Assessment Vs. Judgment

Recently, I started my journey into Orthodox Christianity. My explanation for why I am deciding to walk this path will come in a future post, for now, I would like to expand on a topic I discussed yesterday with the Father at my church.

Once a week, we meet up in the library at the church and the father answers any questions I have and then also educates me on the faith and all of the traditions inside of it. The library is a small room filled with books written in Serbian and Russian, along with beautiful paintings of saints, priests, and religious icons on the walls.

Outside of Sunday service, the father has this black robe on which starkly contrasts his white hair and beard. He has a thick accent, but he speaks very gently and has an answer to almost every single one of my questions.

Yesterday, the topic of judgment came up and he explained why it’s wrong for us mortal men to judge because it is our creator’s role, not ours.

I crossed my arms and pondered this for a moment, something wasn’t adding up.

I said, “But how can you not judge someone? We’re always judging. For instance, if I’m talking to a potential client, I am judging whether or not they’re going to be worth my time. If I’m talking to another man, I’m judging whether or not he’s high value or low value. How do you stop this? It seems to me like it’s just a natural part of human interaction, no?”

Very calmly he responded, “That’s assessing, not judging.”

Damn.

He’s pretty dang good at answering questions in a very short, straightforward manner, using the least amount of words possible.

I love how much clarity he brings me in such a simple way.

He continued, “The difference is that judgment is seeing what someone is doing, and then condemning them for that action. For instance, you see someone sinning and then say “Oh they’re going to hell.” That’s not your role. You can see what someone is doing and say to yourself that it’s wrong, but you should just leave it at that.”

And I really liked that, it was a good way to differentiate the two actions.

On my drive home I thought about how many people nowadays say, “Stop judging yourself” or “That’s very judgemental of you.”

When in all reality most of the time we’re not judging. We’re just assessing.

Think about how stupid it sounds to tell someone, “Oh just stop assessing yourself!”

You should constantly assess yourself and others.

There’s nothing wrong with it.

You assess someone to determine if you want to continue to spend your time with them, whether it be in a friendly setting, business setting, or intimate setting.

For me to look at someone and go…

“They’re a low-value individual, more than likely they have self-confidence issues.”

Is NOT me saying “What a piece of shit, nobody will ever love him, he should really get his act together otherwise he’ll die alone.”

But for some reason nowadays, that’s how an assessment is interpreted.

I think a lot of this has to do with how fragile some people’s egos are. They can’t take any form of constructive criticism, the second they hear it, they shut down, get defensive, and take it personally.

But love ain’t lies.

If you truly care about someone, you’ll tell them your true assessment of them.

I have this friend in the digital marketing space, he has an extremely shady past, he’s transactional in relationships, and from time to time you can 100% see his darkness. I acknowledge this fully and it’s why I don’t do business deals with him and just keep him as a friend.

All of this doesn’t change the fact that we have amazing conversations, and we both have an extremely messed-up sense of humor, so most of the time when we talk on the phone we’re laughing our asses off.

I accept him for who he is, I don’t need him to be anyone else, It’s not my role to judge his past.

The other week he was ranting and raving to me about how he wants to take out one of his competitors, how he’s the best, and how he wants to take over the industry.

I just flat out told him, “Dude I think you’re acting very insecure. I guarantee you (Name of Competitor) doesn’t think about you at all like this.”

Silence on the phone.

“Yeah, you’re probably right.”

I didn’t judge him, I didn’t say he was never going to accomplish anything because of his insecurity and need to be better than everyone else.

I just told him flat out, hey this is what I think of you.

And he respected it and took the feedback.

Normalize this in your interactions with high-value men and I guarantee you’ll gain their respect.

Most of these guys are surrounded by “Yes Men” who agree with everything they say, so to be the guy that just tells it how it is, makes you insanely valuable.

Believe me, they notice.

Just make sure it’s only an assessment and not crossing the border into judgment.