Judging others is something we all do. We tell ourselves we don’t, but we do. It is a natural instinct. Judging itself isn’t bad. We need to make judgments in many important decisions throughout our lives.
We need to make judgments about ideas, situations and people to keep our families and us safe. We make judgments when choosing friends, choosing a spouse and even when choosing our government leaders.
As we interact with other people, we constantly interpret, evaluate, and form opinions regarding their qualities, words, and actions. We do this in order to respond to them appropriately. Although judging others is a normal and necessary part of life, we have a tendency to do it in a wrong way.
Judgments are made on how a person looks, what they wear, how much they weigh or how much money they have. It doesn’t matter how you choose to live your life or what your circumstances are, someone will judge you for it.
Being judged like that hurts. Whether we like it or not, when you have an invisible illness people will judge you. Family, friends, doctors and strangers alike pass judgment because we don’t look sick. At some point, someone is likely to make you feel judged, patronized, or simply not believed.
Judging Others On Social Media
Social Media has opened up the opportunity for those of us with chronic illness to connect with others going through the same thing. To not feel so alone. On the other hand, social media makes it easy to sit behind a keyboard and spout off a lot of negative opinions. I have seen plenty of judging and shaming lately, mostly on Facebook.
When you live with a condition like fibromyalgia and you find something that helps, you want to share that with other people who have fibromyalgia. But sometimes, this leads to a lot of negative comments. Instead of being supportive and happy for you, some people want to tear you down.
Why do we do this? Julie at CountingMySpoons believes we feel so terrible living with chronic pain that we have lost hope. She writes: I want us all to be able to share our success stories and get support from each other. I want us to be able to focus on our own personal journey without tearing down others for their journey.
Judging others does not define who they are, it defines who you are.
Generally, how we judge others is an extension of how we judge ourselves. Self-judgment is so ingrained, we don’t even recognize we do it. Some people look down on others to feel better about themselves and boost their own self esteem.
“When you judge others, you do not define them, you define yourself.”
-Earl Nightingale
Sigmund Freud said people tend to cope with their negative views about themselves by thinking that other people are worse than they are. Therefore, we judge others by our own insecurities about ourselves. So when a person criticizes or insults someone, it may actually say more about themselves than the other person.
On Jessica’s blog NoOneGetsFlowersForChronicPain, she writes: Hurt people hurt people and it becomes a vicious cycle that will never end until a person is ready to accept their life in whole and begin the process of self-love.
Conclusion
When you are secure with yourself, you do not feel the need to criticize others. Remember when someone makes negative and sarcastic comments towards you, it is usually because they feel threatened. They bully and belittle other people to feel better about themselves. By being kind and compassionate toward them, you rob them of their power to control your emotions.
When you have a chronic illness it is not enough to just take care of your physical health. You also have to take care of your emotional well-being. Pay attention to what you think and feel. Identify what causes you stress. Most importantly try to achieve an inner peace.
How wonderful this world would be if we could let go of judging others and come to a place of acceptance and empathy.
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Great post Sue! You are so right with everything you say and we absolutely do get judged by others. It has taken me a long time to be more accepting of that and take it for what it is, ie let it go right over my head! I do feel that there absolutely can be judgement and competition between the chronically ill and there have been a few posts I have written where I thought “I’m going to get flack for this” but thankfully the responses have always been positive. It is sad that people can lose hope. At various points I have been incredibly jealous of people who have recovered their health when I couldn’t but I use that to fuel me to better myself. I couldn’t imagine being horrible to someone who has achieved what I want for myself
Thanks, Donna. I have to admit I get jealous sometimes, too. I am also quite skeptical when I hear someone say they have completely recovered but at the same time I would never bash them for it. Like you said you want that for yourself and so do I. It is very sad that some people give up hope. Thirty years ago I could have been one of them. I was very depressed. Seeing a therapist was the best thing I have ever done and it helped me change my life around. I know that I wouldn’t be the strong happy person I am today if I hadn’t done so.
Dead on. I’m often guilty of the sarcasm and negative comments – not about those who are I’ll, just about others in general. I know it’s a self esteem thing, and it’s something I’m trying to get past. I’ve actually purposefully moved away from posting on my personal fb because I realized most of my posts were either negative or sarcasm (which is still negative).
It is something we all are guilty of at times. I rarely post on my personal page anymore either, sometimes just reading some of the stuff puts me in a negative mood. Self-esteem is a funny thing, I think it waxes and wanes just like chronic pain or maybe because of it. Congratulations on being included in the book: The i’Mpossible Project: Re-engaging with Life, Creating a New You. I can’t wait to read it.