When Everything Feels Like an Indictment
—and how to survive your Inner Judge
I stood in the kitchen and saw the heap of dried dishes that needed to be put away.
“Put them away!” my brain screamed at me.
“No, go pour yourself another cup of coffee!” my body screamed back.
I knew what the problem was. The heap of clean dishes had become to mean something. Putting them away would make me a “good” wife and mom. Not putting them away meant I was a “bad” one.
Here’s the problem: if every action or inaction you make is an indictment against yourself, you will never live. Never move. In a world where every move you make “means” something, or every failure to act “means” something, too, your life becomes intolerable. Paralyzed. Because every action or inaction is black or white. Good or bad. Right or wrong. Left or right. Potato or tomato. You get the idea.
We talk about living in grey, but I wonder if that is too scary for some brains, like mine. Scrupulosity sets in. If it’s grey, then it’s both a little bit bad and a little bit good, but on which side does it fall MORE? If it does fall more on one side than the other, then it’s either more black or more white, and if it’s more black, then it “means” something about me. Indictment.
But what if instead of black or white or grey, things were neutral? You did a load of laundry? Neutral. You didn’t? Neutral. You helped your son with his homework? Neutral. You didn’t? Neutral. I have to admit, for my obsessive-compulsive-prone mind, using “neutral” is both freeing AND dangerous. What if I’m wrong? What if it’s really black or white and I’m just pretending?
The truth is, for parts of me that lean toward excessive self-judgment, using the word “neutral” can be a helpful tool. Because those black and white parts are harsh. Judging. Excessive. They don’t just label “black and white” to the “big” topics in life, but to the small, just the same. Everything I do or don’t do carries moral weight. There is no middle ground.
And maybe “the middle” is neutral. Neither black nor white. Neither left nor right.
I know that neutral may be just as scary for some. Because maybe it’s too ambiguous. Their Inner Judge rises up and says, “No, you must take a stand! You must fight for what is right. You must fight for what is wrong.” But what if what is right vs wrong is the very Inner Judge itself that is constantly evaluating? Maybe that Judge has to wave the white flag in no-man’s land once in a while and just say, “Neutral.” Because sometimes, labelling something “neutral”-- even when it feels uncertain – can be a simple, kind gesture toward making peace with our own humanness.
“Because sometimes, labelling something “neutral”-- even when it feels uncertain – can be a simple, kind gesture toward making peace with our own humanness.”