Humility And Lack Of Judgement

In this engaging and thought provoking podcast we explore what the traits of a peaceful and happy person are. In doing so, we will learn to cultivate and expand our conscious awareness toward attaining a life where we act with humility and learn to let go of the judgement of others.

Transcript

Welcome to the Happiness Podcast.

I'm Dr.

Robert Puff.

This morning before my yoga class started,

I got there early and had a little conversation with the new owner of the studio.

I was asking her how she got into yoga and she told me she had been a producer of films in Hollywood and one day it was just so intense that she screamed at her assistant.

She said,

I just screamed at him and that wasn't me.

And so she decided to do something else at that point.

And now several years later,

She's an owner of a yoga studio.

And I'm sharing this story because I have had a bit of experience working with producers over the years since I do a lot with the media.

And what I found is that their jobs are very crazy.

I've always been surprised at how hectic it is and how just intense they are when I talk to them.

And I think,

Wow,

That's a very hectic,

Intense life.

I mean,

Not all,

But many of them seem to have just a lot of intensity because their work is so intense.

It's so much on the go.

But sometimes we see consequences from that behavior,

Consequence from that intensity,

Like anger.

Not always,

But sometimes.

Another example would be think of a type A person.

We probably all know someone like that.

I mean,

I think what goes along with the type A person is stress,

Anger,

Just a lot of health problems and overall unpleasantness with life.

I'm starting with these two examples just to use an analogy,

An analogy in such a way that I think the paths that we get on are going to shape us.

And we're going to see side effects from these shapings.

So if we're committed to being a happier,

More peaceful person,

Are there any side effects that we might expect to see as a result of our better journey that we're on?

And I think there are.

And I think there's two things we're really going to see come out of us if we stay on this path.

And I also think we're going to like them.

So what are these two things that we can expect if we stay on this journey?

I think with time,

We're going to see a lot more humility and a lot more lack of judgment of others and ourselves.

And I think we're going to like these two things.

Well,

Let's start with humility.

Why would we be more humble?

Why would happiness lead to that?

Well,

It's based upon several things.

The big one is that as we get happier,

What's going to happen is we're going to learn that the locus of control is within us,

Not externally.

It isn't that important what's happening externally.

What is far more important is what we're doing internally,

What our mind is doing with the events that are happening externally.

And what we're really doing is living in the present moment and not looking for anything external to give us happiness.

We can find beauty,

Things to be happy with always in the present moment,

As long as we live a far more unattached,

Free life,

Flowing with life.

I'm not going to get into the great detail.

What are the rules of happiness?

I want to more talk today about what are the consequences of happiness.

So one of the consequences is that now,

Since we don't need anything external,

Including the approval of others for happiness,

We're going to be a lot less concerned about what other people think.

And part of that may be is we don't always talk about ourselves quite as much.

And we're more interested in other people.

It's like we're an observer of life,

Fascinated by all aspects of it,

And not necessarily needing to tell everyone about our successes or what we've done.

It's a far more just being present with what is.

And that may be perceived as by others as humility,

Because if we really aren't looking for the approval of others,

I mean,

We may welcome it if they like us,

Of course,

But we don't need it.

We realize if we're going to be happy,

That's our job.

And because of that,

It's far more of a fascination with life,

Including others.

So we may be very interested in their stories.

I love to hear stories like the owner of the yoga studio today.

I love to hear her story.

But it's amazing how we may not need to share ours unless people ask.

And it isn't that important because we're not tied to our success or failures.

I mean,

Yeah,

We do a lot of goofy things and that's okay.

We just are conditioned to sometimes do that.

But sometimes we do things that other people would be impressed by.

And that's okay too.

But we don't need them because those never lead to happiness.

They're just external things.

And what we're looking for now is internal things to be happy.

And they have very,

Very little to do with what people think of us.

And because of that,

We don't need that external approval.

We may be very kind.

We may be very,

Very gentle,

But we're not going to necessarily have to sell them on how great we are.

Instead,

We're just going to enjoy other people for who they are and the experience we're having right now with them.

Now you may be thinking,

Hey,

Dr.

Puff,

I have a challenge for you.

