Thursday, February 7, 2013

Desire to Inspire: Judging

Thursdays usually roll around and I feel awful for not having a post ready or in the works to link up with Amanda for Desire to Inspire. It's such a great link up and I enjoy participating when I can!
This week, I had two, yes two, posts in the final stages of writing - so there's no excuse for me now!
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Judging - it's something that can happen so fast you don't even realize you do it.
I'm a critical person, I look into everything for meaning. 
What did she say? She must have meant....
So an innocent thought of "what did that mean" can quickly turn into or reflect judgement on my behalf. 
Judgmental, snap comments are as much a habit as anything we do.
Sometimes I have to remember that it isn't okay to say whatever is on my mind.

A great example of this was me sticking my foot in my mouth the other day - 
I was entering payments in the office and I came across a check that was covered in sprawling chicken scratch. If it weren't for the saving grace of the name & address at the top, I wouldn't have known who it was from or what it was for.  As I looked up past invoices for this client to attempt to decipher the amount the check was made out for (praying that she was paying an exact amount) I popped off to a co-worker that this lady needed to go back to grade school. That she wrote like a three year old. 
That was the moment that my co-worker provided me with the piece of information I was missing.
The key piece of knowledge that would have been the difference between my judgmental comment or a showing of grace, patience and understanding. 

The lady who wrote the check is legally blind.
Of course her handwriting is less than perfect.

Embarrassed, I stuttered out a semblance of an apology Oh, I didn't know, whoops.
 In my mind I attempted to console myself and reign in my reddening cheeks. 
How could you have known I thought.
It's not your fault, no one told you. 
 And yes, I suppose to a degree that was a tactless off the cuff comment.
What it really brought to light though is the truth.
How often do I judge without knowing the circumstances.
They could have been raised differently, they may not know better, I don't know what is going on in their life, ...

I need to do a better job of extending Grace rather than passing Judgement.


I hope you'll consider joining in Desire to Inspire!
A Royal Daughter

3 comments:

  1. I so understand. I try to exercise/extending this same grace with parents of special needs children. Often you don't know the circumstances. I've learned a lot just from reading blogs just want the parents and the children go through. Now they have one less person making judgements. It's so much easier to extend grace than to apologize for ignorance. Great lesson! Visting from Desire to Inspire.

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  2. Gosh, I feel like that happens to me all the time, and I probably don't even realize it. Even just like yelling at a dumb driver, but not knowing what kind of day that person has. What a great post to remind me to put myself in the other persons shoes and to not judge other people!

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  3. So so true! Everyone has a story and is having a hard day of their own so best to extend some grace. Thanks for reminder!

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