Beyond Judgement: Discovering the Path to Inner Peace
Mar 27, 2024
Kishar Spiritual (with John Lawyer)
Discover the transformative power of living without judgment in "Beyond Judgement: Discovering the Path to Inner Peace." This episode looks at how releasing judgmental attitudes can lead us to profound inner peace and freedom.
We'll show you what it means to live a life unburdened by judgment. From the roots of judgment anchored in insecurity and fear, to the societal influences that shape our perceptions, we uncover how these factors contribute to the cycle of judgment that distances us from our true selves and others.
Through personal anecdotes, psychological insights, and spiritual wisdom, we reveal the steps to recognizing and overcoming judgmental thoughts, fostering empathy, and embracing a mindset of compassion and understanding. This video is not just a guide; it's an invitation to transform your life by shedding the layers of judgment and opening the door to a world of peace, acceptance, and unconditional love.
For more enriching content and to join a community dedicated to spiritual growth and understanding, visit us at https://Kishar.org.
Discover the transformative power of living without judgment in "Beyond Judgement: Discovering the Path to Inner Peace." This episode looks at how releasing judgmental attitudes can lead us to profound inner peace and freedom.
We'll show you what it means to live a life unburdened by judgment. From the roots of judgment anchored in insecurity and fear, to the societal influences that shape our perceptions, we uncover how these factors contribute to the cycle of judgment that distances us from our true selves and others.
Through personal anecdotes, psychological insights, and spiritual wisdom, we reveal the steps to recognizing and overcoming judgmental thoughts, fostering empathy, and embracing a mindset of compassion and understanding. This video is not just a guide; it's an invitation to transform your life by shedding the layers of judgment and opening the door to a world of peace, acceptance, and unconditional love.
For more enriching content and to join a community dedicated to spiritual growth and understanding, visit us at https://Kishar.org.
Imagine moving through life like water. Your fluid, your accepting, your undisturbed by rocks in your path. This is the essence of living without judgment. And today, we're going to go on a journey to discover how shedding the layers of judgment that you've built around yourself and others can completely transform your life. Join me as we explore the roots of judgment and understand its impact. And we learn how to embrace life that has peace and acceptance and freedom. Welcome to a world where you're no longer weighed down by these unseen chains of judgment. I used to live in judgment. I consider myself this kind person. And I thought that I, you know, really put that out in the world. And I was kind of people and I think that I did live that. But it wasn't completely real because I was still sitting in judgment of myself and I was judging all these other people. And it wasn't super intentional. It's just something that happened and after I had my spiritual moment of understanding a couple of years ago, I understood that I was judging too much and I started to practice this idea of non judgment because judgment didn't make any sense to me anymore. And the essence of how destructive it was really came forward to me. And so let's look at understanding what judgment is. Judgment is in a psychological and social context. The evaluation of people, circumstances and things where we form an opinion or conclusion about them. And I guess for the conversation we're going to have today, we need to differentiate between judgment and observation. Let's call judgment kind of this more negative thing, whereas observation is we look at something and we make a decision and we say, this is useful. I need to to pass observation on this so that I am able to function better in life. But judgment is when you take some some external factors or internal factors and you pass judgment on something and it's not of any use to you, it's not serving any purpose for you. And so let's explore the roots of judgment. It's going to be insecurity is one of the main things that's going to lead you to judge. It's going to give you this deep seated feeling of inadequacy and of not being good enough. And that's a fertile ground for the seeds of judgment to take root when you feel insecure, your natural defense mechanisms are going to they're going to kick in. You're going to judge yourself and others as a way to protect your ego and maintain this sense of self-control. And this momentarily shielded you from vulnerabilities, but then it also traps you in this cycle of negative self-evaluation, where you have this critical assessment of yourself and those around you. recognizing this pattern is the first step towards breaking free from those chains of judgment and moving toward a more accepting, secure relationship with yourself and the world around you. And then we'll move on to fear. Fears is powerful undercurrent that often draws us towards the machinery of judgment. It operates from the shadows of our mind, in our psyche, and it influences how we perceive and interact with everything around us. at its core, fear of the unknown, fear of rejection and fear of inadequacy prompt us to really hastily categorize people in situations. And