I’m Andrea Giles and you’re listening to the Heal from Infidelity podcast,
episode number 164, The Price of Judgment.

Hello and welcome to the Heal from Infidelity podcast where courageous
women learn not only to heal from their spouse’s betrayal, but to become
the boldest, truest, most decisive and confident versions of themselves
ever. If you know there’s more for you than the life you’re currently
living but don’t quite know how to get there, you are in the right place.
Stick around to learn how to create a life that will knock your own socks
off. Is it possible? It is, and I’m here to show you how. I’m your host,
Andrea. Giles. Are you ready? Let’s dive in.

Hi, everybody. Welcome back to another episode. Today, we are going to be
talking about the price of judgment. Before we jump into that, I want to
let you know something.

Earlier this week I dropped a quick last-minute announcement saying that
the day that this podcast is released, which it’ll be going out on November
15th, I am hosting a free class for anybody to attend about how to handle
triggers during the holidays. It’s going to be a really important class,
really jam-packed, valuable class that you’re going to leave with some
actionable things right there in your hand, and I want to let you know
about it.

I decided last minute, hence the last minute announcement, but if you are
listening to this now and didn’t know about it, I want you to know that you
can still access the replay. It will be available. It is totally free. I
want you to have it. The replay, if you are coming to this after the 15th,
you can find it on my Instagram. I will be sending out an email with the
replay. Make sure you’re on my email list. All of that is available on my
website and it will also be in the show notes.

All right, now on to the price of judgment. I decided that I want to spend
a whole episode talking about judgment because it’s something that feels
really, really important and powerful when we are right in the throes of
infidelity, but that may be not having the effect that you think it is or
may not be helping you in the way that you think it might be. For example,
this is something that I see a lot. I see couples that are meeting with me
trying to figure out how to connect with one another, but it is very easy
for one to jump into judgment of the other, which instantly closes down the
conversation.

For example, it can be the person who was betrayed remembering some of the
things that the person did and going into judgment and a perfectly good
evening can be ruined and they can be disconnected and feel angry all over
again even though nothing that day actually happened. There’s nothing new.
Or it can be the person who did the betraying who is judging their partner
for having such a hard time with it. And rather than connecting with their
partner, they are pulling away, they are judging and there’s that
disconnection.

The reason why this is such an important topic and why I decided to do this
episode is because we cannot get to a place of connection and healing until
we learn how to manage judgment. We cannot have real connection and healing
and growth and the kind of intimacy that we want when we continue to judge.
All right, so what is judgment? That description that I’ve said might sound
mostly like judging another, but I want to talk about judgment in all its
forms. In this context today, the definition I’m going to use about
judgment is this.

This is from the Cambridge Dictionary, to express a bad opinion. I will add
to think about opinion, not just expressing it, of someone’s behavior often
because you think you are better than them. Another definition is to form
an opinion or decision about something or someone or something often based
on thoughts, feelings, and evidence. To me, that is a form of judgment, but
that’s also a little bit more in the realm of discerning, which is based on
facts and evidence.

Whereas what I’m talking about is judgment highly based on emotion where we
simply cannot see the data because we are so emotionally flooded with
judgment. This is what I’m talking about today. We are feeling a judgment,
a bad opinion of someone’s behavior and often it’s because we think better,
that we’re better, that we do it different, that the way we do it is
better, that we would never do the thing that they did.

I hear this all the time, “I would never do that thing.” And that may be
true, but what is missing in judgment is context. What is missing in
judgment is compassion, being able to see more than just the bad thing that
we’re viewing. Okay? The types of judgment that we’re going to talk about
today are one, judgment toward others or judging others. We are seeing
them, we’re seeing the way they’re doing things, we’re seeing the way
they’re handling things and we are thinking they’re doing it wrong and if
they were a little better, they would do it a little better. Right?

