The other day I found myself in a conversation with someone I’ve known a long time. We slipped into familiar territory, talking about people we both know. Eventually, we landed on someone in particular and began (not for the first time), commenting on how judgmental this person can be.
There was agreement. A sense of camaraderie. Yes, this person is judgmental! Yes, it can feel uncomfortable to be around!
And yet, when our conversation ended… I felt uneasy. Something wasn’t sitting well with me. Finally, it clicked.
We were judging someone for being judgmental.
We were getting negative about their negativity and doing the very thing we were complaining about!
It takes judgment to recognize judgment. The mind uses the very tool it’s critiquing to do the critiquing. There’s something revealing in that.
Minds judge. That’s what they do.
It can feel personal, especially when we’re on the receiving end, but when you really look, it isn’t actually personal at all. It’s functional. It’s how the mind sorts and interprets experience.
When we label another person’s judgment as "bad", judgment itself becomes the object.
There’s nothing wrong with that either. It’s just more of the same mechanism. But when the nature of that mechanism goes unnoticed, it creates a loop that tightens.
And, of course, it feels uncomfortable.
What changes things isn’t trying to stop judging. That would just be more judgment. What changes things is seeing more clearly how minds operate.
Judgment arises. It labels. It categorizes.
And sometimes, it turns back on itself.
When that’s seen, something softens.
There’s a lightness that comes in. Not because anything has been fixed, but because it’s no longer being taken so seriously. It becomes more impersonal, because it is universal to humans.
We start to see that what we’re pointing at in others isn’t separate from what’s happening within us.
And from there, something shifts.
More space. More understanding. More compassion.
That “judgmental person,” whether it’s someone in your life or the one in the mirror, gets a little more room to be human.