Geoff Thompson: Writer – Teacher – Martial artist

My friends, my friends, my friends, I have been at it again and I have to confess before I explode. I have been judging others and man I am so disappointed with myself. My judgement has not been the usual out-in-the-open criticism that is as ostentatious as it is futile, I have not been on web sites unkindly questioning people’s character and attacking their values and their families, nor have I been on the politician-bashing band wagon baying for the blood of the dishonest and the naive. No, my judgment has been more subtle than that, and perhaps even more insidious; it has taken the form of ‘smug, sardonic noticing’.

I have been ‘noticing’ the people that are overweight, drunk, addicted and cynical, I have been smugly ‘noticing’ the critics and the hypocrites and the undereducated. More than anything else I have been ‘noticing’ and judging the judgers.  Noticing in and of itself is not such a bad thing, to have a widened consciousness is to notice what is going on in the world, nothing wrong with that.  But I find that when my noticing is smug (as in, noticing how very clever I am and how little others know) it quickly fattens into an out-and-out judgment.

And to judge others is as great a sin as you can get, even Jesus warned against it in the bible when he said ‘judge not lest ye be judged.’ So I have stopped judging and I have instead started to re-humanise people, looking instead for what they are doing right as opposed to what they are doing wrong. I have also forgiven myself ever so quickly for my judgment because to judge myself is no better than judging others. To err is human, and I am nothing if not an imperfect man in search of the Perfect. We all make mistakes, even monkeys fall out of trees, the key is to acknowledge the sin and atone, or in other words correct the error by exposing it to the light. Here is my exposure, here is my atonement, it is aimed squarely at myself; it will serve me, I hope it serves you.
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There has been a lot of talk lately about the integrity of our peers, or rather the lack there of. The heads of politicians are rolling hourly because of dishonest expense claims, greedy bankers are being lambasted daily for their fat bonuses in a time of fiscal emaciation and anyone, in this sickly climate of blame, deemed to have sinned is being hung, drawn and then mercilessly and publicly quartered. You might argue ‘good riddance!’ What goes around always comes around, and I would not refute your argument; the reciprocal universe is nothing if not exacting in its affairs, it offers no clemency for position, it shows no favour to colour or creed or ignorance, like time and the tide it can neither be bartered with nor threatened.  I have always been patently aware of cause and effect, and as a man that has been around a few corners and broke – at one time or another – most of the commandments, I have felt the lash of karma on my flesh and it was not good. I am a man of some experience and I have learned to take wise council from this immutable law, and employ it now only to the good. I do my very best to keep my integrity when it appears that all around are losing theirs. As I said at the beginning of this writing, I do not always succeed.

And although I am never less than stunned by the lack of intelligence displayed by the governing literati (and at times by myself) the people I see losing their integrity most of all are not the politicians with expense-stocked duck ponds or the bankers with their fat conscience, rather it is us hypocrites who sell our honour (usually to the lowest bidder) from behind a pint jug in a pub bar or from the comfort of our cosy front room where we are blinded to our own error by a self-deception that is often jarring. And the price asked for our character is pound-shop cheap; spiteful vindication, delicious revenge, or maybe just a little greasy, gossipy arousal from the message board Mushasis who hide cravenly behind a pseudonym on the world wide web. The worst offenders of course are usually the biggest sinners – and I include myself here – you will know them well, because they shout their vitriol the loudest (and they keenly ‘notice’ the glaring sins of others but not themselves). They attempt to hide their own errors and weaknesses by attacking the errors and weaknesses of others. You can guarantee one thing; the bigger their indignation and the wider their campaign the greater their own sin. In psychology they have a name for this rancorous projection; it is called Reaction Formation; we savagely attack in others what we most despise in ourselves. We try to hide our own error by pointing out the error of others.

Does this mean that we should keep our mouths shut and our opinions to our self and not bring the sinners and the hypocrites and the liars to book? No, it doesn’t mean that. Every action causes an equal an opposite reaction, so each individual karma must unfold, and people will always find themselves outed and ousted for their crimes against their fellow man. So fear not, even without the merciless and insatiable demand for the letting of blood, seven pounds of meat will be served up and thirty pieces of silver shall be delivered. Everyone has to suffer the consequences of their own actions, because ultimately all crimes against the other are crimes against the self. But we should all be very careful of what we wish for, because public hangings, even in the metaphor, do not make for pleasant viewing. You might think that the cadavers of fat politicians, voracious bankers and discredited businessmen are just-deserts, but remember this, they are still people; someone’s husband, someone wife, some one’s daddy. People are killing themselves out there!

Suicide is a cruel and lonely way to leave this coil, so let’s be very careful not to send another human being to the rope with our un-kind, un-Christian and often unimaginably savage judgment. As a man that once filled his boots to the brim with sin and suffered the terrible and subsequent atonement I am not worthy enough to tell you what is right and what is wrong, nor am I stupid enough to make the mistake (again) of judging you for judging others, I am just asking you to make your tread careful and be considered on your path, because it is not just dreams that are being trampled here, it is souls. We should all remember this and take heed; when our turn comes to be judged by the God Almighty in heaven or by the god awful here on earth – and that might sooner than any of us might imagine or like – we will be weighed and we will be measured by the same scales and we will be treated with the same consideration.

In conclusion I am directed to the Christos on the Mount of Olives when the Pharisees and the scribes brought to him an adulteress and asked for his direction; ‘should she be stoned for her sin?’ they asked. Jesus bent down and wrote in the dust of the temple, ‘Qui Sine Peccato est Vestrum, Primus Illam Lapidem Mittat’ which translates as ‘he that is without sin amongst you let him first cast a stone at her.’

So if you are without sin – and I certainly am not – start collecting your rocks and fire away and I will be the fist to place myself in your firing line. If however you really want to be of service, to yourself and to your fellow man, put the rocks of hypocrisy back down and instead pray for those that are losing their jobs and their families and their lives because of past errors, and hope that when your time comes to face the consequence of sins that you have forgotten or that you think time has forgotten but that karma has not, some one will pray for you.

I will certainly pray for you.

Be well

Geoff Thompson