In this session, you will be learning about Judgements. By judging ourselves we ignore the endless complexity of a situation. Judgments can be directed inwards to our own feelings and outwards to other people. Judgement means we focus on only one half of the coin good or bad

1. Mindfulness Coaching
Session 3

2. Welcome to the
Mindful
Wellbeing
Workshop

3. Outline –
Session 3
• Homework Debrief
• Seated Meditation
• Judgements
• Judgement strengthens duality
• Judgement limits reality
• Judgement creates conflict
• Mindfulness and judgements
• Being aware of judgement
• Judgement Meditation
• Homework

4. Homework
Debrief
Did you practice the body scan?
If so, what was your experience?
If you did not practice the body scan, what prevented you from practicing it?
What would help you increase your commitment or the likelihood of practicing?
Did you pay attention to daily routines? If so, what was your experience?
Did you practice mindful eating? What did you experience?
Do you have any other questions or concerns?

5. Seated Meditation

6. Benefit Finding
Recall a painful event that you have experienced in the
workplace.
• What were the most negative consequences of this event?
• Now, focus on the positive aspects and the ways in which the
experience has benefited you as a person. For instance, how
has the experience helped you better meet the challenges of
the future?
• What did you learn from this experience?
• How have you changed or grown as a person as a result of the
experience?

7. Judgements
The importance of becoming aware of judgments,
without judging them

8. Judgement
colours
reality• A judgment is like a pair of
glasses or a filter. We see the
world through the glasses of
our judgment.
• A judgment stems from our
beliefs (“Uneducated people
are stupid”, “I’m always
unlucky”, “A man is not
supposed to cry”) or norms
(“One celebrates Christmas
with family and friends”)

9. Coloured perception: the influence of
judgments on perception of reality

10. A JUDGMENT
STRENGTHENS
DUALITY
Dichotomous in character – thought of in extremes – good/bad, desirable/undesirable
Judging creates duality (contrast) – opposites exist only in relation to each other
Two sides of a coin
When judging we focus on a specific half of a coin – on one of the two opposites – we don’t see the
entire coin – our reality is therefore limited to the one half (with our full attention)
At the moment that this separation takes place, we tend to hold onto the good and avoid the bad
because we see them as independent from each other – individual events that are unrelated.

11. Duality
• Opposites can only exist in
relation to each other
• A judgment focuses our
attention on a specific half

12. A JUDGMENT LIMITS REALITY

13. A JUDGMENT CREATES CONFLICT
• Suppose you feel gloomy. By judging this feeling as bad you start a
relationship involving struggle with that feeling. The gloomy feeling is
there, but it is bad and therefore undesirable.
• The moment something is judged as undesirable or bad a conflict
occurs; namely between how things are now (bad) and how things
should be (good).
• Not only can this conflict cause us to feel upset, it can also encourage
us to want to avoid or to escape from the current, as negatively
judged, situation.
• We are encouraged to expend effort to get rid of the feeling, which
often leads to the paradoxical effect that the feeling gets stronger.
• In fact, there is only a problem or conflict when a situation, event or
feeling is judged as such.

14. Mindfulness and Judgement
• Mindfulness helps us learn that people, places and things, and events are neither good nor bad,
but that our mind labels things as such almost automatically.
• Events, feelings or persons are not intrinsically good or bad, they “are” simply what they are;
events, feelings and persons. Only when we label them as right or wrong, they affect our
thoughts and behaviour
• An important part of mindfulness is to understand judgments. Judgments often happen
automatically. This is the conditioned functioning of our mind. There is nothing wrong with that
and it is also necessary to interpret the world around us.
• However, as previously described, judgments may limit us severely or can even be
counterproductive if we forget that they don’t reflect reality but our beliefs about reality

15. Mindfulness and Judgement
• By becoming aware of the natural tendency of the mind to judge,
the effect of a judgment on our functioning is reduced.
• The more we become aware of our judgments, the less our minds
will tend to label automatically
• The conversation with the person who is sitting opposite you is no
longer limited to the box in which you put this person

16. Practice: Being aware of judgements
• NOT striving to not judge – the mind judges automatically - Try to notice this
week as many negative thoughts you have about other people, groups,
yourself, situations at work. Become aware of when you are judging things.
• Become aware of and observe the judgements – try not to judge yourself
• Simply note this judgment and then return to your breathing, the anchor
point of your attention. That it happens is not bad, it is an automatic process.
And if you have a judgment, ask yourself who you really see: the
person/feeling or just your own judgment. That is how you create room for
choice again
• Once you become aware of the fact that you want to judge something, see if
you can let go of the judgment and if you can use a more objective
description in which a judgment is not or at least barely present. For example:
“He didn’t show up, therefore he doesn’t care about me” versus “I was there,
he wasn’t there”. Or: “He was wearing ugly shoes” versus “His shoes were not
quite my taste”. It can be really helpful to train your mind this way.

17. An inspiring video that shows how important our
outlook on reality is for the
way we feel about things.

18. Jon Kabat-Zinn explains what non-judgment
in mindfulness practice means.

19. Judging & Mindfulness

20. Collaboration
• As humans it is Important to connect, we connect easier with those
we trust – to build trust you need to accept people
• Be aware of judgements we make about other people
• We have little control over other people, accept that fact
• Shift our judgements and perspective – find a way to accept a person
as they are and find a way to work with the other person

21. Working with difficult people
• Accepting the person as they are – we are all different and unique
• Mindfulness gives us the ability to have difficult conversations with
emotional intelligence
• Helps us to be courageous to speak the truth
• Acknowledge own thoughts and emotions and have the courage to do
what is right
• Using empathy for the self and the other person

22. Homework• Exercise being aware of judgements at work this week
• You can use a bracelet or elastic band as a tool. Whenever you
find yourself making judgments about yourself, others or
situations, simply switch the wrist on which you are wearing the
bracelet. Do this switch without judgment, without being hard on
yourself, or negative internal dialogue. Just switch in a friendly
manner. You may become aware of how often you actually
(automatically) judge. This exercise may feel somewhat
confrontational, however, it also helps demonstrate in a visceral
way that you are becoming more aware of your thoughts and
actions.
• Do the Body Scan and seated meditation as often as possible,
preferably on a daily basis.
• As you do the “Body Scan” or seated meditation, try to pay
attention to the judgments you make during or after the
exercise: examples of judgments are; “This is useless”, “I can do
this well”, “It didn’t go well”, “It should feel different”, etc.

23. Log Book
Exercise Times performed
Observations or perceptions during
the exercise
Body Scan
Seated Meditation
Awareness of Judgments

24. Dankie
Thank you
Siyabonga
Re a leboga
Ke a leboha haholo
Ngiyabonga
Ndza Nkhensa
Ke a Leboga
Ndo Livhuwa
Enkosi
Siyabonga