The person who’s the most affected by judgment is the person who’s doing the judging.
Every time you judge, you internalize the energy of that situation. In other words, you are investing your life force in something you disapprove of to begin with.
So why do we judge if it’s bringing us down?
My husband and I were walking the dog. We were on our way back home which meant we were all a bit tired, a bit calmer, a bit more relaxed. I reached my hand out to hold my husband’s hand.
Now, he’s bigger than I am. Thus, his steps are longer and his speed differs. Do you know that feeling when someone holds your hand while walking and you start bouncing?
Yeah, that’s what happened. We were completely out of sync.
I don’t know who started it but all of a sudden we got into it:
“Stop bouncing!”
“I’m walking just fine! It’s you who’s bouncing!”
“No, it’s you.”
“No, you.”
And so on.
At the bottom of the disagreement was an underlying belief we both had,
“My way is a better way. My way is the only way. My way is the truth.”
And that’s what judgment is all about – the illusion that it’s me against the world.
It’s our separation from oneness, being out of sync, inability to accept the other person just as he/she is. We have stepped into fear.
A Course In Miracles
To makes us feel safe and in control, we place conditions. If you do as I do, feel as I feel, think as I think, or in this case walk as I walk, that’s when I accept you for who you are.
Yet can you name at least one other person who does, feels, acts, believes just like you?
Right.
Thus, every single person who enters your life has reasons to judge you, and you have reasons to judge them. We judge, and are judged, constantly.
How do we move from judgment to acceptance?
After short bickering, my husband and I re-aligned our walking – I took longer steps and he slowed down. Amazing how little adjustment was needed – just a millimeter’s worth.
In a split second, we were in sync.
To hold someone’s hand and walk in sync – you know that feeling – is one of the greatest joys in life.
IT’S THE PHYSICAL MANIFESTATION OF ONENESS.
According to Taoism, feeling connected to others is the ultimate presence of ‘being whole.’ It’s a place where fear has no space, and judgment vanishes.
It’s a place where we feel home, we feel wholeness, and we experience total acceptance.
It’s that moment when you’re able
“[t]o see the world in a grain of sand, and heaven in a wildflower, to hold infinity in the palm of the hand, and eternity in an hour.”
William Blake
We walked like this for about half a minute. But then our dog wanted to eat something un-identifiable, and my husband saw grapes on the wall.
Just as fast as we had fallen in sync, we fell out of it. We were no longer present with one another. The bouncing came back, and instead of re-focusing on each other, we let go of the hands. It seemed easier that way.
And so it is in life. That small amount of effort that it takes to be fully present with others, to be fully connected and in sync, still seems like climbing mountains, and so we choose to let go.
To justify our choice to not re-connect, we judge – something’s wrong with the other person, the dog distracted us, I don;t have time.
We choose separation.
As a result, we are walking alone, we are feeling alone, and everyone else appears as if they are BOUNCING ON US.
Yet just as we choose separation, we can choose wholeness. Just as my husband and I could choose to walk, hand-in-hand, in harmony, we could choose to let go altogether. Both required minimal effort, and all of our intention.
We are constantly teetering on the line between separation and wholeness.
It’s our INTENTION that decides which way we swing – judgment or acceptance.