Message #12142

[Serena Duvet]

I have two friends that are sometimes led to put others down (unnecessarily.)
Sometimes it's simply a statement that is judgmental.  Sometimes it's a prying
question.  It feels uncomfortable to me when it happens, but I've never been led
to be confrontational back, or question motivation.  Recently I called one of the
friends during the time of the special solar eclipse.  She wasn't feeling well to
the point where she didn't answer the phone.  Later on another day she apologized
and said that she was working through some heavy emotional stuff.  Still later, on
another day, she told me what it was about.  That she had come to realize that she
was very judgmental and that it was very painful.  She goes to many, many meditation
retreats throughout the year and attends Buddhist meditations weekly and takes many
spiritual seminars.  I wonder if her realization was spontaneous, or after much reflection,
or if someone confronted her.  When she told me that she was suffering with the realization
I listened but did not protest.  She had demonstrated it to me so many times.  It seems as
though it may stem from a mistrust of others (at times) with me, anyway.  Once, when we
became separated hiking and she blamed me although I told her I waited and waited for her
when I became aware that she had taken a different fork (behind me) on the way to the same
destination.  She walked by and neither of us saw the other!  Things are funny that way sometimes.
Yes, why blame another?  Why criticize another?  Why judge another?  Jesus said:
"May the man without sin cast the first stone."