Use Your Judgment

I’m currently reading Judgment Detox by Gabrielle Bernstein.  I haven’t finished it, and I would like to acknowledge that she may not be everyone’s “cup of tea,” but I am liking what I am reading.  She’s outlining a 6-step process (because we love to have practical steps, right?) to be judgment-free.  I am only on the second step, but it seems like she has some solid and psychologically sound information she is sharing.  The first step is to start noticing times you are judging.  Notice without judgment.  I am struck by how she encourages you to take that judgment and get curious about what’s behind that and where it comes from. Reading this got me to thinking about a phrase you might have heard: “You spot it, you got it.”  Sometimes these catchy little one-liners are fun and memorable for several reasons, but that doesn’t mean they don’t have strong, deep meaning as you reflect on it.  As you might guess, as you dig deeper on your judgments of others, it often comes back to your own stuff.  What we are judging in others is reflecting on parts of ourselves we avoid or try to deny having.  It usually boils down to shame…our own internal shame.  We have shame within ourselves and start pushing it on to others.  Think about it, when we are judging others, aren’t we basically saying, “you should be ashamed of yourself,” in one way or another.  I’m not going to lie, looking at your judgment can sting a bit.  If I spot it, I got it.  So, if I spot pettiness, I’ve got pettiness.  If I spot entitlement, I’ve got entitlement.  If I spot close mindedness….  You get the picture. Deep breaths.  The good news is that on the other side of spotting our judgment is a path to learning about ourselves and finding healing for our shame.  Another side note within the book, she talks about EFT (emotional freedom technique), also known as tapping.  I was trained in Clinical EFT about 5 years ago.  It can certainly be a good tool within the therapy space, as well as a self-help tool you can do by yourself.  I was happy to be reminded of this powerful tool and hope to revisit it more for myself and maybe some clients.  I may write more about this in future blogs.  I do want to do the “Judgment Detox” for myself, so what I learn may also show up in future posts.