What Stops Me from Judging

It happens often.
That day, someone dismissed me outright. Arrogant, insistent, wanting it only their way. And I was left standing there—unseen, unheard, hot with anger.
I wanted to lash out. I held back.

In that moment I realised I would soon label him as ‘very arrogant’. Even when another time he would be peacefully sharing, I’d meet him with a hidden smirk in my heart that is shouting ‘yeah, you think you know it all !’. I would conveniently disregard everything else about him in every future interaction.

That would make dealing with him easier.

The Survival Map

Maybe labelling is just my survival map in this human jungle. So terming or labelling others is a good technique. Isn’t it?

Just like a monkey is swift and can take your banana, an elephant is heavy and can crush you, a cheetah is swift to attack and a lion’s roar is paralysing.

You have a human jungle to navigate: ‘he is arrogant’, ‘she is petty’, ‘someone is jealous’, ‘someone else offensive’.

All our future interactions then are governed by the label. Easy. No?

Then I read in a spiritual book that highlighted : 

Judgement must not be made thoughtlessly. Because judging others violates God’s authority. What is important is to spiritually discern by distinguishing while not drawing conclusions.

I didn’t get it. How far can empathy stretch? Are we to excuse the behaviour? And if we know something is wrong, surely one should call it out (even if silently in the heart) and not indulge in it.

It started a journey in a spirit of enquiry.

Then I realised identifying right from wrong is important, that is ‘discerning’ which is important. But judgement is not. After a brief Aha moment I again felt as if I was in the dark.

For many times I felt I was ‘just discerning’ but my heart did not feel at peace.
I asked myself: what is judgement? How do I know I have crossed the line from ‘discerning’ to ‘judging’.

The realisation came: judgement is active when you feel negativity towards the person.

So the natural question became how do I avoid that negativity when the behaviour is wrong, something I should not emulate, and something that, having been at the receiving end, I know is utterly unpleasant ?

It became critical to understand why not to judge, especially when I felt I was above the poor behaviour (wink) !

A Quiet Reframe

I waited. For Days. Silence held me.
In an emergent pause on a quiet morning, this truth, like a gentle butterfly, dawned on me.

Behavioural patterns don’t just appear. They are woven from old wounds. Childhood scars. Deeper echoes of the soul.  Roles from earlier lifetimes.

Someone arrogant and conceited—maybe they have lived lifetimes as a king: obeyed, indulged, worshipped. Their role demanded they order, be authoritative, show no vulnerability. 

Perhaps arrogance is not arrogance at all. It’s a costume stitched to the skin. 

A king who forgot to take off his crown !

So deeply stamped that they don’t even see it. 

Not yet. 

Until they awaken, God and karma are already at work on them, in ways you cannot know.

This reframe helped me

And the weight lifted. I no longer needed to check, correct, fight or judge. Their growth will unfold at its own pace.
What I can do is discern.

Discernment notices the act; judgement condemns the person.

Notice how their behaviour makes me feel. Refuse to pass that forward.

For all the days I felt unheard, unseen, bullied, humiliated, I try to see it all differently now. Apart from the deeper realisation that they were instruments of what I needed to experience. 

I try not to label. I discern, and I feel freer.