The capacity to evaluate and discern is an essential human trait. It helps us act consciously, make decisions and it ensures our security.
It is useful to remember however, that when it comes to evaluating other people, our conclusions are often affected by our own fears and preconceptions. Additionally, our judgments are frequently inaccurate. Constant lateness can seem like evidence that a person is uncommitted, and failure to reply to our emails can be seen as a sign of disinterest – neither of which may be true.
Behind our own tendency to criticise or ‘put people in boxes’, we often find our own insecurity, and a need to set ourselves apart from the very thing that we fear. Traits we hope we don’t possess can trigger judgment when we (think we) see them in others, because doing so distances us from those same traits.
And we seldom know what roads people have travelled before our paths cross. If we are quick to pass judgement on them, it prevents us from truly seeing that they, just like us, are human beings. Furthermore, we prevent ourselves from truly coming into relationship with them, and for trust and co-creation to flourish.
When we can learn to tolerate, rather than judge, it can take our relationships to a whole new level.
Some steps to bring more tolerance into your interactions:
1. Acknowledge that you are thinking or behaving judgmentally
2. Ask yourself where this need to judge comes from – what do you fear so much within yourself that you wish to deny its existence?
3. Come back to your ‘I AM’ by acknowledging and accepting your own imperfections. Giving words to those thoughts and feelings can help.
4. From your ‘I AM’ see the other through more compassionate and appreciative eyes.
Finding the gifts that others undoubtedly bring, can bring more light and creativity into both of your lives and to the world as a whole.
Now, consider how you could begin to introduce that into your life and work now. Could that, paradoxically, be the tipping point that accelerates you toward your goal?
