I have a ?. If the bible says not to judge, don't that mean that eveything happens for a reason, so were not supposed to get upset when we get less than pleasing results in life?? also a book i read the other day " a new earth" says the same thing there is no such thing is good and bad it just "is" and that we should not judge as good and bad because its all from God. ?? what confuses me man as if were all made from God and creeated in his image wouldnt that mean that were already perfect and why do "sinners" everyone get told were not perfect when we were created by The Holy God IN Heaven and that we have to ask god to save us when he's already IN Everyone in the 1st place. Eveything is of and from God...?? im a christian, but i don't get it!!

Well freedomday,

That is a few questions all in one. I am not a theologian but was a serious Christian for most of my life. I find it more useful to see 'sin' as disconnection from God, and not God out there but God within us - which the bible mentions as: the kingdom of God is within you. So you could see it as being saved by Christ within you when you connect back with him/the source/your spirit/the universe or however makes sense to you. SOGR would put that in terms of atuning to the thinking stuff that everything is made from and is between and around everything.

It doesn't seem like God looked at his creations and said, that's no good - as you refer to - he said it was good. The pain and suffering we feel and cause seems to have come after man was expelled from the Garden of Eden. In fact it also says that now man will have to work hard to grow food etc, rather than picking ripe fruit off the trees (I have just been reading Stuart Wilde's book on Life not meant to be a struggle).

So it makes more sense to me to look at judging as a very unhelpful framework to live by. If we judge another we say they are wrong and need to change. If we judge ourselves we say the same thing. With that tends to come feelings of hatred or despair. If we accept others and ourselves as developing beings (SOGR says to see seeming evil as simply underdeveloped)then we can be happy. We can reconnect to God and let our true self shine out, which is what God wants, IMHO.

Hope that helps a bit anyway.
Pauline

My take on "not judging" is to not label something (or someone) as "good" or "bad" (because how can I ultimately know if that is true or not) but simply to decide if I want more of less of it in my life. That way, I take responsibility for my own preferences without having to judge what I don't like as wrong.

Hope that helps.

Mozz (Inveterate brightsider)

quote:

Originally posted by freedomday:
I have a ?. If the bible says not to judge, don't that mean that eveything happens for a reason, so were not supposed to get upset when we get less than pleasing results in life??

Everything you experience is FOR your greater good. The reason we get upset when certain things happen is, in that moment we BELIEVE whatever is happening is NOT for our greater good.

Of course, this is not a simple thing to understand, or else most people would do it. For example, how many people could get diagnosed with some disease, or get word their spouse wants a divorce, or get laid off or fired from some job, or get thrown into jail, get publicly humiliated or rejected, or get into a car accident, etc., and instantly feel good about it?

The answer is, probably almost NO one.

But the truth is, these kinds of things have happened to people. And there are plenty of people who, with hindsight, will tell you, “It was the best thing that could have happened.”

For example, many people diagnosed with some illness will tell you that the diagnoses was exactly what they needed to get them to stop and really look at what they were doing with their lives, and get focused on the things that were truly important and meaningful.

Or, people who have been given a divorce notice will tell you that it was what it took to finally wake them up to the fact of an unfulfilling relationship, or to how they were contributing to an unfulfilling relationship, etc.

Or, people who have lost jobs will tell you that that was exactly what it took to get them to go out and find some work that was better for them.

It’s like Nelson Mandela sent to prison, and he used those prison years to overcome and heal his anger and hate and he came out to lead his country into a new era of greater freedom.

And, the list goes on and on, for getting rejected, humiliated, sick, evicted, going broke, etc., etc.

Now, there is a ‘trick’ to life that, if you learn it, you can avoid at least some of the major painful ‘growth experiences’ (e.g., painful disease, painful divorce, painful lack of work, etc.). The trick is to pay attention to how you feel – about your relationship, your job, your self, others, your circumstances, etc. – and LISTEN to what your feelings are trying to get you to look at. If you can learn to ‘fix’ things when they are minor irritations, you may avoid having the Universe send them to you as major complications.

If you’re not happy with some part of your life, you are going to experience something to wake you up to it and deal with it. Now, you can either do that proactively (by your conscious choice) or the Universe is going to send you some kind of ‘wake up call’ like a lay off, divorce, accident, illness, etc.

It’s not that the Universe is trying to hurt you. On the contrary. It’s that the Universe is trying to give you more of the life experience you really want. And sometimes we need to be ‘slapped upside the head’ so-to-speak, to look at something to ‘get out of our own way’ or to get the courage to move forward.

"I didn't see it then, but it turned out that getting fired from Apple was the best thing that could have ever happened to me. The heaviness of being successful was replaced by the lightness of being a beginner again, less sure about everything. It freed me to enter one of the most creative periods of my life." Steve Jobs -- Stanford University commencement address, June 12, 2005

Steve Jobs, the co-founder of Apple Computers, was forced to resign from the company in 1985. He formed a new company called NeXT. In less than ten years he made it a new super power in the computer industry. In 1996, Apple bought NeXT for $429 million. Not bad for someone forced into resignation.

"One day Socrates was walking down a street with some friends when a nobleman approached. As was customary, Socrates greeted him, but the nobleman walked straight past, declining to return the courtesy. The friends of the philosopher were angry at the nobleman but Socrates used the incident to teach a lesson.

'Suppose,' said Socrates, 'you meet a man on the street with poorer clothing than your own? Would that make you angry? Why then are you angry at a man who has poorer mental habits than you possess?'

