The following are the excerpts from the speech I made at the RBS Toastmasters meet yesterday.
Sharing it with you all:
I am going to talk about Judging. It’s a topic I have been reflecting about a lot lately.
Now Let’s face it. We all do it. We judge.
We are all different in mindset and upbringing. We judge and are being judged. It’s a vicious circle which creates negativity and discomfort.
Someone cuts me off in traffic? I mumble, "What an idiot!" I see someone wearing something odd? I think, "She needs a makeover!"
We like to label others. We don’t like “undefined” people. We extrapolate based on our interactions and observations.
Judging makes us feel safe and comfortable because we have “defined” a person and because we have that definition, we know how to act accordingly. We move on to the next person and do the same until our entire social circle is defined. It helps give us a sense of control and safety. But judging perpetuates stereotypes, which is not a good phenomenon.
We often tend to project our own values and beliefs on others and if others fall in line with what we believe, we judge them as “good” and the rest as “bad”.
Judging is something which we do without thinking. It has become a habit. When you talk about someone else, most people will gladly join in. There is a bonding that comes with judgment. But consider that this bonding is based on false pretensions and would be short lived.
Despite our best efforts to judge, we all know deep down inside we can’t really judge another person.
And why is that?
Because Who are we to judge?
Seriously!
And then there is another reason not to judge.
That is: We don’t know the whole story.
It’s foolish to assume we know everything there is to know about a person without knowing their story. Few observations, interactions, actions become the basis for our judgments.
A person I consider stingy, he might be saving for a good cause. I person I consider rude, he might have had a tough life which might have hardened him.
You may see a woman with rumpled and stained clothes coming to office and may remark how clumsy she is. But she may be a working Mom like me who has just come to office after feeding porridge to her child, remains of which are still visible on her dress. She had no time to smother her dress because she was doing a last minute nappy change.
As Henry David Throreau said It's not what you look at that matters. It's what you see.
Its very easy to state someone wrong. But its another thing to step into that persons shoes and see what he or she is going through.
Everyone has a story. And we may not know about it.
So how do we free yourself from this natural urge to judge?
We must consider a few points :
Firstly, Nobody has the ABSOLUTE right to judge.
And second, that everybody as a story.
Instead of judging, just accept. Acceptance is the key.
If we are into judging others, it is very easy to judge ourselves and there’s way too much stress in that. For example, If you judge what other people wear, you would be extremely concerned with you wear. You would do this less if you didn't judge others so harshly.
If we accept and understand others, it’s so much easier to accept and understand yourself.
Once we become more comfortable with who we are, we judge others less.
We become less influenced by the judgment of others because we realize that nobody has the right to judge another and even though people still judge us – they don’t know the whole story so their judgments lie on faulty foundations.
The “social weight” of fearing how others will judge you evaporates. You feel FREE.
You can be yourselves.
Let me tell you about an instance which happened while I was at Miami, I once visited a new friend’s house and everyone in the family was shorter than me. Since I’m the shortest person in my family, I never felt too tall.
When my friend’s mother met me at the door and said with a slightly disappointed tone, “Oh, you are so tall,” it didn’t affect me. I was aware that she had some discomfort with my height, but I didn’t take it personally.It was because I was comfortable with my height.
When we stop judging, Opportunities come knocking down your door.
I have realized that people are one of the greatest gateways to opportunities and when we ACCEPT another person, we open a door instead of closing it by judging. In this process, we get a lot of goodwill indirectly, which can translate into opportunity.
So, set yourselves free. Accept not Judge.
Sharing it with you all:
I am going to talk about Judging. It’s a topic I have been reflecting about a lot lately.
Now Let’s face it. We all do it. We judge.
We are all different in mindset and upbringing. We judge and are being judged. It’s a vicious circle which creates negativity and discomfort.
Someone cuts me off in traffic? I mumble, "What an idiot!" I see someone wearing something odd? I think, "She needs a makeover!"
We like to label others. We don’t like “undefined” people. We extrapolate based on our interactions and observations.
Judging makes us feel safe and comfortable because we have “defined” a person and because we have that definition, we know how to act accordingly. We move on to the next person and do the same until our entire social circle is defined. It helps give us a sense of control and safety. But judging perpetuates stereotypes, which is not a good phenomenon.
We often tend to project our own values and beliefs on others and if others fall in line with what we believe, we judge them as “good” and the rest as “bad”.
Judging is something which we do without thinking. It has become a habit. When you talk about someone else, most people will gladly join in. There is a bonding that comes with judgment. But consider that this bonding is based on false pretensions and would be short lived.
Despite our best efforts to judge, we all know deep down inside we can’t really judge another person.
And why is that?
Because Who are we to judge?
Seriously!
And then there is another reason not to judge.
That is: We don’t know the whole story.
It’s foolish to assume we know everything there is to know about a person without knowing their story. Few observations, interactions, actions become the basis for our judgments.
A person I consider stingy, he might be saving for a good cause. I person I consider rude, he might have had a tough life which might have hardened him.
You may see a woman with rumpled and stained clothes coming to office and may remark how clumsy she is. But she may be a working Mom like me who has just come to office after feeding porridge to her child, remains of which are still visible on her dress. She had no time to smother her dress because she was doing a last minute nappy change.
As Henry David Throreau said It's not what you look at that matters. It's what you see.
Its very easy to state someone wrong. But its another thing to step into that persons shoes and see what he or she is going through.
Everyone has a story. And we may not know about it.
So how do we free yourself from this natural urge to judge?
We must consider a few points :
Firstly, Nobody has the ABSOLUTE right to judge.
And second, that everybody as a story.
Instead of judging, just accept. Acceptance is the key.
If we are into judging others, it is very easy to judge ourselves and there’s way too much stress in that. For example, If you judge what other people wear, you would be extremely concerned with you wear. You would do this less if you didn't judge others so harshly.
If we accept and understand others, it’s so much easier to accept and understand yourself.
Once we become more comfortable with who we are, we judge others less.
We become less influenced by the judgment of others because we realize that nobody has the right to judge another and even though people still judge us – they don’t know the whole story so their judgments lie on faulty foundations.
The “social weight” of fearing how others will judge you evaporates. You feel FREE.
You can be yourselves.
Let me tell you about an instance which happened while I was at Miami, I once visited a new friend’s house and everyone in the family was shorter than me. Since I’m the shortest person in my family, I never felt too tall.
When my friend’s mother met me at the door and said with a slightly disappointed tone, “Oh, you are so tall,” it didn’t affect me. I was aware that she had some discomfort with my height, but I didn’t take it personally.It was because I was comfortable with my height.
When we stop judging, Opportunities come knocking down your door.
I have realized that people are one of the greatest gateways to opportunities and when we ACCEPT another person, we open a door instead of closing it by judging. In this process, we get a lot of goodwill indirectly, which can translate into opportunity.
So, set yourselves free. Accept not Judge.
