Transforming our Criticism of Others into Acceptance and Compassion

Why do we feel the urge to criticize others? What if embracing acceptance could lead to healing and deeper connections in our lives? Join me, Rev. Rachel Harrison, as we explore these compelling questions in our latest episode. We'll dive into the roots of our judgmental tendencies, tracing them back to our upbringing and our innate desire to control external circumstances. By redefining criticism and gaining a compassionate understanding of it, we can shift our perception and learn to accept people as they are. This transformation can reduce the suffering caused by our disapproval and pave the way for more fulfilling lives.

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Join others on the Soul Recovery journey on Monday July 1st from 6-7PM on Zoom for the FREE Soul Recovery Support Group. This month we will be talking about 'Criticism and Judgement.' I will give a brief talk, open for questions and then we will break into small groups.  Register on the website, or if you have already registered- be on the look out the day of the meeting in your inbox for a reminder email.  

This podcast is for educational purposes only and is not allied or representative of any organizations or religions, but is based on the opinions and experience of Rev. Rachel Harrison. The host claims no responsibility to any person or entity for any liability, loss, or damage caused or alleged to be caused directly or indirectly as a result of the use, application, or interpretation of the information presented herein. Take what you need and leave the rest.

Transcript

Rev Rachel Harrison: 0:59

In today's episode we're flipping the coin of criticism. Last week we talked about how to be empowered and heal yourself when others criticize you, but this week we are actually taking a honest look at ourselves and why we might use judgment and criticism to reflect to others our disappointment and to be able to look at how we can choose to see things a different way. What is the perception in which we can shift, to let go of the need to criticize and to accept people exactly as they are, even if we don't like it? Enjoy the episode. Welcome to the Recover your Soul podcast a spiritual path to a happy and healthy life. My name is Reverend Rachel Harrison.

Rev Rachel Harrison: 1:51

I started Recover your Soul after having profound changes in my life from my recovery of alcoholism, codependency and control addiction. I was guided to share the tools and principles of spirituality and soul recovery to help others transform their lives as mine was transformed. For us to overcome external circumstances, we need to turn the attention to ourselves, focusing on our inner change and healing. Positive results in our lives will follow. Welcome to the Recovery Soul Podcast. I'm Rev Rachel and I just thank you so much for choosing to spend your time with me, whether you're new to the soul recovery community, or you're coming back week after week, waiting every Monday for this episode to air, knowing that it is going to help you to transform your life, and I can't thank you enough for those of you who either text through the new application or you can text me directly from the show notes, or people email me I get DMS on social media. You're sharing with me that the soul recovery work is transforming your life and my life was so transformed to know that I can share my own experiences with you and that from those experiences, from the teachings of soul recovery, from spirituality that you are indeed having transformation too, is so, so, so incredible. So thank you very much for trusting me in your life. Together we're doing the work that will recover your soul. It's incredibly profound in all levels. So if you were here, it is by no mistake, that's. All I can say is that Spirit has indeed brought you here to learn how to use the tools and principles to better your life.

Rev Rachel Harrison: 3:41

Last episode we talked about criticism, and we talked about it from the perspective of people being critical to us as a main focus of that particular episode to empower ourselves through being able to witness somebody else's reflection to us and to maybe even go back and see if we can see something that we need from the button that we feel was pushed when they give us that criticism that could be healed, and that's a very, very powerful experience to truly be able to look at. Why are we taking this personally? What is going on with us? Are we taking this personally? What is going on with us? Well, in this episode I wanted to flip the coin because I think it's important that we're always looking at all aspects. Soul recovery is about learning to love ourselves completely, to be honest with ourselves and to heal deeply in all ways in our life. So in this episode I wanted to reflect on when we are judgmental or critical of others, because they are really mirror reflections of each other, and I think it's really important that we don't overlook the need for us to look at ourselves with compassion and honesty. And I know that sometimes, oh my gosh, sometimes those blind spots, those places where we don't think we have a place to look, is where some of the most powerful and deep healing can actually occur.

