to go through a vicious cycle of never living up to my own standards, my expectation of how I should be. It is destructive and toxic to my growth and I didn't understand how severely it obstructs the learning until this past year.

All the self-reflection and other activities in developing the higher self become twisted versions of themselves when they’re conflated with wrong or right.

For example, I've also been learning to take personal responsibility and the barrier I keep bumping up against is judgement. When I start assigning right and wrong to something that happened, I avoid taking accountability due to it feeling like Blame or Fault.

These words, blame and fault, are born out of morals. Because of this, my being won't open up to how I can be responsible for the way my life is.

What is the difference between self-consciousness and self-awareness? They relate to each other like Shakespearean comedies and tragedies. Both types of plays are about character shortcomings and flaws, but how those foibles are treated in the play determine whether it draws laughter or tears.

In much the same way, self-consciousness and self-awareness both involve presence, but how my foibles are treated once they are brought to the surface determines which of these is elicited.

Will I be self-conscious about my ignorance, letting it drown out my ability to create my world or will I be self-aware and allow compassion to shine through, keeping the doors of possibility open?

Take the High Road

It is funny what the mind will do to avoid being "wrong" or "bad". It will perform the most Herculean mental gymnastics so that it ends up on the right side of "good", whatever that is. Even if it costs relationships with loved ones or living a life that is dry and listless.

The way forward is to practice presence and disregard judgement. It serves no purpose here. Judgement might still occur, but I recently discovered that my mental chatter is basically a crazy person anyway so why believe it?

What is there to judge? There is just this life. Life is life. Life is not good or bad. It just is. When I finally digest and integrate that, the rate of emotional reactivity will decrease and freedom will increase.

A Side Note

It's very ironic but an argument with Jim bubbled up as I was writing this post. And I made Jim wrong so I could be right. Refusing to take accountability because I was wronged, I huffed and puffed. There's a great line I heard recently at an Improv class that is relevant here - "It's not about me tonight, it's about us over time." Each time I judge what's going on to the detriment of our partnership, I choose me.

Time and time again, my egoic desires keep me from seeing my self-created miseries and impede the creations I want to see in my life. All there is to do though is to own it and apologize as soon as I recognize it. There is no need to make myself wrong about it, or conversely good if that's relevant. Either way, these attachments create damage. So here is where I sign off because there's someone I love who needs to know.

---

Posted from my blog with SteemPress : https://www.tantrabanter.com/20-things-i-learned-in-my-20s-lesson-11-judgement/

---