Are YOU a Judgy Judger?
As much as we hate people who judge others, especially in a negative and harmful way, we have to admit that...at certain times in our day or lives...we are ALL a bunch of judgy judgers . That was my A-HA moment from a motivational speaker I heard a few years ago.
As some background, Craig Zablocki’s whole shtick is centered on how kids have no fear….play with reckless abandon….laugh a lot….take risks because they don’t know they can fail ….and ….maximize what they get out of life. At some point in our development, we lose those qualities and we are cautious in our approach, we don’t enjoy what we do (or don’t demonstrate it), we don’t laugh as much and everything has to be serious stuff…after all we have a reputation to maintain...don't we?!
His challenge was to….
….give more
…..enjoy more
…..motivate others
…and give them permission to maximize their lives
He also reinforced that leaders need to “be aware that their actions speak louder than their words”
He continuously asked,
“What would it take that you would feel comfortable giving more of yourself and going outside your comfort zone? What are the obstacles stopping you from achieving this vision?”
He also talked about the traits that you admire and that you hate in others. The reality for me…and what I took away from his talk is the following:
- Who we are at ALL times matters (not just when we want people to pay attention but also who we are when we think no one is watching or paying attention)
- If this was your last day on earth how would others remember you and what would you do differently? If that is how you want to be remembered – what is stopping you from doing that EVERY day?
- We genuinely believe that the traits that we admire in others are the traits that we display most often and we believe that we never display the traits that we hate most. The truth is, that we display both positive and negative traits each and every day – it’s just that we choose to think that when we display non-flattering traits (or traits that we hate about others) that we were somehow justified or that we were not self aware enough in the moment to catch it . We also believe we are positive more than we are negative. If that is the case…where did all the negative people come from …because it can’t be ME….right!?
- We are ALL a bunch of judgy judgers. One of the main reasons we don’t give more, laugh more, take risks and live each day as if it were our last is because we are afraid of what others would think of us. Whether we like it or not we judge others and we live in fear of being judged ourselves.
What do we need to do about that last bullet point? In my opinion we have to be more authentic and communicative. We have to give ourselves and others permission to admit that we are not perfect, that we do not have all the answers, that sometimes we are the judge and sometimes we are the judge-ee.
“We need to be comfortable with our imperfect selves and embrace what we do and how we do it with great comfort…all the while knowing that we are TRULY just trying to make a difference in the best way we know how.”
Leadership Questions of the Week for YOU: “Based on what I described from Craig’s talk, what do you think of the list of observations and do any others jump to mind?” “What is your most recent “judgy judger” moment that either you displayed or that you witnessed?” “Knowing that we are ALL judgy judgers from time to time…what are the two to three things we can do as leaders to guard against it? Work through it? Or minimize it?” “What are the two traits you admire in others? What are the two traits that you dislike in others? Can you look yourself in the mirror and admit recently when you exhibited the admirable traits and (gasp) when you exhibited the negative traits?” “What did you learn from those examples that you can apply going forward?”
Thanks for reading and remember....YOU make a difference!
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