Rev Rachel Harrison: 5:16

Before I started, I looked on my phone to see what does criticism actually mean in the definition in the dictionary and I thought it was really interesting, because criticism is the expression of disproval of someone or something based on perceived faults or mistakes. And what I love in this particular definition is a couple different things. One is it says perceived faults or mistakes, and the other one is disapproval of someone or something. And I think this is fabulous because this is the core of soul recovery. This is foundational teachings of soul recovery that we are learning that we're powerless over people, places, circumstances, that our desire to control anything outside of ourself causes us suffering. We're going to feel the feelings, we're going to be upset, but our desire to change it, that we have disapproval of it. That's where the suffering is, and the suffering is this clinging, this attachment, this wanting for it to be different. And then the second part of this is perceived faults and mistakes. Perceived faults and mistakes. Now, I love this because, in soul recovery, one of the foundational teachings that I hope that I am getting across is the value of starting to look at judgment.

Rev Rachel Harrison: 6:48

We are taught judgment from the very, very beginning Good, bad, right, wrong, yes, no. Good girl, bad girl, good boy, bad boy. We are taught that somebody is right and somebody is wrong, that you are going to get rewarded or you're going to get punished. So of course we have judgment in us. Of course this is how our brains work.

Rev Rachel Harrison: 7:14

The most fundamental and primitive parts of our brains are always looking for how can I be safe? How can I be safe? What's the right thing to do? How do I stay in the line? What is the way to figure out this system so that we can make sure that we're not going to be eaten by lions, right? How are we going to have shelter? It's very primitive and if you think about animals who don't have the frontal cortex and have this other thought, you see that they stay very rigid within their instinct. So, if you think about it, animals can come out of eggs or be born to foster animals or people, and they will still behave in some very specific ways because of their primitive thinking.

Rev Rachel Harrison: 8:07

But we have a higher level of reasoning. We have the ability to start to look at more complex thoughts, creating more complex systems. But a lot of what happens to us is that we get stuck in this very, very old, rudimentary way of being that is black, white, black white, right, wrong, right wrong, and that's perception. So, ultimately, what's fascinating about looking at expanding the way that you think about things something. Recently, I just had this like visualization that we are all these brains and I might have said this in another podcast, who knows. I've been thinking about it a lot but we're all these brains and each of our brains is uniquely our own.

Rev Rachel Harrison: 8:55

The only thing that we think came through here. It came through how we choose to see it, and so every situation is through our own perception, this perceived fault, this perceived wrong. So when you think about the fact that there could be oh, let's look at my family, right, so there's four of us If we looked back and we had each of us sit down and tell our story not the victim story, not the story about woes me, but the empowered story, where we look at our lives and we feel our feelings and we really share what it was for us and how we experienced it and how it created our belief systems there would be a lot of situations that mirror the same that you could say, yeah, that sounds like they all lived in the same house. There is absolutely no chance that it is perceived the same way for all four of us. We experienced it completely unique to ourselves, and this desire that we have to have it all line up, that the people in our lives will experience it the same way that we did, or see it the same way that we perceived it, is really going to cause us insanity, right? It's going to cause us harm. It's going to cause us upset, because we will be going around and round and round trying to show them how the way that we saw it is the way that it should be, and that's not true. The way that each of the parties, each of the players in that scene, in that situation, how they experience it, is their truth for them. So what's interesting about judgment is this concept around disapproval. Right, that we disapprove of someone or something and we perceive that they're either having a fault in how they're handling it, or what we're trying to do is we're trying to fix, save, make it be better, right, what we're trying to do is we're trying to fix, save, make it be better right. That's our piece of us being codependents, or enablers, or people pleasers, that we're showing up with this perception of disapproval, not necessarily because we think they're terrible people. We have a disapproval because we think that if they would just do it a little bit different, it wouldn't be so hard for them.

Rev Rachel Harrison: 11:35

If you're ready for soul recovery, as a spiritual coach I can support your healing to help make real changes that will bring you a life of peace, happiness, connection and abundance. You can also work in smaller groups by taking a deep dive in a Zoom workshop or with me in person at a retreat or an event. Join others on the Soul Recovery Path, once a month for the free Zoom support group or daily on the private Facebook page. Visit the website recoveryoursoulnet to book coaching sessions with me or find all the information you need about soul recovery dates that are coming up and how to register for those groups and workshops. To support the podcast and the community, check the links in the show notes to make a small monthly donation or a one-time donation of your choice. That will make a huge impact to support this community and the soul recovery mission. Together we can do the work that will recover your soul.

