Judging Other People

I am pretty judgmental.  I tend to look people over and make conclusions in my head.

It’s a useful trait.  When I’m interviewing people for job positions, I’m very good at picking the right people.  I take a quick look at the person and listen to absolutely nothing that comes out of their mouth.  I watch instead for their nuisances.  I look at how they’re dressed, how they carry themselves, how they sit, how they phrase their words, how they react to off-the-wall questions, how they laugh, and other things less tangible than what their words contain.  I’ve gotten into lots of arguments over hiring in my old jobs.  I simply didn’t like a lot of people others seemed to like.  And when their choices prevailed, I’m usually proven right.  I’ve stopped having arguments about hiring the last couple of years.  I still judged harshly and said my piece, but I’ve let people get their way.  The arguing’s not worth it since I don’t have the last say.

While judging works correctly in that kind of scenario, it doesn’t in some others.  When you get in the habit of judging this way, you tend to evolve into a closed person.  When you get used to making immediate judgment, you label people once and pigeonhole them that way.  You end up either idealizing someone or looking down at them.  And it stays the same way.

The bigger problem it presents is you end up judging yourself in the same manner.  You end up either idealizing your own worth or looking at down at yourself.  Often, when you engage in this mindset, it’s the latter.  And it hurts you in many different ways.

I’ve been working on holding this habit at bay.  Partly, because it makes me ostracize people who have flaws that I quickly jump on and harshly pick at.  Mainly, I want to keep it in check because I want to stop judging myself.
Like I said, people who judge others harshly tend to judge themselves even worse.

I haven’t been a complete success at it but I’m slowly getting better.

There are a few things I’ve been trying to do, none of them a full-proof solution….yet.

1. Suspend judgment.  Instead of judging someone and making up your mind about them, mentally tell yourself that you’ll give it a day before you decide.  The next day, say you’ll give it another day.  If it’s not working, suspend by the hour.

2. Think about something else.  Right now, my favorite alternate thought has been to imagine myself finding a million dollars, in a black Echolac shoulder bag right in front of me.  I’m sure this will make no sense to many people but I’ve previosuly written about this technique to remove negative thoughts and it works a bit hit or miss when it comes to suspending judgments.  Everytime I begin to think negatively of someone, I just imagine finding the money in the bag right in front of me wherever I am and my attention is usually shifted into the absurdity of the idea and the general imporabibility of it.  It’s pretty much using misdirection to quit a thought.

3.  Look for what’s good.  I’ve done this several months ago and while it’s healthier than looking for what’s bad, it just perpetuates the habit.  What I’ve noticed when judging positively is it uses the same processes as judging in a negative manner.  You just focus it differently.  It’s like a different side to the same coin.  What I feel like I want now is to remove the habit.  My mind is not made up about it, but I think there are better ways than this.

4.  Ignore.  I basically try to ignore any observations that play around in my head.  This is damn hard.  My original intention is just to allow whatever people brought to the table and make the best of it.  I think this is the right way but I’ve struggling with it thus far.

I’ll continue to test the stuff above and see how things unfold.  I really just want to be able to appreciate people but, like everything, it takes a fair amount of time to go from one habitual behavior to another.  Hopefully next time I write about it, I can talk about something I am certain of.  In the meantime, I’ll just keep working on it.

Wish me luck!

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