I made an observation back when I used to grow my own vegetables and herbs: Relationships are a lot like plants.
What I mean is that you can usually tell how a personal or professional relationship is doing by looking at its fruit. A relationship that is carefully tended usually yields fruits of peace, joy, meaning, and exponential growth. But a relationship that is suffering from disease or neglect usually droops with sadness, fear, anger, or anxiety.
The fact is that both plants and relationships are meant to be nurtured. They both require some cultivation in order to grow and blossom.
So then why do our plants sometimes blossom while our relationships suffer?
The short answer is judgment.
Judgment is like pumping poison onto the greenhouse of our relationships. Nobody likes being around someone who is judging them. No relationship can survive the unbearable weight of constant judgment.
And the simple solution is you.
Have you heard the old saying, “Do not judge to not be judged”? That’s because it’s true.
You are the core – the bar that sets the standards. When you focus on reducing the amount of judgment in your life, you can remove your mask first. It’s only when we stop poisoning others with our judgment that we begin to cultivate and thrive.
You’ll be amazed at how your relationships will change and grow without judgment!
AIM: Aim to improve your key relationships by looking through a positive lens at the circle of people around you daily.
FOCUS: Take today’s challenge: How many times have you judged yourself today? How many times have you judged others? Think about what you can learn and what you can model.
GROW: Awareness is the first step to growth. Looking for common ground gives way to growing where most would think is impossible.
Curve to Success LLC is about staying curious, exploring your possibilities, and seeing the life you crave come into focus. It’s about putting our personal lives and our organizations, back together and on track simultaneously. It’s not a quick fix, it’s a wild and outrageous invitation allowing for some crazy, unchartered, and sometimes unexpected outcomes with delightful insights yet frustrating predicaments – raising the lid, growing personally and professionally and through the process our organizations allowing ourselves to be put back together through being the best version of ourselves and the organizations we are a part of.
Vicki Tomlinson shares more than 30 years of experience in growing people, and the organizations they are a part of.
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