I'm No Better Or Worse Than Anyone Else

What if we learned to live without judgment?

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A few years ago, my mom told me a story she had just heard. A man had been told, ever since he was a young boy, by his parents that, "You aren't better than anyone else; and you're not worse than anyone else either."

I remember feeling intensely jealous. That man had been taught something at a young age that, in my late 20s, I was still struggling to learn.

It probably doesn't take much to explain why thinking that we're worse than other people is bad for us. For decades, I felt like I was worthless and that everyone else was better than me. This mindset, fueled by addiction and abuse, drove my anxiety and my depression. It made me look down on myself, discard my own discernment, and accept poor treatment from other people. As mindsets go, it was pretty bad.

It took me longer to realize why the inverse, thinking I was better than other people, was in some ways just as bad. When I started doing some personal development work, started seeing some success as a writer, and started to climb out of the pits of Hell, I started to feel pretty good about myself. But that confidence metastasized into hubris. I started looking down on other people.

The first problem with this mindset is that it's a violation of a deep spiritual truth. The truth is that we are all made equal in God's eyes (or in the eyes of the Universe, Infinite Love, or whatever you call the animating impulse that gives us life). We may have different skills, and different abilities; but we cannot and do not have different worth. That universalism is the bedrock of every spiritual tradition I have come across that has stood the test of time.

The second problem with thinking that we are better than other people is that it leads to insecurity. This insight surprised me at first. After all, if I think I'm better than my friends, how can I be insecure? But the comparison game is the spiritual equivalent of keeping up with the Joneses. If I think I'm better than John because I've written for Quillette and he hasn't, then I better hope that he never breaks into Quillette. That's a terrible thing to hope for. But if he does (or if Quillette stops accepting my pieces), then my self-conception breaks down. Any change upward in someone else's status, or downward in our own, starts to threaten our identity. It's like building a house on a foundation of sand.

From a spiritual standpoint, comparison in either direction is just feeding the ego (or false self). Dr. Alok Kanojia, Instructor in Psychiatry at Harvard Medical School, warns us that the ego "relies on comparison." "Anytime you make a comparison between two people," he cautions, "that's ego." Feeding our ego pulls us away from our true selves and from God (or Spirit, Source, Infinite Intelligence, our higher selves, etc); and that's true whether we feed it by saying that we're less than other people or that we're better than them.

So if comparing ourselves to others is so bad, how can we avoid it? I'm by no means perfect, but I've found three mindset shifts that have helped me.

Mindset Shift 1: I Don't Know Your Struggles

Father Gregory Boyle founded the largest gang intervention rehabilitation and re-entry program in the world. It's called Homeboy Industries, and he's spent 40 years working with gang members to turn their lives around and become productive members of society. One quote he shared in an interview is this: we should "stand in awe at what people have to carry, rather than in judgment at how they carry it."

One of my friends is so crippled by fear that it is sometimes hard for me to know how to talk to her. She told me in 2016 that she was numb with terror at the thought of a President Trump. On our last call, she broke down crying because she couldn't understand how Republicans could be such awful human beings. Her fear makes her lash out; and because I'm not exactly far-left, she has frequently lashed out at me. It would be easy for me to judge her. And I did, for many years. But inspired by Father Boyle, now I'm trying to shift my mindset. What has she gone through that made her so scared? How much pain is she carrying? I have no idea. I don't know her struggles or the weight of the burden that she's trying to carry. Without knowing that, how can I judge her for how she's carrying it?

This mindset has helped me a lot in dealing with partisans on X (formerly Twitter). When someone yells at me, instead of getting mad I can take a deep breath and remind myself that I don't know their story or what they're going through. If I assume their burden is large (and somehow, all of our burdens feel large) than I can also stand in awe at what they're carrying, rather than in condemnation for how they're carrying it. This mindset helps me to respond with love and grace and kindness and a sincere desire to help them; because ultimately we're all in the same boat.

Mindset Shift 2: I Don't Know What Tools You've Been Given

I had a coworker a few years ago who hurt himself and a lot of other people. He would lash out at inopportune times. He was incredibly thin-skinned and had difficulty receiving feedback. He would spend hours every day not doing his job.

