Nonjudgmental

Being nonjudgmental is an important value in yoga. It really resonates with me and is part of what drew me to yoga and kept me there.

It's human nature to judge others. We want to understand what is going on around us, including the people around us. We try to figure out how they think and what their motives are. Unfortunately, we naturally compare our perceptions of this to how we think it should be, and tend to form harsh judgments. Either we think we are better than they are, or we wish we were and try to find something wrong with them to convince ourselves that we're better.

So then it comes down to noncompetition. Another important value in yoga that really resonates with me. There is no need to be competitive. It doesn't matter who's better. Really, it doesn't matter. We waste so much energy trying to be better than others, when life is so much happier when you realize that you don't need to be better. We can all be happy together without concern over who's better.

My latest challenge is to let go of the need to be better and not to judge others' weaknesses. I can learn something from everyone. I want to focus on learning rather than wasting my time and energy judging.