Rev Rachel Harrison: 12:32

Okay, so this was a big piece for me in looking at myself and it was a painful part of my journey to truly look in the mirror and recognize that I had a lot of criticism that I had for the people around me and because I'm a nice person. I didn't think of it as criticism. I thought of it as being opinionated and or stubborn, which is still sometimes not that great. But the truth was that it all came out of this desire that I had to improve the situation, or a protection for myself, a protection for my own pain. So we're going to come at this at a little bit different angle than we did at the last episode, which was really around.

Rev Rachel Harrison: 13:29

Someone says something to you. They're saying why are you doing this? What's wrong with you Is what they're basically saying you should be doing something different. I don't understand why you're being like this. Why don't you drive like this? Why don't you do this? Why can't you put the dishwasher like this? Why weren't you this kind of a wife or mom or daughter or son or friend? Why, why, why, why, why? Why can't you, or you should, you should be doing this right, and when we take those in, we feel the intense pain of inadequacy and our own pain around how that makes us feel, and I talked about it being the buttons that we have on our chest right. So I'm not going to redo that. We did that last episode.

Rev Rachel Harrison: 14:17

So flip the coin and here we are, on the other side and we're saying to them you should, I'll just use rich as usual. You should talk to your employee like this. You should do this in your next thing. You should. Why why don't you just call him? Why are you texting him like that? Why don't you say this? Why don't you do that?

Rev Rachel Harrison: 14:43

Now, look at that on the flipping of the coin on the side, where I'm the one who's giving the advice that he's perceiving as criticism. What I'm really trying to do is fix or understand or have curiosity as to what is going on with him, right? So Rich has this ongoing situation that he's had for the entire time that I've known him. That is around communication with the people in his life, and I have been trying to fix it for 32 years. I've been trying to make it quote unquote be better for him, and it's a place of massive frustration for me and has continued to be so way less than it used to be. Right. I was so upset with him about the boys for so long, particularly around Alex and how he treated Alex, and it was around communication.

Rev Rachel Harrison: 15:38

Well, now I'm watching myself in this more awakened state in this place, where I recognize that every thought that I think every action that I have, every word that I say is powerful and will create the world in which I live in it's cause and effect. Cause and effect works for everyone in the situation in their own world, right? So if we're sitting at the table again with looking in on this scene, this movie that we're talking about, we each have our own scripts of how we perceive the movie. We all are bumping up against our own cause and effect and yet I'm spending more time and energy trying to fix his cause and effect. I care deeply about my husband and it's hard for me to watch him be bumping up around some of these reoccurring same situations, but I find that when I'm irritated by it, when I'm critical, I'm disapproving of how he's handling it. But if I'm coming from a whole place, if I'm coming from my soul, recovery, heart, I care about him and I care about how he feels and I'm curious and interested about what his process is and what's really going on with him, so that I can ask questions that aren't critical or giving unwanted opinions and I can just listen and be present for him, because the truth is most of the time when people in our lives are reflecting what's happening for them, to us. They're just asking to be witnessed.

Rev Rachel Harrison: 17:32

And I noticed that when I'm in criticism, when I'm in a place of judgment, I'm really just protecting myself. Again, it's like the button, but a different way. I'm protecting myself because it's uncomfortable for me to have the people around me be upset. I don't like people being upset. And it actually is another place where I have a belief, my self-righteousness, which is one of my defense mechanisms, that thinks that I could maybe have it be better for him, that I would know better that if he would text this person in a certain way or if he used these certain words. But you know what I'm doing. If I do that, I'm denying him of his cause and effect. I'm denying him of his ability to bump up against whatever it is that he needs to bump up against.

