Judgment: An Effect And Act Of Abuse By Dr. Lisa Cooney

Judgment is an insidious yet subtle energy. It can be the most destructive effect and after shock of abuse. Judgment itself is also an act of abuse.

When used against yourself, you become your own eternal jailer trapped in falsely believing that you are flawed, wrong and worthless. There’s great comfort in knowing how wrong you are, how bad you are, how horrible you are. Because if you’ve ever experienced abuse, that’s familiar: the feeling of your wrongness. That’s the real epidemic of abuse on this planet, and a breeding ground for more abuse.

When used against others, you perpetuate a cycle of distancing yourself. You either judge others as better or worse than you are, yet either way, regardless of the judgments, you are keeping yourself separate. Judgment of others is a devaluing and disowning of what you’re not willing and able to see in yourself. You project the judgment upon another to relieve the pressure from yourself.

Judgment of self and others also locks you in a pattern of lies and limitation. This guarantees that you never have to – or will – be more than you are right now. Instead, judgment keeps you perpetrating you and keeps the abuse cycle going.

If you keep thinking something is wrong all the time then you are going to create and manifest that it is, so that you can prove yourself right, at least about that. There is a part of us that likes to prove our wrongness of that which we have deemed to be negative. Again, it is that familiarity that we are used to calling home.

The challenge with judgment is that it doesn’t allow for the freedom and expansiveness of greater possibilities. Instead, it keeps you small and struggling.

Judgment keeps you locked in a body, relationship, career and life that is limiting and dissatisfying, because how can you ever truly enjoy what is, if you’re constantly in judgment?

Moving beyond judgment is one of the key components of getting beyond abuse. That’s why it’s important to explore all the judgments you make of yourself and others. You need to see and acknowledge them first. Then you can begin to move beyond them and create your life from seeing the greatness of you, rather than the wrongness of you.

Here is an exercise you can do on your own. I encourage you to copy these questions below into a notebook or word document and write your responses to them. Or you could speak your responses out loud. Either way, the target is to get these judgements “out” of you so you can see them for what they are: judgments that keep you locked in the invisible cage of abuse. The more awareness you have of your judgments, the more choice you have over whether or not you buy them as “true.”

1. What are the biggest judgments you have about yourself? Include:
a. Your life
b. Your body
c. Your relationships
d. Your money flows
e. Your career/business
f. Anything and everything else

2. What are the biggest judgments you have about others?
a. Your partner
b. Your children
c. Your parents
d. Your relatives
e. Your colleagues
f. Your friends
g. Your boss
h. Anyone and everyone else

Notice what you experience in your body when you think about these judgments.

Every time you think or say these judgments you are locking them into your body even further. By getting these judgments out on paper or spoken out loud you begin to release their grip. Next time they arise in your mind you’re more apt to be able to see them as a judgment – and then choose whether or not you are going to keep believing in that judgment or see more clearly what is true.

Living beyond judgment brings a profound sense of being okay with who you are. As you Kick Abuse in the Caboose in this way you may experience a deeper sense of peace, a sense that, “It didn’t get me. It couldn’t take my true intrinsic goodness. It couldn’t have all of me. I am still who I am and who I was, I’m just better.”

{This article is an excerpt from Dr. Lisa Cooney’s soon-to-be-released book, “Kick Abuse In The Caboose.”}