I want to talk about our judgement for a minute, specifically the habit of judgement.  Given the context of our conversation yesterday regarding POV(point of view), I think it’s important to learn how to discern when our opinions are needed.  We will find that in most situations regarding other people and their choices, our opinion isn’t needed.  Corey Talbott shared a story of a mother coming up to her and saying she was a bad mom because of some slight this woman perceived in the actions between the kids.  I have often been told that our perception is realty and that has always pissed me off.  Not that I’m innocent in making clean observations all the time (and I’m certainly guilty of rash decisions—I’m human) but I have always hated the fact that we made allowances for people’s idea of what happened to take precedence over what actually happened.  Many mistakes and poor decisions have been made prior to understanding the facts of the situation.

The reality is there is no purpose in judgement.  Even if we think it has to do with some moral or religious context, those are debts to settle when the time comes for that person—they aren’t for us to call in and they aren’t for us to keep someone on track and hold them to our standards.  This society puts so much pressure on hierarchy and proof of power that we lose sight of what power actually is, the communion with life through use of our gifts and fulfilling our purpose.  Power is living in joy and love and peace and understanding that this time is ever so fleeting and we need to reprioritize what matters to us.  No one else is on the same trajectory of our lives so we don’t need their opinion and they certainly don’t need ours.  I don’t profess to ignore blatantly bad behavior and total anarchy—I’m not talking anything egregious.  I’m talking about the day to day living we do that we all do a little differently.  There is no one right way over another—we do what is best for us.

So if we are going to judge, judge ourselves by where we are today.  Did we do better than yesterday?  Have we knocked anything off of our to do list?  Have we worked toward our goals?  Have we helped someone today?  Have we practiced gratitude today?  Have we told those most important to us that we love them today?  Are we a little bit better than where we were yesterday?  Then that is all that matters.  No one holds the measuring stick in our lives and we need to stop pretending they do.  If we feel judged, we need to realize that hurt people hurt people and it is a fleeting moment—and being judged by a moment serves nothing.  We certainly wouldn’t want someone to judge us at our worst—or perhaps not even at our best.  Life isn’t a series of extremes—we are allowed to be middle ground.  We are allowed to be happy and content with what we have just as we are allowed to go after more.  The point is, what we do with our lives is our responsibility and no one else’s.  No one else pays the bills in my life nor do they in yours.  So why let them decide what we do? Our judgement pertains to what we do with our lives, not with what other people think we should do with them.  Shed the weight of their POV and use our own sight to find the way—it’s much clearer.