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Years ago my sister joined a cult. And when she gave me the opportunity to prove it and rescue her, I leapt at the chance.
She invited me to a meeting of her group and I sat quietly and listened as member after member got up on stage and spoke. What I discovered was that, yeah they were a little pushy about signing up new members but, as I had found with a coworker who attempted to recruit me to the same group, they were disappointed but good about stopping the selling if you clearly told them no once or twice.
What I had built up in my mind as a cult was really just personal growth classes that worked well for some people (though not all) like my sister and other people I know and cherish and who are not freaky cult members by any stretch of the imagination. The idea that it was a cult was a story I wrote in my mind about my sister's experience.
A concept from that meeting that has stuck with me is that other people have stories and we are better served when we stop, listen and let them tell us. Here is a description from a reporter of her understanding of the concept of stories as the group uses it:
We are constantly affixing "stories" to events rather than seeing the separation between "event" and "interpretation," and these stories are usually based in our self-righteous feeling of being wronged.
My concept of stories is, I think, somewhat different that what they teach, but it was an eye opening revelation to me and has served me well all these years. When I start to judge other people, I try my best to stop and remember that the other person might have a story I don't know.
Years ago I dated a man I thought I would marry. And then he started to disappoint me. He stopped coming by every morning on his way to work to bring me the paper and a cup of coffee. He stopped calling me and even returning my calls. After a few days of this I assumed that he no longer loved me and was passive-aggressively breaking up with me.
When he called me several days later he told me that his child was had been hospitalized and being by her bedside is what had kept him from me. I was ashamed by my judgment and the story I had made up about his behavior and my "self-righteous feeling of being wronged."
The twist after the moral of the story is that I was right and he was passive-aggressively breaking up with me. But, guess what, that twist is also a moral of the story.
Just as I cannot write someone's story for them, I can only write my own. Whether or not the ex was being a good father or a bad boyfriend all that I could control is my own feelings. Either way I did not like how I felt in the relationship so I broke it off.
And that's my story.
Do you find yourself judging other people and making up stories about their behavior? Have you ever found that you were wrong to judge someone because they had a story you didn't know? What benefits have you found come from listening before judging?
Related Reading:
Carolyn Hax at The Washington Post via the IdahoStatesman.com: Stop judging people and trying to run their lives
You'd be doing the right thing if you stopped judging her and wishing you could run her life for her. But, short of that, I suppose biting your tongue is a start. Not nattering about her every move with "other family members" would be an excellent second step.
Virginia Heffernan at The New York Times: Comment Is King
Heffernan provides an interesting look at the stories commenters make up about Pulitzer Prize-winning writer, Anne Applebaum.
Tom Bergeron at The New York Times: Does Susan Boyle Know What's Next?
The truth is, more often than not we look only for what we expect to see. I’ve been guilty of this too. Once when I was hosting a daily talk show in Boston, I greeted the studio audience before the broadcast and put them through a training exercise in applause. One woman didn’t seem to be buying it. She wasn’t applauding at all.
“Come on,” I teased. “You’re going to have to do better than that. Show a little enthusiasm.”
Minutes later, a nervous staff member came up to me in my dressing room.
“That