The friends of Socrates were enlightened by hearing of this totally new way to respond to a so-called insult." ~~The Daily Guru~~

“I remember being taken off the air in Baltimore, being told that I was no longer being fit for television,… And it wasn't until I was demoted as an on-air anchor woman and thrown into the talk show arena to get rid of me, that I allowed my own truth to come through.”

And, in her late thirties, after being born out of wedlock, black, in poverty segregated Mississippi, sexually molested as a little girl and, as a teen becoming rebellious, pregnant and losing her baby, later experiencing a very painful, unfulfilling relationship, etc., etc., she said:

“I trust that everything happens for a reason, even when we're not wise enough to see it.” - Oprah Winfrey

You said you thought the “do not judge” message might be a message telling us we “shouldn’t” get upset with things. But that’s not it. It’s not that we “shouldn’t” get upset about certain things. It’s just that, when we DO get upset we need to learn that we can take that as a cue for some GOOD possibility, instead of just having the knee-jerk reaction that “this is something bad.”

In a nutshell: If you are upset with something, immediately STOP and tell yourself: “This is some kind of wonderful opportunity. This is some kind of wonderful opportunity.” That alone will help set you on the right course.

You may not know what it is right away. But, somehow, someway, whenever you’re upset, you’ve been handed some wonderful opportunity. It may be like digging for gold. The opportunity may be completely hidden, but it is always there. Your job is to find it, discover it, and have it more you forward, into more of the life you really want.

“Every adversity contains within it an equal or greater opportunity.” -- W. Clement Stone, created a personal worth of over $500 million in the 1960s

Phil

quote:

In a nutshell: If you are upset with something, immediately STOP and tell yourself: “This is some kind of wonderful opportunity. This is some kind of wonderful opportunity.” That alone will help set you on the right course.

I'd fine-tune this just a bit. Instead of making a statement and telling myself anything, I'd ask a question:

"Why is this actually an opportunity to receive a much greater benefit?"

"How is this going to turn out to be a benefit?"

Starting with what we'd PREFER to experience as if it's already true and then turning it into a question can help bypass that "Yeah, but" stuff.

It can also set our subconscious minds on the track of finding all the reasons why this will turn out fine.

See, when we've just been hit by something that in the moment feels awful, our conscious minds simply aren't going to believe it's good. So if we're going to choose the good, then we just sidestep the conscious mind, and we can do that directly by questioning.

The point is NOT to come up with answers right now -- that's your conscious mind. The point is simply to point the subconscious in the direction you want to go.

A little mental aikido, if you will!

Try it. I've got whole notebooks full of empowering questions (and that's just the ones I write down!)

quote:

If the bible says not to judge,

Well, I'm no Bible scholar, but I'm guessing you're referring to Matthew 7:1 in the New Testament where Jesus says: "Judge not, that you be not judged. For with the judgment that you pronounce you will be judged, and the measure you give will be the measure you get."

Here's how I look at that statement:

In the very moment that you are judging someone else, it's really YOU who is the one being shown up, because whatever you see in someone else, you're really just looking at a reflection. If you're willing, you can easily see how true it is that, in one way or another, anything you judge somebody else for is something YOU have done, too.

And the second part about the measure you give being the measure you get, well, that's Law of Attraction, pure and simple. Whatever you focus upon -- whether to embrace it and say "yes" or to judge, condemn, fight against and say "no," you're always giving it energy and attracting more of that sort of thing to you.

quote:

Originally posted by freedomday:
I have a ?. If the bible says not to judge, don't that mean that eveything happens for a reason, so were not supposed to get upset when we get less than pleasing results in life?? also a book i read the other day " a new earth" says the same thing there is no such thing is good and bad it just "is" and that we should not judge as good and bad because its all from God. ?? what confuses me man as if were all made from God and creeated in his image wouldnt that mean that were already perfect and why do "sinners" everyone get told were not perfect when we were created by The Holy God IN Heaven and that we have to ask god to save us when he's already IN Everyone in the 1st place. Eveything is of and from God...?? im a christian, but i don't get it!!

Freedomday, I think in general, the Bible says not to judge PEOPLE. We do not know what is within someone to say, "that person is good or bad." We cannot see them as God sees them. We cannot know what things have brought them to their decisions and choices. So we can love in every situation. I think there is a general benefit to deciding what are good and bad behaviors FOR SETTING STANDARDS FOR OURSELVES. And God does that too. Government does that as well, for the benefit and happiness of everyone. But I think He wants us to be happy.

Having said that, as experiences come to us, what is the value of getting caught up in something being good or bad? Often, the thing has already happened and calling it good or bad doesn't do much to change it. There may be value for introspection, but defining it in those terms does not usually benefit us. In fact defining something that APPEARS to be bad, as good, often has great results in how we feel about it.

I think everything happens for a reason. Either because of the nature of life, God's will, or our own contributions through our thoughts and actions. But in any situation, there is value to us, if we choose to see it.

Sin can be an opportunity for us to try again, return to alignment (for me returning to my SOURCE--God) But most people don't see it that way. God loves us whether we "sin" or not. And we should too. When we realize improvements need to be made, we make them. It's that simple. One of the meanings of repent is change your mind. 70x7 if necessary.

Finally, I do believe God is in us, but we are not God. We are not perfect. We are striving for that, but relying on Him and His Son, helps us to draw closer to that state.

These are my beliefs. With respect to others and theirs.