Non-Judgement

Each morning, I set an intention for the day. Sometimes I remember it, I put it on my To-Do map, but just setting the intention can make a difference, even when it never shows up in my mind the rest of the day. Joy, success, peace; simple intentions that I was recently told is a Buddhist practice for "Keeping in Mind" or "Mindfulness".

This morning my intention came to me early: non-judgment. And I realized that, as an intention, it is a negative statement. Non-judgment means I am trying to stop something, I am creating resistance to something in my mind or my life. When I resist, I give it more power.

And where did the judgment come from, anyway? It was a habit that was developed in my youth as a constant motivator. There was judgment for my grades and scholastic achievement and non-achievement; there was judgment in athletic endeavors; everything was graded. As we learn in The Four Agreements, after a while, we take over the judgment ourselves, and we become the Great Judge of everything we do.

I can see now judgment was used as a motivator to push me along to accomplish greater things. Would that it had worked that way. And now? I continue to judge myself because I fear that there will be no motivation to accomplish anything if I stop judging. The fear of judging myself is seen by my old self as a motivator for doing my To-Do list.

What happens when Judgment is no longer my motivator? What is the worse case scenario? I can see that a lot of activites would be shunned because they did not fulfill my purpose to become the best-version-of-myself. Conversely, if activities were fulfilling my core values, I would feel a sense of joy. If an activity did not fulfill my core values, it would not feel rewarding.

And what happens without judgment? What happens when I fall short? I can choose again. That's all. Just choose again, and turn back to those things that are leading me to my higher good.

A challenging idea, because now I have to have faith in my ability to discern what is contributing to my highest good. To have faith in the ability to see and hear and know what is giving me passion in my life. To have faith that I can live my life well without the fear of judgment.

This is a journey into uncharted territory. We sail at dawn.