You asked me not to judge you.
What a bizarre predicament.
“Don’t judge me” . . often said
As if behind the words
Lies meaning like weighted lead;
“Don’t you dare judge me,
You don’t know,
My life’s so hard,
You don’t know
What it’s like being me.
How can you know?
You’ve never been me”
Et Cetera . . . listen
I’m your friend and I’m here,
Let me give you some advice.
.
.
.
Firstly, don’t forget you know me
As little or as much as I know you.
We only have a working knowledge
Of ourselves and ‘the other’,
The ‘I’ and the ‘you’.
With this limited knowledge
We fashion the ‘us’ and the ‘them’,
The ‘others’ for our world.
Secondly, forget how worldly wise
You are, or how far you have reached,
Or how many trails you can trace.
In the realm of your own mind is
Your only place,
That limitless but bounded space,
Where you can know what’s going on.
.
.
.
As to what the others see,
Welcome people to judge you.
Live your life so you can be
Sure of yourself and your actions.
Remember others in this and
You’ll find their judgement will
Be often favourable.
Take the criticism.
Appreciate well-founded criticism.
But don’t change until you feel you have to.
Until you judge that it is necessary.
Not when someone else takes issue,
With something you have said or done.
Without, grasping the overall picture,
Without, knowing what’s really going on.
.
.
.
We all judge all the time.
Whether we study or work,
Entertain or perform,
People have to judge us.
Our audiences judge us,
We judge each other
On the limited knowledge
We have of one another.
On appearances, conversations
And the attitudes that
We suppose people hold
Because of the way we see them act.
We do this because we have to.
To make sense of the world to survive.
No-one really knows what’s going on.
.
.
.
I think the problem is
That you see yourself,
Through my eyes,
Forgetting
I know as little as you
– Cam, 2009