Welcome to Love Notes from Rhonda.

And Mother Teresa says something so beautiful.

She says, if you judge people, you have no time to love them.

If you judge people, you have no time to love them.

So let's apply that to ourselves, shall we?

How busy are you judging yourself?

Determining if you're just right, doing the right thing, doing the good thing, doing the best thing, being better.

If you judge people, you cannot love them.

You won't have the dime to love them.

You won't see what's there to love.

So today I invite you to be honest with yourself about your level of self judgment.

And if you choose to also include the judgment of others, how quick you judge.

Now remember, our brain is wired to judge.

Our brain is wired to judge ourselves and to judge others.

Why is our brain wired to judge?

Our brain is wired to judge because it creates categories and rules and guidelines in order for it to save energy so it doesn't have to think.

If we had to stop every time we saw a grain of rice or a grape and had to redetermine what it was and should we eat it or not?

Or is this a good or not?

Right?

Like it would be exhausting.

The challenge is the way we're wired is not only do we do that for grapes, but we also do that to people, to ourselves.

So when you find yourself automatically judging, I want you to ask yourself, is this an opinion?

Like, so, for instance, I might see a woman with a dress on and go, ugh, don't like that dress.

I'm not talking about the woman.

I'm just talking.

That's not my style.

That's my opinion.

That's my preference.

That dress is not for me.

Right?

I'm not saying the dress is bad and the dress should be burned to this.

You know, the evil dress and the woman who's wearing it is dumb or stupid.

I'm not saying any of that.

So sometimes I think when we have an automatic thought go through us, we think we're bad to have that automatic thought.

The fact is that the automatic thought is thinking us.

We're actually not thinking it.

It's an automatic thought.

What we do afterwards is what matters.

So have a thought.

Oh, that dress is ugly.

I can either beat myself up and go, oh my God, I shouldn't talk that way.

Oh my God, I'm a horrible person.

Or I can say, yeah, that color wouldn't look good on me.

Or I can say, yeah, I totally get why I don't like that dress.

That's so not my style.

Oh, Right.

I'm not making it about the person.

I'm not saying she's a bad person for wearing the dress or the dress is bad because I don't like it.

It's just I don't like the dress.

Like I said, it's what we do after we have the thought that causes us pain and suffering.

Just like if you were eating food and you're eating something for the first time and you go, oh, I don't like that.

Right?

You don't sit there and go, I'm a horrible person because I don't like that.

Now, let's say it's from a friend of yours mother's who's made their favorite dish.

And you're like, oh, my God, I don't like it.

And I don't want to say anything.

I get that you're trying to be polite, right?

You're trying to be nice.

You're trying to be polite.

Everybody doesn't have to know what you think, right?

Everybody does not have to know what you think.

Everybody doesn't have to know your opinion about things.

It's not your place.

It's good for you to know, but you don't have to advertise it to everybody.

In some ways, that is on some level, that's not caring or not considerate or rude, et cetera, et cetera.

And sometimes it is the very thing you must do is share your opinion.

You must have your voice.

See, it's the inability to have both speaking up or being silent by choice that gets you into trouble.

If you can only be silent because that's your only mode of operation, then that's not okay because you don't have a voice.

But if you have to say everything you think because you need to have a voice, then that too is not okay, right?

That is you still going from a need that is an ish unfulfilled.

And you're just talking to talk.

You're not using discernment.

You're not mindful about appropriateness and social cues and what's really happening in this room.

Does this matter that I don't like this?

Maybe, maybe not.

So I want you to be able to know when to.

Oh, yeah, it's really not my place to say this.

And it's really.

Nobody cares and it's not my business or their business.

Like, it's totally okay that I do not share this particular opinion.

And then other things.

Oh, absolutely.

You must share your opinion.

Absolutely, 100%.

Because those opinions can turn into beliefs, right?

Those opinions can turn into stands.

Those opinions can turn into guides for how we live our life.

But we want to be consciously awake to that rather than letting our automatic brain that's trying to conserve energy decide what we like and what we don't like, what we believe what we don't believe, right?

We don't want that to decide for us.

We don't want fear to decide for us.

We want to decide.

So if you're too busy judging and not stopping to reflect, you don't have time to love you or love others.

So if the thought goes through you, that's nice, you can go.

Ah yeah, I heard your thought and I'm practicing self love.

I'm practicing kindness, I'm practicing gentleness.

I'm practicing living true to me.

And while I may not like that dress, it doesn't mean I can't talk to the woman in it.

Until next time, be fearless.

I love you.