Do you find yourself judging the activities and decisions of other people frequently?  Do you feel judged by your activities and decisions?  Do you give a shit?  In this episode I talk about how there's no such thing as good or bad, rather just value statements that we make on one another.

After watching my channel, there will undoubtedly be value judgements that you've placed on me.  You may hate me, you may think I'm a decent guy, you may think I'm a shitty electrician, or you may think I'd make a great leader.  Either way, I'm none of those people.  I am me.  I'm just some guy, living on the earth, who like the rest of the 7 billion of us here...have NO idea what's going on or how we got here.  I'm nobody special.  I'm just a guy.  Anything you think I am or am not is YOUR judgement on me, and has nothing to do with the truth of me being me.

We are all many different versions of ourselves depending on who we are around, or the situations we find ourselves in.  For instance, with my wife I'm a deeply introspective, dorky, nonsensical goofball hell-bent on tickling and making smile the woman I love every day.  At work I don't talk much, I try to lead and make decisions, and I work more than I talk.  To my closest friends, I have deep conversations about some of the most profound topics humanity could be having.  I'm caring and I'm always there for them.  To my son I'm a teacher of life and death, love and hate, and what it means to be a man....and also a bit of a goofy nerd.  With my parents I'd probably watch clean humor, with my friends I'd most likely throw on George Carlin, Bill Hicks, or watch the whole of East Bound And Down.  When I'm around customers I talk cleanly and respectfully.  When I'm with my homies I cuss like a sailor and no topic is too far to joke about.  I'm a lot of different versions of myself everyday, for my entire life.  We all are.

So how is it that we can make a value judgement about any one of us?  Well, its because of a feeling we get about their opinions or actions based on what WE feel, or have been taught to think by other opinionated people or groups of people.  There's nothing wrong or right about any decision I make.  There's just decisions I make.  Everyone is trying to be happy at the end of the day, and an action or opinion becomes "right" or "wrong" when it's met by another persons evaluation of it.

Say we know a person who's lived 50 years on this planet and has only done what we as a society call "good."  They've given to charity, they're involved in their religious affiliations, they help out others around them, and stand for injustice in the face of adversity.  We call this a relatively "good" person right?  Well what if on their 51st birthday they molest a 12 year old child?  Now they're a monster in the eyes of society.  They should go to jail, be punished, or be put to death according to the news and most people in this country.  Everything they've done through their entire life has been wiped away because of this one action.  Is this person good or bad?

Lets look at the reverse example.  Say we have a person who's lived 50 years of terror and horrible decision making.  They've been in and out of prison, may have killed some people, maybe they've manufactured and distributed narcotics, and have been involved in years of gang violence.  We as a society would call this person "bad."  But say on their 51st birthday they meet a person who wakes them up, and changes their entire perspective on life.  They suddenly become a love-centered individual, fall in love with a woman, have kids and raise them well, and turn away from a life of crime.  We would say this person has really "turned their life around" and would consider them "good" all of the sudden.

Why do we do this?  How can we judge an action or opinion of one person regardless of an entire lifetime of work they've done in the past?  How can we classify a person as good or bad, when life is long and ever-changing?  We can't.  We do, but it is inaccurate to measure someone based off of OUR value system, when they may not have the same value system as we do.  We make people good or bad by deciding they're good or bad.  Until our judgement of them, they were just a normal person living on this earth, making decisions and trying to survive so that someday they can die....just like the rest of us.

My point is, stop having so many high expectations of other people.  Stop judging people for the path their on and how gracefully they're dealing with the things life is throwing at them. We only have control over 50% of life at any given point.  50% is just shit that happens to us that's outside of our control.  The other 50% is what we do with it.  So stay in your lane, and do what you can with your 50%.  And let others do the same.

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