If I go to your website or see your stuff out there,

You talk about how the happiness podcast has been downloaded over 4 million times.

And you're often asking for reviews.

Why do you do that?

If humility is one of the consequences of happiness,

You don't sound very humble.

Well,

For me,

There's a couple parts to it.

One is I do want people to be happier.

I think that's one of my missions on life.

And one of the ways I think that can happen is by someone listening to this podcast.

I do think the skills in this podcast can make our lives a whole lot better.

So why do we do anything?

Nowadays,

It's really based upon referrals.

I think Yelp and Google Plus and places like that have really made it that we really read those reviews and we care.

And we care that someone is doing something that other people like.

So that's why I do it.

I do it so that new people will begin to listen to this podcast.

If I just say this is a happiness podcast,

It may not draw as many people,

But people are drawn towards things that other people like.

So that's why I do it.

When I'm not doing this though,

Just so you know,

I'm not doing this at home.

Like if we went to my yoga studio,

If you ever joined me there,

You'd find that most people there,

I think almost not everyone,

But most people there have no idea what I do and have no idea that I create this happiness podcast.

They just don't.

I don't mention it.

They don't talk.

We don't talk about it.

So I don't,

Isn't that I'm shy about it.

I just,

I go there to do yoga,

Not to talk about my happiness podcast or to make them think highly of me.

That's not my goal when I'm at yoga.

My goal of yoga is to do yoga and you want to know something that's really cool.

Even if people think you're an arrogant SOB,

You're not going to care that much.

You're not going to care either way.

You're not going to care if they think highly of you.

You're not going to care if they think lowly of you.

You're going to be far more focused on just engaging with them and join them.

And if they're mean,

Of course you'll set boundaries,

But if they're nice,

You're going to reach out to them and explore life with them and engage in present moments with the people you're with.

It's really nice just to flow with life and enjoy it.

Instead of being concerned so much about what people think about us,

It's far better just to enjoy life.

And that may be perceived by others as being humble.

I don't know.

You'll have to let me know,

But I think you may find that to be the case that at least having to get on your soapbox and tell everyone what you do or don't do or haven't done,

I mean,

Fill in the blank,

Whatever it is,

We don't feel as compelled to do that anymore because we're not those things.

Those things are just events that happen to us.

We don't identify with them.

What we identify with is the present moment.

And in the present moment,

There is no ego.

There's just now.

And that's a really great way to live life.

So part two,

What's that?

Lack of judgment.

Why do I say that?

Well,

You see,

To function in our world,

We create concepts,

Prejudices,

Ideas,

And those ideas shape us.

They shape the way we interact with the world.

So say we have a prejudice or an idea against a certain ethnicity.

And if we see that person,

All of a sudden all those labels will kick in and we may act a certain way towards that person.

And sometimes our acting isn't always kind.

But what happens is when we become far more happy and living in the present moment,

We don't label as fast.

We're not as quick to judge others.

We're not as quick to say,

There's something wrong with you.

We may not like the behavior and say,

Well,

I wish that person wasn't doing that behavior right now.

But that person isn't those behaviors.

That's just the behavior.

And we may even stand up to that behavior,

But we're not going to say that person is that behavior because we're not either.

We do things because of our conditioning and our genetics and so to other people.

Now,

Mind you,

We can change that conditioning.

We're doing that right now by listening to this podcast.

We're getting ideas of how to interact with the world differently.

But if we hadn't had this new conditioning,

Our behavior wouldn't change.

So we get that people's behavior is really based upon their conditioning.

They're not their conditioning.

They're far more than that.

So much more.

So because we're mostly focused on making our lives better and far less concerned about what other people are doing because they don't have power over us anymore,

Either to make us happy or unhappy,

We're going to judge them so much less,

Perhaps not at all.

Again,

We may set boundaries with them and we may hang out with them if they behave in ways that we like.

But as far as judging them,

There's going to be a lot less of that.

And we're going to like that because life's so much better and we don't judge others and we don't judge ourselves.

We can learn from things.

Again,

It's like when I was a kid,

The first time I actually burnt my hand,

I remembered it.

And after that,

I was very careful with fire.