these really simplistic ways and I dualistic ways. Okay, it's good or bad, it's safer, dangerous. It's really simple. But that limits our capacity for empathy and understanding. And then we judge these people and these situations through this lens of fear, and that alienates them to us. And also we rob ourselves of the opportunity to connect with these people in a deeper and more meaningful way. And so beyond fear, we have these learned behaviors and societal influences that shape our process of judgment. So from when we're really little, we're taught both directly and indirectly, that we have a certain way that we need to perceive and evaluate the world around us. That's judgment. And these lessons come from our our families, schools, media, our friends and our community. And this ingrained us with certain biases and expectations within us. And this conditioning leads us to adopt judgmental attitudes that align with these prevailing attitudes of our communities or our society at large. And oftentimes you have these preconceived notions to judge, and you may not even know it because you've you've just been around it your whole life. And there's even evolutionary biases that are built into kind of our central operating system that cause us to judge Some of that's observational. It's important for us to stay safe and be protected. And our mind and ego are trying to do that. But a lot of it is causing judgment. It's not necessary. And these societal standards I'm talking about go into what's what's success or what's beauty, what's good behavior or morality. And that influences how you judge yourself and how you judge others. And so how do you break free from these patterns of judgment that society kind of puts on you? It takes conscious effort to really question and challenge these narratives that you've been given. And I think if you recognize the origins of some of your judgment, then you can begin to see beyond them. And that really opens yourself up to a more inclusive understanding and compassionate point of view, and you'll interact with the world in a much more constructive way. And judgment can serve as this defense mechanism that theoretically protects you and serves you. But in actuality, it's leading you to be disconnected because it sows distrust and separation between you and other people, even between you and yourself. And this is where that mind and ego I was talking about come into play when when you leave the mind ego unchecked, there'll be a disservice to you because the mind and ego are beautiful things. They are super helpful. They've kept us alive for thousands of years. They make sure we're safe. They make sure that that we're protecting ourselves. But they overperform tremendously overperformed, especially in today's society, where we have a lot of our basic needs that are met every day. So our mind and ego are still trying to keep you alive, working really hard at this. And if you just let them do that, then, then you're always going to have these racing thoughts. You're always going to be trending negative because the mind and ego trend negative because they're looking out for you. But like I said, they're overperforming. So if you could kind of visualize that, you can visualize what the mind and the ego are doing as far as having you pass judgment on yourself and pass judgment on others. Before we move on, please subscribe by hitting the watermark in the lower right hand corner. And if you think any friends or family could benefit from this, please pass it on. In order to overcome judgment, we have to be able to recognize it. So how can you teach yourself to recognize that you're in a cycle of judgment? You got to look for signs, be aware of your internal dialog. Are you having these critical or negative thoughts that lead to judgment of yourself or others? And so think about these thoughts that come into your mind about yourself. Are you criticizing yourself? Are you being negative about yourself? And think about that with other people. When someone walks into a room, walks into your office, you run into them in the subway or whatever, what do you think about them? Are you are you thinking negative thoughts? Are you thinking critical thoughts? Are you being judgmental? Be aware of this as you're moving through the world each day, Take a day and as you're going through this whole day, think to yourself and maybe even write it down or take notes on your phone about each time that you judge yourself and each time you judge someone else and tally that up through a whole day and do that maybe for two or three days, I think you'll be amazed at how often you're passing judgment on yourself, how often you're passing judgment on other people. And that can be something that's through that really is going to open your eyes about how detrimental this is to your emotional, spiritual, even physical health. There's also our emotional cues. Are you having feelings of superiority? Are you feeling inferior? Are you defensive around a person or an issue? So there's emotional things that are happening that can lead to this judgmental process and these cycles of judgment that you put yourself in. And there's behavioral indicators. It's it could be gossiping, it could be, you know, excluding people from situations or excluding yourself from situations or giving overly critical feedback to people or you know, really critical feedback to yourself. one of the best ways you can look at this