David Truman - Judge Not Thyself

Jesus: Hey, brother! How are you?

David: It's been a fantastic day. Interesting day. We did that presentation about the dehumanization of people in the industrial society. I was very happy about that. The industrial age.

Jesus: You did a great thing today.

David: Thank you. Appreciate that. So what did you have in mind today, brother?

Jesus: It is just a simple understanding I thought I should share with you. You know, mankind was not meant to judge himself, was not meant to be in that position exactly. You know what I mean?

David: I can see the bad results of it, THAT I can see.

Jesus: Yeah. He is meant to be able to feel. But it is largely by means of the attraction of the heart towards goodness, rather than some kind of judgment.

David: Yeah. Or intellectually analytic process, possibly?

Jesus: Yes, yes, yes. So, now, a man says, "Are you a man or a mouse, my son? Are you going to jump into that pit of fire and get your mother's ring, or not?" And the kid goes, "Well, I guess I must be a mouse," examining his situation.

David: In other words, the criteria for being this or that have been set forth, and now one is supposed to analyze oneself in accordance with the criteria.

Jesus: Yeah. But the problem is, when it becomes that, the person is divorced from their natural heart. When they are in the position of judging themselves, it is based on their ideas. When they are simply following their heart, it's based on the heart.

David: Yeah. And he could have known in his heart that going after the ring would be foolish. His heart would know that. But now, his mind has an opposite analysis, or judgment based on that analysis, that directly contradicts all his true reason, his feeling, his intuitive awareness of things, and the relative values. "Am I to burn my hand off in order to get a silly ring?" The heart would know.

Jesus: Yeah. And that is very similar to what people are doing in many ways. They are burning their hand off to get a ring and calling that virtue.

David: Yes, that is true.

Jesus: So you see, in the old legends God told man (this is not really exactly how it went, but since this is the human legend I shall use it): "Don't eat from the tree of knowledge of good and evil." They ate it, and then they felt ashamed and so forth, thrown out of the garden. You see? When mankind decided to judge himself as if his intellect could do that, he created an endless misery for himself. You know?

David: Yes. I could say, "If I could jump over that table in one bound, I'm a good person. If I couldn't, I'm a bad person." So I decided that this was the measure of personal worth. Then I tried it. I happened to fail to jump over it. Now I'm a bad person. What we see in the industrialization is, if I FEEL, I'm a bad person. If I don't feel, I'm a good person. So therefore every time I feel I judge myself as weak. Feeling means weak. Love means endangered.

Jesus: Passion means bad in many cases.

David: Yeah. So when I said, "That's true," it was because I suddenly remembered this basic aspiration to be a kind of a stainless steel person that I criticized in my talk today.

Jesus: Yeah. And throughout the ages, you were not allowed, for example, to love somebody too passionately if you are not married to them. Even now that is true.

David: Yeah. It goes on and on. And in fact a man is not allowed to love a man too passionately.

Jesus: A man is not allowed to love a man. A man is not allowed to have female friends who he cares deeply about if he is married. And a woman is not allowed to have male friends she cares deeply about if she is married.

David: And if they do that they are a _____.

Jesus: Bad.

David: Or unfaithful, fickle, whatever the words are.

Jesus: Yeah. And, you see, they have an idea of integrity that has nothing to do with integrity. They create their own ideas that have to do with selfishness.

David: Give me an example.

Jesus: Three sisters are given an allowance of $5 each. They go to a market and there are many, many pretty things. But over in the one corner there is a very desolate looking woman, obviously beaten down by whatever her life is, poor as poor can get, with a little box for a table, and bracelets made out of the most unattractive material, whatever she could find, not high quality stuff. But there she is, gaunt, having pulled this together in the hope of making a buck or two to be able to eat. And the sisters are shopping. One of them decides she will spend her allowance at this woman's table.

They walk on from there, and her sisters say to her, "Did you really like those bracelets?" She had to pretend she did 'cause they were set to . . .

David: . . . pounce on her; they would tell her that she was a fool for buying the bracelets out of compassion.

Jesus: Right. Exactly. "It's your five bucks. You could have spent it on something nice." They would make her wonder, did she do the wrong thing?

David: I remember when I was a young man, at that time maybe seventeen, eighteen, my father had a college student living in our house, and he was up against some pressure -- exams or something -- and he was whining about the fact that it was very difficult for him to get his laundry done, and take his exams and study. And I said, "Well, no worries. I'll do your laundry." And he said, "What are you, a whore? You keep THIS up, people will walk all over you. This is disgraceful." He was genuinely concerned for my welfare, sincerely in a sense, within his value system.

So yeah, we understand these things. This is fantastic. It really is, brother. This is a jewel of tremendous value. Thank you. Just let it percolate through the little layers of resistance and cogitation and we'll get something really good out of it. I promise you.

Jesus: I know it.

David: What a great thing. This is tremendously liberating! My God, man! You know, if the people could wrap their heart around this! I was about to say "brain," but I really realize they need to FEEL this thing. FEEL the implications of all these judgments.

Jesus: By what measure are they judging themselves, you see? And here's the next part of it, brother: Even if their measure sounds reasonable, even if they dictate the values of their own heart -- love, honesty, kindness, discipline -- even if they dictate that on a list and then measure their own self by that, you see, that too is a problem. Because it is a lie in and of itself that they can measure themselves that way; that they somehow find their value by how well they are doing on a scale of one to ten in ANY value system they can write down on paper.

