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We judge ourselves by what
we feel capable of doing, while others judge us by what we have already done.
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
 Judgmentalness is a conclusion that something
does or does not exhibit characteristics which we believe that it should
exhibit. We are comparing something to an ideal, and to our personal values.
This conclusion is not merely a mental conclusion, it also contains other
factors such as emotions of anger and resentment, or elation and praise. It is
an attitude toward a behavior design, not a person. The person is merely
enacting that behavior.
The positive aspects of judgmentalness.
 | Judgmentalness is our attempt to discern what is beneficial to us. We
can discern that a criminal is a danger to the society in which we live.
Judgmentalness can also be a positive evaluation. We can judge a person's behavior
to be beneficial, however, judgmentalness goes beyond the mere
discernment. |
| Judgmentalness is our attempt to affirm our values and our standards of
morality. When we judge a person's behavior to be wrong, we are asserting
that a different behavior would be right.. |
| Positive judgmentalness is our attempt to affirm a person. We are judging
people when we applaud a performer, or when we congratulate someone, or when we
say, "I approve." In those acts, we are implying that those people
comply with our values, and that they have earned our respect. |
| Judgmentalness is our attempt to assert that people are responsible for their
actions. |
The negative aspects of judgmentalness.
| It distracts our attention from the reality of the situation. Instead
of perceiving things as they are, we are dwelling on our ideas of how the
situation should be. |
| It distracts our attention from the reality of ourselves. In order to
judge other people, we must repress our awareness that we are capable of
performing similar acts. When we judge, we are always hypocrites. |
| It distracts our attention from the current moment. The unresolved energy
of our judgmental thoughts, images, energy tones, and actions draw our attention
to them such that we are not attending to the present situation. |
| We are limiting our range of expression. When we implant judgmental
thoughts, images, energy tones, and habits in the field of a design, our
main intent is not to affect the person. Our main intent is to make that
design situation so unpleasant for us that we will not want to enter it. We
are preemptively punishing ourselves because our self righteous self image
would be damaged if we engaged that design situation or if we performed a
similar act. Life will require us to enter that design situation at some
future time, regardless of the self inflicted pain. Indeed, we must enter
that design situation for various reasons:
 | We need to discharge the energy of the judgmental thoughts, images,
energy tones, and habits that we have implanted into that design. That
charge is the very force that creates the design situation in our life.
The punishment for judgmentalness is that we have to do whatever we
judged someone else for doing. If we judge someone for being dishonest,
we will soon find ourselves doing something dishonest. Indeed, we become
that which we hate. |
| We need to understand that design is an aspect of life. Our
judgmentalness is proof that we do not yet have that understanding. Only
by entering that design situation, and experiencing the life which is
there, can we learn about that design as a part of life. We can have
damned the Aggressor design. When life rightly requires us to be an
aggressor perhaps in defense of our family or country, we need to enact
our Aggressor design, but our ability to employ it is crippled by the
damning elements that linger in that design. |
| We face the following possibilities:
 | We do not act. We are unwilling to enact the design because
we associate it with unpleasant qualities and therefore we fail to
obey intuition's guidance. To block the impulse from intuition, we
generate additional judgmental elements such as thoughts, or images
that cause even more of an energy blockage, rendering us less able
to respond appropriately to intuition when we confront this design
again. |
| We act. However, our actions are inaccurate and ineffective
because we are distracted by our need to simultaneously discharge
the field's lingering energies that we implanted during our period
of judgmentalness. We are divided by guilt because we are violating
the judgmental values that are registered in that field. |
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| Judgmentalness does not feel good emotionally. Even though we can
enjoy the emotional excitement, and the adrenaline, and other aspects of the
experiences, we generally prefer to be in a state of happiness and love.
Judgmentalness changes pain into suffering. Pain is merely an experience of
discomfort, but suffering is the additional emotional distress that we
experience when we decide that this pain should not be occurring. |
| Judgmentalness can lead to complacency. |
| Judgmentalness is not productive. |
Techniques for dealing with judgmentalness.
| Design-work. We generate the energy tones such as calmness and
peacefulness.
| Affirmation. "I accept whatever I perceive." "People
are doing the best they can do in every moment." "I forgive myself
and other people" |
| Directed imagination. |
| Modeling We act as if we are non-judgmental. |
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| Intuition. Intuition can tell us how to respond to situations in which we
would tend to be judgmental. Our response includes particular thoughts, images,
energy tones, and actions. |
| We differentiate between judgmentalness and similar states. We can still
like or dislike. We can still discern. We can still reject something as
"not right for me," or "not appropriate for me". |
| We can practice acceptance. We accept the reality of the world as it is.
Of course, we can still like or dislike particular things in the world, and we
can still work to change the things that we dislike. We accept ourselves when we
realize that we are being judgmental. |
| We avoid perfectionism. Judgmentalness is based on our assessment that a
person or situation is not perfect. |
| We avoid projection. When we are judgmental, we are usually projecting
our own faults. |
| We can do potential-work. |
| We explore humility. In any situation, we allow ourselves to respond with
thoughts, images, energy tones, and actions but we realize that our response is
merely a personal reaction. When ever we label a behavior as right or wrong we
are being judgmental. |
| We can explore forgiveness. In judgmentalness, there is a lack of
forgiveness. |
| We question our use of judgmental words. Depending upon the context,
those words can include should, ought, must, damn, if only, I wish, I
disapprove. We observe the occasions when we are exhibiting the various types of
judgmentalness such as complaining, criticizing, gossiping, or cursing. |
| We accept responsibility for the judgmentalness. Regardless of whatever
we are judging, we are responsible for our reaction of thoughts, images, energy
tones, and actions. The judged thing is not forcing us to respond in any
particular manner. |
Great Spirit, help me
never to judge another until I have walked in his moccasins.
Sioux Indian Prayer
Next topic: Forgiveness |