is that we often judge ourselves by our intentions and then we judge others by their actions. And that's a really important statement. So I'm going to say it again. We judge ourselves by our intentions and others, by their actions. And this really reflects a cognitive bias that it's actually called the fundamental attribution error, where people tend to attribute their own actions to these situational factors while at the same time attributing others actions to their character or their overall disposition. So basically what that means is when you're evaluating your own behavior, you're more likely to consider the context or the intentions behind it. So you look for mitigating factors. well, I, I did this, but there was a reason because I did it. I did it because of X, Y, and Z. But when you see the other person in your observing them, you don't look at those mitigating factors that causes them to do X, Y, or Z or that x, Y, and Z caused them to do that behavior. And so you're just judging them solely based on what you see them doing. And if you take a step back, you probably realize that you do this. I know I do this. I think it's natural. And so take another further step back and say, how how can I reflect on this and then realize that this this bias is happening, that I'm I'm judging others totally different than I'm judging myself. that's really going to help you move forward and and you'll probably have much healthier relationships in the world. You're going to have a healthier, healthier relationship with yourself as well. Wayne Dyer said. When you judge another, you don't define them. You define yourself. So when you're out there judging, that's all about you. It's not about them. And I think we know that if we look at it, if we kind of, you know, dissect it and pick it apart, but just reflect on that a little bit when you're judging others, you don't define them. You define yourself. So next, we'll look at the impact of judgment. Dietrich Bonhoeffer said judging others makes us blind, whereas love is illuminating. And that's pretty deep. Judgment destroys relationships. it closes us off and eliminates our understanding and empathy towards others in ourselves. And if we're living in judgment, we're in darkness. You know, joy and light aren't going to find us when we're living in judgment. It pulls us to the dark side of the universe. Judgment is this negative thing, and so is the universe, is balance. And you're kind of in between the light, in the dark, walking that middle path, you know, we get to choose where we put our attention. It's a choice. Every every day we get. We've got choices. And so are you choosing to put your focus and energy towards the light or are you letting your focused energy drift towards the darkness and realize you're making that choice every day? Think about that and think about these things. As far as the impact this judgment is having on you living in judgment, it's pulling you towards darkness, it's pushing you away from the light. It's turning your gaze to to a very dark place. But all is not lost because we can move towards non judgment. You can move towards non judgment. Walt Whitman said, Be curious, not judgmental. So look at it like that. Instead of being judgmental about yourself or others, think, okay, well let's have curiosity, let's ask questions, let's let's embrace this and embrace self-compassion and, treat yourself with kindness, self-love, deep, complete self-love of yourself leads to complete non judgment. Because when you're loving yourself, you can't judge yourself. And if you love yourself completely, you're going to judge other people way less. And when you're looking at other people, can you take that self-love and turn it into loving kindness that is this empathy and understanding where you're trying to understand what other people are going through and what's behind their actions, what's behind their situation, what's their story, Maybe talk to them, maybe ask them. I think communication is this great thing that can really break down this concept of judgment. We can move beyond it and just being less reactionary if you're constantly reacting to things without thinking about it first, with that being kind of aware and intentional about what your next step is, then you're being controlled by by external factors. You're being control controlled by maybe your internal monologue or your mind or your ego. And so how can you be less reactionary when something happens that's going to help you not judge as much? And mindfulness practices can help you move away from judgment and live this non-judgmental existence. If you're mindful about things, you're observing the world as it's happening. You're not tied to the past. You're not worried about the future. You're living here in the present moment and you're mindful about the things that are happening around you, and that's going to bring you more peace. It's going to make you more calm and it's going to make you way less prone to have that reactionary judgment. And then you can also reframe your thoughts, learn to identify, be judgmental thoughts. Like I said earlier, maybe you did that exercise where you wrote down, where you judged yourself and others for a day or so. Maybe one, two, three days. Right? So now take it a step further. Now, when you have a judgmental thought, identify that don't have to write it down, but think, what am I going to replace that with? Question The question