Rev Rachel Harrison: 18:29

And when we start looking at criticism and judgment from this new perspective, that when we start to lift the veil of how we choose to see it, this perceived wrong, and we recognize that everyone's just doing the best that they can with what they have in their own mind right, like everything that we have is through our own perception, there are these elements of how we are in the world that we've all agreed upon. But there's really the truth that how we choose to see it is the power to make a different choice, in kindness instead of in critique, in awareness instead of judgment. And I'm telling you, it's not easy. It's really a muscle that has to be grown and shifted because we were so, so, so, so, so socialized early on to have this whole thing that someone's right and someone's wrong. What I think is so fascinating about looking at my past, with my family in particular, and just being present with more attention to my own feelings, instead of trying to interpret other people's feelings or fix it for them or defend myself, that I can actually hold space for everyone's experience and allow it to have a space of um. It's really deep compassion for everyone involved. It's really an awareness that this cause and effect can be incredibly painful, that when we are being critical of others, we're actually protecting ourself in a way that is harming us again. Now people again are going to be making choices that we are judging and maybe we're critical of.

Rev Rachel Harrison: 20:41

Maybe I'll just use my house, for example. My mom, who I love so much, is very tidy. She's a tidy person. Her house is tidy, her yard is tidy. The art that she makes is precise. She's a tidy human being. I am not tidy. My house is not tidy. If you come to my house right now, there's construction projects, there's materials projects, there's materials. We are eclectic, interesting couple is what we are.

Rev Rachel Harrison: 21:14

I could think that she's judging me, or I could judge her right. This ability for us just to hold space and just to see that we're just people for exactly who we are, that I don't need to critique her for being so tidy. I could come up with all kinds of words. I could, you know, create a whole story about what that is, but the truth is it's just who she is and I am just who I am. And I could create a story that says that she judges me and thinks that I'm who I am and she doesn't like it.

Rev Rachel Harrison: 21:49

She did make a comment when she bought her house that she drove around the neighborhood to make sure that there wasn't a house like the Harrisons, and you could hear that in whatever way you wanted to. She chose to pick a neighborhood that doesn't have a house like us, that has a bunch of stuff in the front, and I'm sure we irritate some of the people that we live next to, to be honest, but I have no judgment about their connection to me, what they think, and the truth is that when we have more space of letting go of criticism and not thinking that people are perceiving that we're perceiving they're doing something wrong, we can actually start to have conversations that are without that heavy air of you should be a certain way, and we can ask for what we need. One of the great models is when you blank, I feel blank and I need A neighbor could come to us and say when you guys have a bunch of building materials in your front driveway, I feel worried that it's going to stay there for a long time and it doesn't reflect good on the neighborhood and I'm wondering if you could do some work to pick them up Now. That'd be totally reasonable and the truth is we're not quite that bad, but it could be that bad. So when we use those whether it's an innocuous situation like people asking a neighbor when you put your trash cans in front of my such and such, I can't get my car out and I need you to put them someplace else we look at facts instead of a whole bunch of perceived wrongs, and we can use the same thing when we're talking about family members and something that we might be more critical about. For Rich, for example, he has this ongoing communication style, or whatever this is that he's got to work out on his own, his own cause and effect. This is his work to be doing of how to interact with people, right, and I am working so, so, so hard to turn the attention to myself, to work on.

Rev Rachel Harrison: 24:02

What is it within me that's feeling irritated right now? Because that's telling me something that I'm irritated. Right, that's my GPS system telling me that there feeling irritated right now Because that's telling me something that I'm irritated. Right, that's my GPS system telling me that there's something for me to look at. But there are times when he'll come home from a job site or from being with some people and he's just he's feeling agitated, and so then he'll pour out all of his agitation If it's too much, if it's feeling overwhelming, if I feel like I need a boundary or I need to say something instead of being critical, instead of my mind going to.

Rev Rachel Harrison: 24:36

Well, here's what you should do. And did you tech this person this way? And if you would only be like this and if you could finally communicate with people like that. That's me being judgmental, that's me being judgmental, that's me being critical of him. But I could say, when you come home and dump all your frustration out on me, I feel overwhelmed and stressed out by it and I need you to temper back what you're sharing with me and please be sure to include the stuff that's going great in your life, because I recognize that it feels heavy, because I think that's your only experience, or the story I tell myself is that everything is really hard and that you're unhappy. Using words that say the story I'm telling myself or this is what I'm needing, this is what I'm recognizing, that gives you the power to start to communicate in ways with people that make it so that you won't be creating a resentment or being critical or judgmental, because ultimately, those are protections of you. You're trying to protect your uncomfortableness, you're trying to protect their uncomfortableness, clarity, but it doesn't necessarily reflect that all of a sudden, all communication becomes easy and that means that we have to watch that judge, critic, that we can be on other people even more, because we can have a criticism that says if you would just do your work, then this wouldn't be so hard. Cause and effect. Again.

