Judge Not

It’s one of our moral compasses in life, a trusted rule to live by. Judge not less you be judged. Yet, how often we find ourselves guilty of breaking it. A mother judging another mother for their parenting methods. A young critic examining the work of another so harshly. The skinny child with the high metabolic rate looking at the overweight child wondering what about their diet. We are all guilty on some level. It would seem the only solution would be to live out another moral rule; to walk a mile in another’s shoes.

That’s exactly what Drew Manning from Fit2Fat2Fit did. This personal trainer had it all. He has a great family, was in great physical shape and lived a disciplined nutritional life.  Drew went on a 6-month journey to where he would stop exercising, eat without restriction any food that was deemed unhealthy and purposely gain weight. This done in efforts to empathize with his clients, understand their world and then experience what they would in order to get fit again. Drew recalled a story of what he experienced in the grocery store line with his cart full of unhealthy foods. Now overweight, this trainer once receiving admiring looks now receiving looks of judgment for his food purchases. He now understood what it was like in some else’s shoes. In our interview with Drew, he would explain the greatest lesson he learned from his 52-week journey was not to be judgmental.

Isn’t this the classic story of so many fairy tales and movies? That true beauty must come from within, you should never judge based on your own ideas and most certainly you must become like the other to truly empathize. Yet, as well as we may know the lesson it’s an act we still commit. Sure, maybe not be in grand ways, but possibly in small, simple ones.

The typical response when we ourselves are judged may sound like this, “how could they judge me, they don’t even know me’. This is the reason people judge. They don’t know you, your circumstance or your story. They are not in your shoes with your brain and your weaknesses. I would suggest that instead of judgment, that we open the door to conversation and get to know the individual. It might be best if we take our eyes of judgment and turn them towards ourselves. After all, we are only truly responsible for ourselves and have control over our own actions. We all have of own ‘stuff’ to work through. Maybe judging others is the easy way to turn the spotlight off our own issues. Whatever the reason may be, judgment doesn’t help anyone. Walk a mile in someone’s shoes, maybe even two. Think for a moment what the view might be like from their eyes. We will be better neighbours, friends and companions if we take the advice of the ancient moral law and judge not; and we will be even better if while we walk a mile in someone else’s shoes, we get to know them along the way.

Listen to GetRealLive interview Drew Manning below on demand or download from iTunes. You can Listen LIVE weekdays 9:30 Mtn/ 8:30am Pac and follow us on Facebook and Twitter. Join the conversation because ‘life is boring without you’.