So we can learn from things,

Of course,

And hopefully we do.

Sometimes we don't,

But hopefully we do.

But the main thing is what we learn is that everyone has their conditioning.

It's very different than ours.

So instead of judging them,

We just enjoy them.

And mostly,

We enjoy them in the present moment.

If they're doing something in that moment that we do not like,

We may remove ourselves or we may talk to them about it.

But as far as labeling them or labeling ourselves,

That's going to be gone because it just doesn't serve any purpose.

It's unhelpful and it keeps us from interacting with the world in a beautiful way.

One of my favorite sayings is once I label a sparrow,

I stop seeing it.

So when we stop labeling,

We start seeing.

And the less we label,

The better we see.

And that's where I think it's so important not to label people,

Not to judge people,

But get to know them.

And you'd be surprised how often,

Even though we may not agree with their behavior at that moment,

That we can say,

Okay,

I still see the beauty there.

And maybe through my gentleness and kindness,

They'll begin to change a little bit.

Most people don't change when we scream at them.

That tends to shut them down.

Or if we judge them,

We don't hang out with them.

Again,

We don't get to know them.

So having an open,

Non-judgmental approach to life works so much better.

As always,

We can definitely stand up to things that are wrong,

But that's different than judging people.

We may put people in jail,

But I still think it's good to love them and to not judge them and saying they're paying the consequences for their behavior.

But I don't need to hate them.

I just need to give them boundaries so they can't keep hurting other people.

So as I started this podcast,

I said that there really are two potential consequences to choosing to live a happy,

Peaceful life.

One of them is to observe more humility in our behavior.

The second one is to notice more non-judgmentalness in our behavior,

In our minds,

In our thoughts.

I do think these two things are consequences of getting on the path of happiness.

It may take time for them to develop,

But I think if we're looking for,

Am I doing better?

Is this working?

These are the things we'll probably see.

And if we're seeing them,

I think we'll like them.

I think life is a lot better when we don't need the praise or approval or disapproval of others and a whole lot better when we're not fighting with everyone in the world and having so many dislikes of others and ourselves.

It makes our life and perhaps even the people in our lives go better,

A lot better.

So if you ever do want to ask yourself,

Am I doing it right?

Am I on the path of happiness?

Look for these two side effects.

Are we more humble and are we less judgmental of others?

I think these two things will help us to realize we're on a good path,

On a good journey,

And we like the effects of these two things because they just make life go better.

And when life goes better,

We are happier.

And remember,

No one can keep us from being happy but ourselves ultimately.

So if we are struggling right now,

If we are not doing well,

Let's not give up on ourselves.

Let's keep pushing forward and learning the skills of happiness so that we can live a glorious life throughout our lives until our dying breath.

We may not impress others,

But I do think we'll make the world a better place to live in for all of us.

Thank you for joining me on the Happiness Podcast.

Besides creating this podcast,

There are a variety of other things that I do.

If you'd like to keep abreast of these activities and perhaps someday we may be able to meet in person,

Just go to www.

Happinesspodcast.

Org.

That's happinesspodcast.

Org.

You can subscribe to my newsletter.

And if you do,

You'll be emailed a free PDF copy of my meditation book called Reflections on Meditation.

And until next time,

Accept what is,

Love what is.

Reviews

Really appreciate this - even though I feel far from the goal - I seek externalaffirmationand judge myself so I need to listen 1 million times 🤭Thank you💫

Incredibly eye opening. Thank you for this! It was needed. Sending you love, peace and all the best. ♥️

Thank you Dr Puff. Such a challenging topic, which you address with such wise, comforting insight. I have so much respect for the work you do. Your podcasts are my “go-to” when I I want to address life’s challenging moments more mindfully 🙏

Very useful insight here!

As always - wise words 🙏💕

Very helpful for me, thanks a lot

The happiness podcast is always thought provoking and a really good complement to a meditation journey.

Thank you, Dr. Puff! Spot on!!

“The less we label, the more we see! This is beautiful! 🙏

Very insightful and helpful to me! I look forward to checking out The Happiness Podcast.

Thank you 🙏Happy Thanksgiving Day!