Rev Rachel Harrison: 26:25

This is what I realized with Rich the other day. I want him to be happier, I want him to be more at ease. It can be very painful to watch him be in such upset at times, and it's not even as much upset as I might be relaying it. It's just to listen to somebody who's hurting and feeling frustrated and working through their stuff. And then I realized that when I'm critical or when I'm telling him what to do, or when I'm believing that he's not doing something right, I'm actually not letting him have his experience, which might need to be yucky enough that he's willing to do something different, and that I feel yucky enough that I need to be willing right now to do something different. And it's all around. How am I going to perceive it? How am I going to show up with it? How am I going to be in integrity and how can I actually have my voice to use clean, clear, kind, compassionate communication, to ask for what I need, knowing that he may not have those tools entirely yet, and then to stay out of judgment, to stay in my lane, to stay compassionate, to stay kind.

Rev Rachel Harrison: 27:43

It's this really fascinating dance of continuing to come back and be curious of your own self and the more that we're curious about the people that we love from a witness perspective that allows everyone to have their own opinion about any given situation, without somebody being right or wrong, the easier it is to take the critic hat off and be interested in how they see it, and to be interested in why they let their house have a bunch of stuff in front of it like ours is or not. Who cares? To be honest, I have the cause and effect of living in a house with unfinished projects. That's my cause and effect. If it was really not working out for me, I would do something about it. Truth is, I don't care anymore. I've got a lot of other more important wonderful things to do and I have. 90% of the house is beautiful and 10% is junkie. I don't care.

Rev Rachel Harrison: 28:45

So when we start looking at everything almost everything again from the step one, which is we are powerless over everything outside of ourself, it is the most transformative opportunity to get out of other people's way, out of other people's business, to allow them to have their own cause and effect, and to put the attention on ourselves and how we are going to work with the cause and effect in our life To recognize that the criticism and the judgment is often a protection, and to be with ourselves and understand what it is we're protecting and why we want to judge and why we're perceiving that there's something wrong with it in the first place. I'll close with a quote from my tiny Buddha daily calendar for June 18th that was given to me by one of the listeners in the community. It says acceptance isn't passivity or defeat. When we accept what is, we're better able to make the best of it and also recognize what we have the power to change and to do. By Laurie Dishini. And this is exactly what we're talking about today. When we let go of criticism for others, when we let go of our perceived belief that they're doing something wrong, we're accepting what is.

Rev Rachel Harrison: 30:13

If you're interested in working with me directly to work the first step or to work the nine steps of soul recovery and have some real ability to let go of this aspect of protecting yourself through judgment and criticism, I'd love to help you Also. Step one is up and available for work, the steps on your own, the coursework on the website, as I slowly, slowly roll out all the other steps as well, and I'm just so grateful for this community and for your being here today. Until next time. Namaste community and for your being here today. Until next time. Namaste for only $3.99 a month, or become a Patreon member, and on this platform you can choose $5, $15, or $25 a month to show what you want to support the show with. On both of these subscriber platforms is an entire catalog of back episodes intended to inspire and support you on your soul recovery journey.

Rev Rachel Harrison: 31:24

I really want to invite everybody to attend the free once a month, every first Monday of the month support group. This is on Zoom. Everyone is welcome to attend and by giving a like or a review and sharing this with your friends and family really helps us to share the soul recovery message with even more people. We are on social media. We are on all the platforms. I am on TikTok. You can listen to guided meditations by Rev Rachel Harrison on Insight Timer. Thank you for supporting the show. Thank you for being part of the community. To find out more about soul recovery and everything that's being offered, visit the website wwwrecoveryoursoulnet. Together, we can do the work that will recover your soul.