How To Be Judgmental

We can’t stop being judgmental and it is not a bad thing…

Judgment has always been necessary for our survival and improvement. Often, we have been constantly being told not to be judgmental towards others. What it meant to not be judgmental towards others simply means not to label others' actions as good and bad, holy or evil.

We Label Things For Efficiency

Unfortunately, to not label things & actions isn’t something that is natural to us. We label things using our judgment such that we can sort them into different categories of usefulness. Through sorting, we can easily access the required thing that is needed for our present circumstances. We also compare ourselves and our things to others to look for areas that can be improved upon using our judgment.

Negativity Can Be Triggered When We Judge

Sadly, this nature of ours can also bring us harm. When we judge someone for his/her actions or possessions and then compare it to ourselves, we can trigger negativity such as jealousy, envy, anger, etc. This flipped side of usefulness may be due to the carelessness as to how we use it.

Negativity can be stemmed from beliefs that create a sense of lack within us. In cases where one person is jealous of another is can be due to the jealous one feeling unworthy & insecure. Unworthy simply means not capable enough to achieve what the person of observation is able to, while, insecure can mean that the survival is being threatened so a fight or flight response may be triggered.

Negativity Comes From Feeling Threatened

Survival is threatened when something or someone is perceived to be going to take our livelihood or lives away. Therefore, when negativity appears within us, it may just be us perceiving that something is going to take something precious away from us even if it may not be the case.

For example; seeing someone else having things that we wanted and yet feeling that the person took it away causes us to treat the person as an enemy, which also means to feel envious or jealous of the person. We may feel that the person took that precious thing away from us because of believing that thing is supposed to be ours and we can’t find another due to its scarcity. However, often, it is not the case.

Just like one kid fighting with another over a toy and not noticing that there is a same toy right beside them, which the kid can take instead of fighting over the same one; the belief of scarcity may blind us from seeing the abundant that we may be able to access if we stop being fixated on the one we saw and start looking around.

Judgment Is Important And We Have To Use It Properly

If it is just our perception that is playing tricks on us, what we may need is just a change of a perspective on the matter that’s triggering our negativity when there is no need to. With the change of perspective, we can redirect our focus onto things that matter in the present circumstances instead of dwelling in the pain which hurts us rather than benefit us.

All in all, judgment is something that’s in our nature to keep us from harm and to improve our lives, however, if we misuse it, it will end up in the opposite purpose of its function. Just as any tools, it needs to be used properly to fulfill its purpose. Hence, being judgmental is necessary to ensure our survival in the world full of labels.