So much of life is spent trying to avoid negative judgments. Even if one refrains from judging, it’s still nearly impossible to be free from its influence. There are judgments connected to everything humans do, whether it’s related to schooling, movies, TV shows, books, paintings, live performance, day jobs, etc. A few moments of thought will quickly bring to mind the many other areas that are rife with judgment.
It’s incredibly hard to refrain from judging oneself by what others think when that’s how all of society is set up. Although this is easiest to see when it comes to negative judgments, it also applies to positive judgments. So many people are doing whatever they can in the hope of getting compliments, good grades, and other forms of praise from those around them. This attempt to change someone else’s behavior by praising them in some cases and condemning them in others is often called “carrot and stick.” As with most other behavioral change philosophies, it makes no effort to understand the emotions that are driving the behavior. Instead, it focuses solely on the behavior and uses reward and punishment in an effort to control others.
All this judging makes it easy to fall into reactive behavior, whether by falling in line to avoid judgment or going against the norm to intentionally upset someone else. It’s much better for everyone to be proactive by doing what is best in a timely manner, regardless of what anyone else thinks about it. To that end, I’d like to see the elimination of everything based on judging other humans, including things mentioned in previous paragraphs. It’s caused far too much harm to warrant continuing it. Even if it takes time to figure out a suitable replacement, it’s always better to stop doing something harmful than to continue doing it. Suppose, however, that some judgment of other humans is necessary. If that is the case, then it will become crystal clear once it has completely ceased; it can then be added back in the areas in which it appears crucial while being kept out of all other areas.
If judging continues, I would at the very least love to see everyone stop judging the humans themselves and focus instead on judging their behavior. Don’t ruin someone’s sense of self by saying they’re awful, especially when that someone is a kid whose sense of self is still developing. Identifying someone as their behavior instead of separating their sense of self from their behavior is the cause of all the self-esteem issues that manifest everywhere in the modern world. Those issues always begin early in life when someone close to a kid, especially an adult authority figure, forces a negative identity onto them and makes the kid continually judge themselves that way from then on (often for the rest of their life).
The most comfortable relationships I’ve ever had have been with those who refrain from judging me personally and also do little to no judging of what I did or how I felt. It’s hard to describe the peace I feel and the ease of interactions with those who do this. A handful of humans have been able to do this for me, and most animals do it automatically. My dog Sawyer always showed me love rather than judging me or making me feel bad about myself. Unfortunately, it seems that humans judging other humans is becoming increasingly more common. As long as the tendency is to react on negative emotions (anger, jealousy, envy, bitterness, etc.) and take out those emotions on someone else rather than noticing and releasing the emotions as they arise, judging will continue. If I can’t stop this from happening, I hope I can at least reduce its frequency by releasing the emotions that incline me to judge so that I can finally find peace with myself and others.