“Thinking is hard, that’s why people judge.” - Carl Jung
A glaring irony of the information age is that people seem less curious, locked in their own opinions and viewpoints, with little desire to learn about alternatives, not to mention facts. With so much information at our fingertips, judgmentalism has become a primary way to limit what our inundated brains need to process.
Think of people you’ve known who were judgmental of others or had strong opinions about complex issues. They were intolerant of disagreement and dismissive of alternative viewpoints. They’d get angry at the suggestion of facts they may not have considered. Although intelligent, they supported most of their judgments and opinions with cherry-picked or outdated evidence or no evidence at all. Judgment preclu…
“Thinking is hard, that’s why people judge.” - Carl Jung
A glaring irony of the information age is that people seem less curious, locked in their own opinions and viewpoints, with little desire to learn about alternatives, not to mention facts. With so much information at our fingertips, judgmentalism has become a primary way to limit what our inundated brains need to process.
Think of people you’ve known who were judgmental of others or had strong opinions about complex issues. They were intolerant of disagreement and dismissive of alternative viewpoints. They’d get angry at the suggestion of facts they may not have considered. Although intelligent, they supported most of their judgments and opinions with cherry-picked or outdated evidence or no evidence at all. Judgment precludes interest, limits understanding, and makes us defensive. Judgmental people are unhappy people.
Curiosity vs. Judgmentalism
Curiosity makes life interesting and helps to maintain interest in love relationships. Curiosity is as good for life and relationships as judgmentalism is bad for them.
In verbal exchanges, judgments sound like declarations; curiosity sounds like questions.
Judgment: “You’re untrustworthy.” Curiosity: “Would you please tell me more about your feelings and thoughts about this? I haven’t listened as well as I should have.”
Denying a partner’s judgment risks reinforcing it.
“It’s not fair that you call me selfish.” “That’s just what a selfish person would say.”
To change negative judgments, we must be curious and caring about the feelings and thoughts of the people we’re trying to influence.
**Judgment: “**You’re selfish.” Curiosity: “What can I do to seem less selfish and more focused on your well-being?”
Caveat: Don’t confuse curiosity with interrogation. That will happen if you try to negotiate while resentful or angry, both of which are judgmental, devaluing, and coercive.
With genuine curiosity, we want to learn and understand, not “win” an argument.
If your relationship is characterized by resentment, you’ve lost touch with the internal experience of your partner and your partner has lost touch with yours. You merely react negatively to each other’s defenses against hurt and vulnerability. There’s a lot of information about each other that you’re missing or suppressing with negative judgments.
The good news is that there’s a lot you can learn about each other, once you free yourselves from judgmentalism and engage your natural curiosity.
Overcome Motivated Reasoning
In place of curiosity and a desire for truth, motivated reasoning has become epidemic in all forms of media and public discourse. Motivated reasoning is the use of reasoning to justify a preferred conclusion or belief, rather than to discover what is true. Along with its cousin, confirmation bias, motivated reasoning impersonates scientific fact and makes us think we know more than we do. To overcome motivated reasoning and confirmation bias, stop trying to prove anything. Instead, ask yourself, “What can I learn?”
The more curious we are, the smarter we get. The more we judge, the dumber we get.