We came from similar backgrounds (abuse, addiction, etc) and I used to judge him for not handling his shit better. But where would he have learned to be better? Did he have any positive role models, or only negative ones? Did he have access to the same spiritual mentors that I did; or did he conceive of God as someone who hated him? Did he have the money to invest in self-help programs, or not? Did he have parents or a peer group growing up who taught him the importance of working hard even on hard days, or not? I I don't know. When I was working to forgive the people in my past who had hurt me, something my coach told me was, "If they had known better, they would have done better." Did my coworker know (and therefore eschew) more effective ways to cope with his brutal emotional baggage? Or was I just assuming that he did, and judging him based on that assumption?

I've studied martial arts for 10 years, and I can do a lot of different techniques. But I recently realized that I can't do a question-mark kick. It's just not something I've ever been taught. It would be unjust if my martial arts sensei judged me for not being able to do a question-mark kick, because I've never studied a martial art (ex. Taekwondo) that emphasizes these kinds of kicks. When I spar with someone, I do the best I can with what I have; and there are probably lots of techniques that would be effective in a sparring match that I don't use because I've simply never been taught them. In the same way, it would be unjust if I judged my coworker for having mediocre coping mechanisms, when it's likely he was simply doing the best he could with what he had.

Of course, my sensei could teach me to do a question-mark kick, if he thought it would be useful. And if I could go back in time, maybe I would try to teach my old coworker some of the techniques that have worked for me (ex. meditation, learning to Goggins my way through the pain, etc). And that's an essential point. I'm not endorsing moral relativism or saying that we should tolerate bad behavior on the grounds that the person might not know better. Nor am I saying we shouldn't try to help each other; I wouldn't have started this Substack if I didn't believe in the power of personal transformation. But what if, when we see someone behaving in a way that hurts themselves and other people, our come-from was "Have you considered trying XYZ? If you think it would be helpful, I can talk a little bit about how XYZ has helped me and how to get started." That might be more effective (for our own development as well as the other person's) than a come-from of "What is wrong with you for not doing XYZ!?"

Mindset Shift 3: I Don't Know Very Much About You

A few years ago, a casual friend found out that I was Christian. As soon as the topic came up, he proceeded to barrage me with pointed and insulting questions. He reiterated multiple times that, in his own words, "I probably sound like an asshole," but continued to proceed along the same lines of attack. Afterwards, I asked him about it. Why would he say things that he knew made him sound like an asshole? He said that he had been triggered by the topic of my faith; that it had happened before with other people, and that it would probably happen again.

I'm tempted even now to judge him for that outburst. But is that judgment justified? The truth is that I know next to nothing about him. Maybe he's an incredible boyfriend and a wonderful father. Maybe he's a pillar of his community. Maybe religion is his one bugaboo, that he's actively working on; and in every other area of his life he has achieved a level of inner peace and joy that would leave me in awe.

I think that judging someone based on one outburst is a little like trying to ascertain whether the Mississippi River is contaminated or pure by measuring a square inch of water along one bank. The river is so vast that any kind of analysis on that level is going to obscure more than it reveals. In the same way, each of us is an incredibly complex creature. We all have areas where we're more peaceful and full of joy, where we're more resilient and in touch with God. We also have areas where we're more sore, where being poked is more likely to make us lash out (God knows I do). If we only see someone's sore spots, are we really getting a full and accurate picture of them as a human being? If not, how can we judge them?

To be clear, in none of the three mindset shifts above am I recommending just tolerating bad behavior or letting go of boundaries. As a victim of abuse myself, I would never recommend that people just toss their boundaries by the wayside. Nor am I arguing that we should give up on people. What I am arguing is that if our goal is to be closer to God (or Spirit/Source/Infinite Intelligence, be more in line with our higher self, etc) than a good way to do that is to let go of our judgments. I think the same is true if our goal is to be of more service to (other) broken people in the world. 

So here's our action item this week, as a community of practice. Next time you feel tempted to judge someone, try one of the mindset shifts I outlined above. And then let us know how it went, including if your mindset shift led to any different action than you would have otherwise taken.