“It’s hard for people to think, that’s why they judge.” -Carl Jung
If there’s a single mindset that can work against you establishing a regular meditation practice- being overly judgmental is it.
When we judge we are essentially telling ourselves ‘Yep, I’m the oracle of knowledge on this. Full stop. All other theories be gone’. Although such self righteousness might leave us feeling empowered in the short term, the depth of life experience we allow ourselves to encounter is greatly diminished. We can judge things quite easily as humans. It’s how our brains are wired. Like an evolutionary hangover, somewhere in our mind the message: ‘Anything I don’t recognise immediately could be a great woolly mammoth!’ rings loud and true. So we jump to our own imaginary rescue. We promptly decide that X is X and Y is Y. No if’s but’s or maybe’s. The wooly mammoth has been identified… next problem please.
Be curious, it is the antidote for judgement.
Being forever curious is much like living your life the way a scientist explores the world. Scientists observe the world, developing theories that could explain their observations. Then they develop experiments designed to test these theories. Often, these theories are wrong. Great, this is the aim! If a theory is proven correct, nothing has been learned and the whole PURPOSE of the scientific method IS TO LEARN. This has nothing to do with proving you’re right. Think about it, suppose I say mixing the colours blue and red will make the colour purple. We run the experiment and it turns out I’m right. What now??
Scientists live with the endless possibility that future experiments could prove their current theories wrong. They hold their current theories very loosely. By adopting this mindset they are open to discover what they do not yet know or understand with the awareness that the next experiment (question) may prove everything they thought they understood to be completely wrong. How exciting!