Everywhere you look people are making choices. People are taking action, taking sides, digging into their perspectives. When I see the one-sidedness and separation that are widely accepted as valid opinions I want to disagree, I want to explain myself, I want to change minds. Then I remember that it is, in fact, that very desire which creates separation and entrenches ideologies.
Everywhere you look people are making choices. But they don’t need your judgment. They need your love.
Have you ever wished you could read minds? It seems like an incredible super power. There are some obvious perks: you’d do very well on game shows that ask trivia questions, and you’d know what the silent teenager across from you at the dinner table was actually thinking. But the gilded idea of mind reading would very quickly become exposed as a major disappointment.
Our minds operate according to the same structure, with different content for each person. The mind uses the content of your life to fuel its never-ending cycle of thought after thought. It also efficiently uses those thoughts to build up momentum for its continued operation.
Even though it seems logical to base your thoughts about another person on the thoughts they have or share with you, in reality they are a human being who also happens to contain the same thought-creating machine you do, and more often than not that machine is running on autopilot. Mind reading would only end up telling you what content that person’s mind uses to fuel its incessant thinking, and not who that person truly is.
Can you tell which thoughts you consciously choose to entertain versus those that randomly fire of their own accord?
If I am honest and aware, I can tell that the majority of my thoughts are produced by a mind on autopilot with no actual prompting decision to engage in thinking. I don’t consider this a failure, rather it is liberating!
When you can watch your thoughts and notice which ones were on purpose, and which ones were involuntary, you can choose to not take the autopilot thinking too seriously. The more you notice involuntary thinking, the more you are able to choose thoughts that are of some purpose for you instead. Thoughts of worry, fear, judgment, complaints, and attachment are then seen for what they really are; firmly established patterns of the mind that fuel its autopilot mode of thinking. They are nothing to take too seriously in yourself, or in others. Now the mind is no longer using you, you are using the mind.
This morning I listened to Deepak Chopra’s The Seven Spiritual Laws of Success as I was getting ready for work. Chopra talks about accessing the field of potentiality, the space in which your highest dreams have the opportunity to manifest, and how to access this space. One of the prescriptions he gives is to go the day without judgement. Along with other tools, such as meditation, going without judgement creates space for the highest potential of any moment to arise.
I made the decision as if it was easy, “Sure I can go the day without judgement!” Which within ten minutes turned into me becoming aware of how often I was judging the world around me. I first noticed it standing at the bus stop. I saw a guy park his car “way too far” from the curb, and as I was thinking this thought, I realized I was already judging! In conversations with friends and coworkers, I began to notice how often I voiced my opinion.
I wasn’t just noticing negative judgement, I also noticed that I judged things all the time in a positive manner. I would see a tree and think, “What a beautiful tree!” I would look up at the sky and think, “Such interesting clouds today.” Negative or positive, I found that I was constantly in judgement.
This experiment was anything but a failure, it truly helped me see how often I was judging the world around me instead of perceiving it as it really was. Tomorrow I’m going to try again and see what happens. I invite you to join me in going one day without judgement, just to see what it’s like! Let me know how it goes, I’d love to hear your story!
Let Yourself Learn 