Change

I’m a judgmental person. I am. And I’ve known this for years. Recently I’ve become pretty sick of it. Usually I judge people I don’t know. And I’m usually wrong. I don’t like to be wrong. So theres one reason to stop being judgmental. Chances are, if you’re reading this, I’ve judged you. I’m sorry. It’s wrong of me and stupid. I think people judge others because it makes them feel better about themselves. Why do I feel the need to take away from others to feed my own self worth? It doesn’t work like that anyway. If I’m taking away from others to feed myself…I’ll always remain a bottomless pit. I’ll always be finding more reasons that I’m better than someone else but it will never satisfy me. I’ll keep getting more miserable and my self worth will stay the same or get worse. The Christian thing to say here is that I should let God fill the bottomless pit…because honestly he’s the only thing that can. But looking at it that way is too abstract to be useful to me. Really I just need to stop looking at people the way I do and start seeing them the way God does. And if I can’t do that I at least need to try to see things in the best light. Chuck puts it this way. Before he judges someone or an issue he has with them he “let’s the defense speak” in his mind. It’s like having a hypothetical court case in your head. You, the prosecution, have all the most compelling arguments and perfect evidence—of course. And the defense, whoever you don’t like or are having problems with, don’t even get a chance to speak usually. The trick is to give them a chance to speak. I like this idea. I think Chuck got that idea from a book written by a Buddhist monk. All truth is God’s truth though, right?