Judgement: A Vehicle To Nirvana?
Embracing judgement
Judgement. Isn’t it so common? We can judge people for so many reasons, ranging from how they look, to how they reacted to something. The common denominator, however, is that for whatever reason we’re judging, we haven’t walked in their shoes. We have no idea what they’ve been through.
Here is one way we can turn our propensity to judge to our advantage. It’s a two step approach.
We’ll use the example of someone saying something hurtful to us at work. We feel angry and tempted to judge them.
(1) Be present with your feelings
Meditation teaches us to observe our inner world as a witness, absent judgement.
In this example, we accept and process what happened. Someone said something we didn’t like. We feel angry. That’s spiritual opportunity. Our bodies are intuitive vessels that store emotion. The more we objectively observe how we feel, the more we treat our emotions for what they really are: sacred teachers.
So in the example we had:
“It’s okay to feel angry. My mind wants to say “it feels horrible!” but that’s not my current reality. If I observe the physical feeling in my body as it is, it’s a pressing sensation in my chest area. In my current reality, my hands get warmer and there’s slight pressure in my forehead.”
Every physical sensation when observed will feel either neutral or even slightly pleasant. Just let it be until the feeling subsides.
(2) Use your tendency to judge as a reflection of your own self
This method requires a radical degree of emotional honesty with ourselves. This can feel uncomfortable.
People that trigger us are often reflecting projections of our own ego. In other words, we don’t like how they’ve acted because unconsciously, we act in the same way. How exactly that expresses itself in us is often different, but it’ll still be there in us if we’re open to looking.
“And why do you look at the splinter which is in your brother’s eye, but the beam in your eye you do not consider?” Matthew 7:3–5
Observe yourself judging them.
Ask: “what triggered me about what they did?”
Then introspect: “do I do that same thing, but in a different way?”
"I was wrong" can be the three words that unlock our God potential. They can deepen our relationships.
And so in the same example:
“He was so controlling when he said that! But are there parts of me that can be controlling? I guess at home, with my family, I can be controlling when it comes to deciding what we should shop for. I could let them decide more. This is an opportunity for me to learn and to love.”
Why love? Because judgement can be an opportunity to love. We react with: “you made me feel angry, but I still love you”.
And also: “it’s okay that I can be controlling. I’m working on it, but I still love and accept myself for who I am. Even the ugly parts.”
Conclusion
If we choose to use this, it’s important to remember to temper this with compassionately setting boundaries and embracing diversity of perspective.
Judgement can be a vehicle to spiritual enlightenment if it’s a tendency that we can see in ourselves that seems hard to shift for now. Eventually though, even that gets discarded.
