After you have had an important conversation, do you go over it later? Do you remember the words you have used, and replay it, analysing and judging them? I used to do this everyday. I did not remember what the other person said necessarily, but I remembered what I had said. Then I would pull it apart, thinking whether it was the right thing to say, the kind thing to say. I would decide which words were right and which words were wrong – then I’d feel awful about the “wrong” words, or because I’d worded it in the wrong way.
Maybe you go over conversations in your head and judge the other persons words? It’s much the same really. When we are judging others, we are actually judging ourselves. Sometimes it’s a way of avoiding judging ourselves. It all gets tangled up.
Maybe you go over conversations or things people have said to you, and think how good they were?
Funny, we seem to treat negative judgements as judgements and positive judgements as okay. Even a positive judgement is a judgement. If you consider someone’s comments about you to be positive and they make you feel good – it’s still a judgement. If they say something negative about you or your work, it’s a judgement. Just because one lot of judgements make you feel good, doesn’t make them right. It’s just that you feel good and we all want to feel good, don’t we?
We hear criticism in someone’s words or even just in the tone of voice, and we feel judged. How is this? When someone gives you some feedback, what leads to this being a judgement – one that you don’t want? Or is it just their opinion, one which does not need to be taken on board personally by you.
What if we could listen to the criticism/feedback and leave out the judgement that it was a judgement.
Recently I was my own harsh judge. I sat under this judge and believed every damn thought I had. “I made a mess, I did more harm than good, I did it wrong, I am useless, I can’t trust myself, I’m hopeless, and so on.” Were these thoughts true? No, they weren’t. But the judge and the doubts were seriously overwhelming. Until I realised that I was believing my own thoughts, all of which were conjured up out of my own head, supported by my past.
In this way we create our own suffering. There is no need to believe the thoughts in your head. They are only thoughts, not wisdom.
The way to wisdom is to drop deeper than your thoughts and your emotions and find out what’s here.