where it's coming from, what's the origin of it? Ask yourself why you're having these thoughts and then consider an alternative perspective. And then can you reframe them that perspective with compassion and grace? Can you focus on positive traits in yourself and others? And then you repeat that process and you reinforce it. It's habit, it's a routine, and then you can move into intentional self-reflection about where judgment is coming from. You can journal about it. You can even have a conversation with yourself about it, and maybe you can talk to someone else about it. Because sometimes it's important to talk to others and get their perspective on things, and that will help you learn about yourself. So how do you hold yourself accountable in this process? Informed this new habit. And so now we're going to move into living in nonjudgmental. We've talked about kind of how to get there. So now let's live it. Let's embody this process, Deepak Chopra said, non-judgmental, quiets the internal dialog. And this opens once again the doorway to creativity. So non-judgmental, Open this door. Right? A creativity. That's kind of a beautiful thing. Creativity is kind of this universal oneness. You know, creativity comes from this divine, universal thing inside of us that connects us to everything. I think that's probably art and creativity. That's my opinion. So when we're when we're living in nonjudgmental, we open ourselves up to the universe and you can set your intention each day to be less judgmental. So when you start your day out, can you think to yourself, I'm going to live in non-judgment today, I'm going to be kind to myself, I'm going to have grace for myself. I'm going to have grace for other people and be kind to other people. You can practice gratitude and shift your focus from criticism to appreciation. Gratitude is this amazing thing is so, so many problems. If we can wake up each day and we can think about what we're grateful for, then suddenly it changes the whole dynamic of our outlook on life. And when you have this negative space and you feel it, and then you decide to change that negative space and fill it up with this positive perspective, amazing things happen. So how do you how do you personally shift that mindset, that perspective into one of gratitude as that's completely going to free you from judgment and you can engage with the community or a group and participate in activities, Is that foster acceptance and diversity? You know, this channel is sponsored by a spiritual community called Kishar, and we have conversations just like this all the time. We help each other out. It's a nonprofit, inclusive place where people cannot be judged and we can explore our own spiritual journey that's uniquely ours and empowered within ourselves. And so if you're interested in that, head over to Kishar.org and check us out. But the journey of transitioning from judgment to non judgment is this continuous process that's going to require patience and persistence on your part. And this completely opens you up spiritually when you really start to get into this practice of non judgment, you're giving yourself time and space to be more spiritual. You're going to be more grounded, you're going to be more centered because practicing non judgment is going to help you have far greater alignment of mind, body and soul. And when that mind, body and soul is in line, you're you're going to have this great foundation that you can walk on down your spiritual path as you as you take this journey for yourself. And so it's this truly amazing thing. And like I said, there's great peace in non judgment and and there's so much weight that you will free yourself from when you think about moving through life every day. And if you're embodying non judgment, if you're trying to live non judgment and don't be wrong guys, sometimes we're going to judge it's okay. This is just about working towards something where you're judging way less and getting that as close to zero as possible. But if if you're living every day in non judgment, that's your that your mindset and perspective, you're going to be so free because we're carrying all this weight around, because we're judging ourself, because we're judging others. And I can tell you from personal experience that that walking around in non judgment has been this amazing thing that has freed me so much. There's all these aspects of letting go. You know, there's forgiveness, there's non judgment, there's all this other stuff. But, you know, today we're talking about non judgment and it's just part of this process of letting go and not letting go in a bad way. It's just letting go in this good way and this this way of being more open to the universe. Do you judge yourself and others as you move throughout your day? I'm interested in what you guys think about judgment. How do you feel about it and how do you think you'd feel if you started practicing non judgment? And where do you think that could take you? And if you're already working in living in this kind of non judgment way, how's that working out for you? What what does work for you? What practices reinforce non judgment? What does it what does that feel like? I really am interested in what you guys had to say about this and I will absolutely respond if you guys hit me up in the comments Please like this video. If you want us to keep making content just like this and until next time, I wish you peace on your journey.