If you have been on my blog before or have read any of my previous posts, you would know that I talk a lot about being more accepting towards everything and everyone and am always trying to let go of any preconceived notions I have already formed about things so I can open my heart to anything and everything that does not conform with my beliefs and can accept everything the way it is. Yes, while trying to do this, I do come across things and ideas that I don’t like or wouldn’t support myself, but I don’t disregard or put labels on them.
To let go of my judgments, I mostly have a dialogue in my head between my judgmental and more accepting sides of mind, and that’s how I slowly train myself to be more accepting of different things. On Wednesday night, my son, my siblings, my mother and I went to a shopping mall. We had a great time there and as we were exiting it, my son asked me to buy some roasted peanuts for him. There was a vendor sitting in a park and I approached him. I asked him to give me a small bag of peanuts and he said it was for Rs. 50. Usually, that bag is sold for Rs. 20 in other areas and I knew he was over-charging me. Instead of apologizing for over-pricing the commodity or giving me a logical explanation for that action, he blatantly told me that he won’t give me any concession and that bag was for Rs.50.
I was quite offended by his demeanor and did not want to buy peanuts from him, but since my son was hungry and the food court in the mall was closed, I decided to go ahead with the purchase. After handing Faateh his peanuts, the following dialogue is what I had in my head and what slowly helped me to nurture a more accepting attitude towards that vendor.
The Dialogue
Judgmental Side: How rude of that man to unashamedly tell me that bag was for Rs.50 and he wouldn’t charge less for it!
Accepting Side: Maybe he has to pay a huge rent to sit in front of the mall and he has lots of expenses to meet that he cannot afford to sell peanuts for less than Rs.50.
Judgmental Side: If that was the case, he should have told me so and given me an explanation for overpricing the peanuts.
Accepting Side: He does not owe you an explanation because he is just doing his job. Was he rude to you?
Judgmental Side: Ermm no, not really.
Accepting Side: Think hard and tell me if he was rude to you. Did he speak in a harsh tone to you?
Judgmental Side: No he did not, but he was clearly charging me too much for a small bag of peanuts.
Accepting Side: If you felt the peanuts were overpriced, you should not have bought it.
Judgmental Side: Faateh was hungry so I had to buy it.
Accepting Side: Yeah so you made a decision because of your personal reason so there is no point to blame that man. Understand that like you, he may have a family to support too and if he is doing some business instead of begging or engaging in any illegal activity, you should encourage him or if not that, at least not be judgmental of it. Just let go of the negativity inside you and calm down.
Once I started listening keenly to my more accepting side, I started taking deep breaths and within a few minutes, all the judgments and negativity inside of me had departed my mind and body, and I felt a lot better than before. I felt quite happy with myself and felt quite light too.
When we harbor a judgmental attitude and nurture any sort of negativity or hostility towards someone, we feel quite disturbed mentally and emotionally. Even if we don’t acknowledge that feeling right away, deep down we don’t feel at peace. That uneasy feeling is because of our judgmental attitude especially if we have verbal diarrhea and cannot hold our judgments inside of us, and have a deep urge to blurt them all out.
However, if we try to have a conversation with our judgmental mind and talk to it logically, and give ourselves a few moments before reaching a conclusion, making a decision or saying something, we would open our hearts and minds to the possibility of being more open and welcoming towards new ideas and beliefs, and will become more accepting towards people. Is it hard to do? Oh yes- it can be quite difficult at times, especially if you are sure someone has wronged you and have certain preconceived notions rooted inside your mind, but if you do make consistent efforts to become more accepting, you will slowly find yourself feeling more liberated, open and free. That feeling, I tell you, is nothing short of pure awesomeness!
I hope that you enjoyed this read and learned something from it. Would love to read your thoughts on it. Love and light,
Sharoon.
If you liked this, you may also like the following of my articles:
@sharoonyasir/the-beauty-of-letting-go-being-forgiving-and-accepting-others
@sharoonyasir/christmas-beautiful-for-many-hard-for-some
I am a part of some amazing communities here that I think you should consider joining too.
@ecotrain which is full of inspirational content and people.