David: Yeah, they're judging God's creation.

Jesus: Yes, their very existence! It is ignoring something profound about their very existence as a beautiful heart. It leaves that out.

David: Okay, now here's my concern. There must be a standard of integrity and perfection to which the saints have held themselves, without -- well, they did not probably do this, but ideally without -- casting judgment on what God made.

Jesus: Yeah, there is.

David: But, even though the values were valid, the judgment of the soul on the basis of values is not valid.

Jesus: The value of love is not something that you hold as a measuring stick for how well you are doing. Honesty, love, discipline -- they are not something you're supposed to judge yourself by. That is a lie about love, honesty, discipline. The value of love is found in its effect on somebody else. The value of honesty is found in the fact that it allows for unity and functionality.

David: Right, but these values are extrinsic in the sense that, even though the value of love has been realized in the healing of this person, it doesn't mean that you yourself are more or less for that. You yourself.

Jesus: No. I'm saying, you YOURSELF find the value of love in the fact that it makes somebody happy; you are not loving because you want to be a good person. You see what I'm saying?

David: Right. You find it in exactly what it can do, what it's worth. Intrinsic value of love. But you associate . . . I'm just trying to say, who you are as a heart is not defined as whether or not you live that heart. You are a heart whether you live or suppress your nature.

Jesus: It is true, but wait. Wait.

David: I'm sorry. I'm screwing it up.

Jesus: As a heart, you see, you CARE about these things, but you don't care about them as some way in which you are measuring yourself. You know what I mean? That is where the illusion comes in.

David: Yeah, I think that is actually what I was trying to say.

Jesus: Yeah, but . . . Discipline for example, okay? You'll find the value of it in its effect. It got something done that did some good. Now, it is separate from the fact of who you are no matter what you do. I'm trying to make a point about WHAT THE HEART LOVES. You know what I mean? How the heart would have a natural way of functioning that didn't need any kind of self-judgment.

David: Yeah, it was entirely independent of that.

Jesus: Yeah. You see, it would love because it wants to see the beloved happy.

David: Yeah, okay. So self-judgment is a way of either letting the self off the hook or of hating oneself, or of casting some sort of conclusion on oneself, as oneself. But that process is completely extraneous to life and to oneself. That is only: Do I destroy my self-confidence or not? Do I destroy my good image in my mind or not? That's what I can do with judgment.

Jesus: But that whole thing is a waste. You see?

David: Yeah, I see it now. That that is entirely irrelevant, and only subtractive of well-being. But it doesn't have anything to offer at all, except for damage to self-esteem.

Jesus: Or illusion of some kind.

David: Or vainglory, which would be illusory. You can do it in both directions, so-called positive or so-called negative.

Jesus: Self-judgment has NO place, you see? No place.

David: Okay yeah. I see it now, yeah. That is not it. There ARE values. The heart knows what it loves.

Jesus: The heart knows what it loves, and there are purposes that man has naturally, and they have nothing to do with whether or not I personally am a good person. There are purposes: to make people happy, to create beauty, etc.

David: Right, and then when we get this random grid of conclusions based on, "If I do this I'm good. If I do that I'm bad," that gets in the way of all the operations of the soul. All of it, because it's always just messing it up more or less randomly . . . It might inhibit the best things. It might call for great emphasis on the worst things. Which is what we find, exactly what we find.

Jesus: Yeah.

David: I got it, baby. Thank you. I see it.

Jesus: I love you, brother.

David: Pardon my density.

Jesus: Oh, no. You did good, I would say. You were pretty quick, I would say.

David: We came out of it. We're good. I'm very pleased with this. This is infinite value!

Jesus: Yeah. Let me give you one more example, okay?

A man falls in love. He loves this woman. He wants to take her into himself emotionally. He wants to be with her. He wants to commit to her. He loves this woman. Then the devil, so to speak, whispers in his mind, "Well, loving somebody this much would make you a very good person, wouldn't it?" And there you go.

David: You're kidding.

Jesus: There's the seed of . . .

David: . . . the undoing. Doubt. Because the ego would say, "I don't want to be a good person."

Jesus: Well, no. It's because it takes the whole thing and puts it in a different world. You know what I mean?

David: Oh, the world of evaluation.

Jesus: Yeah, self-evaluation, which mankind is so habituated to. SO habituated to.

David: Well, but what's the next move on the chessboard based on that statement? "This would make you a good person, wouldn't it?" What does he do now? Does he pursue it because he thinks it would make him a good person?

Jesus: His focus becomes partly on himself.

And twenty steps down the road he's working his ass off for her at his job. Trying to be as good a person as he could be. You know what I mean?

David: I see it. Ohhhhh. That is far afield.

Jesus: Far afield from where it started -- a natural loving impulse to make her happy.

David: Oh yeah. Beautiful! Thank you for that. If I had a million dollars I'd donate it to your favorite charity, in your name. Because I know you don't carry any cash. But I would give to your favorite charity.

Jesus: I love you brother. I love you brother.

David: Probably LoveTrust.

Jesus: (laughing) Yeah.

David: I like to think so.

Jesus: I love you, brother.

David: This is it, man! This is so huge. My God. It's strong medicine. It just melts the whole game.

Jesus: It's truth.

David: It's good.

Jesus: I love you, brother.