A second form is self-judgment. Often we flip-flop between judging others
and judging ourselves. This is when we feel overwhelming guilt, shame or
self-reproach, self-judgment. The third is societal judgment. This is a big
one when it comes to infidelity. We’re going to get into that. Okay? Now
what’s the difference between judgment and discernment? As I mentioned,
discernment is when we, from a very calm place, we’ve collected data, we’ve
collected the facts, looked at it all, and using wisdom.

I think discernment is coming from a very wise place within us. We are
making decisions based on our own wise self. That is discernment. Judgment
is condemning, judgment is unproductive. Judgment separates us from others,
so if you imagine a couple sitting on the couch talking with one another
and something is said, something is done where the one is suddenly judging
the other, it instantly is emotionally pulling them apart. And if you can
imagine one person standing above the other with their arms folded, kind of
looking down at them, that’s what judgment does.

You are no longer sitting on the couch, even if you physically are, you’re
emotionally standing above the other person with your arms folded, looking
at them sometimes in disgust. Now, how does judgment affect both partners?
Let’s talk about that. All right, so for the betrayed partner, let’s start
there. When the betrayed partner is feeling betrayed and hurt and angry,
sometimes ragey, right? And they feel judged for the way they feel, it can
just amplify all of it and make them feel even more unsafe. In reality,
there’s something that they are hurting.

I mean, they’re hurting obviously from the betrayal, but there’s something
that in that moment they might be needing that their response of their
partner is not only helping them to obtain, but it’s making it worse. Often
what we are seeking when we’re in those intense moments of hurt and anger
and betrayal is reassurance. We want to know that we’re cared for. We want
to know that it didn’t mean that we weren’t lovable.

It didn’t mean that we didn’t do the best we could in the way that we did,
that we didn’t drive our spouse to go have an affair. Right? Those are the
things we need assurance of. And when one partner goes one-up and is
thinking that they somehow are doing it better, it is very damaging. It
drives a bigger wedge and it can amplify. Not only can it drive a bigger
wedge to where the person that was betrayed feels even more betrayed, but
it can amplify feelings of shame, embarrassment and isolation. I am alone.

I am alone. I’m embarrassed and I’m ashamed. And we can go to a place of,
“Maybe I am taking this too hard, maybe I am doing this wrong. Maybe other
people would not be hurt by this, but I am so what’s wrong with me?”
Self-judgment can lead to self-blame and it can lead to really intense
questioning of self-worth. You can see how stepping into self-blame can get
blown up really, really fast and how this can happen from the person who
betrayed, judging the person who is feeling hurt. It is disconnecting and
can just amplify all of it.

Now let’s talk about the person who betrayed. All right, they are likely
feeling feelings of guilt and shame and fear of being judged harshly. And
when we are judging, when we go to a place of black and white statements
about that person, “You are this, you are that,” it can amplify all of
that, it can lead that person to thinking that they are just a big failure
overall, that there’s nothing that they can do right and lead them off into
their corner of feeling ashamed and like they can’t get anything right.

They want to avoid talking about anything, that they can’t handle any of it
because it just makes them feel so bad about themselves. Now, part of the
problem here, this is part of the sabotaging nature of judgment. What we
really want, instead of them being like, “Yes, I am a loser. Yes, I know I
hurt you. Yes, I know that I just am this terrible person that did this
thing.”

Although we think that we might want to hear that, what we really want is
for them to take accountability and ownership of what they did and of their
healing restoring process. That’s what we actually want. When we come at
them in judgment, it is probably not going to get us what we want. Because
we are humans, we react as humans do. When we feel attacked, we wall up or
we lash out.

When we can soften our approach, when we can come at things with curiosity,
it can open things up to where you can see is this somebody who is willing
to take accountability? Is this somebody who is willing to own all of it?
Not just the things they did but how they’re trying to restore. Intense
judgment from others, because we are human, especially if it’s coming from
many places, can lead somebody to be less inclined to take full
accountability because they’re living in so much shame. They just want to
duck and cover all the time.

It is doing the exact opposite of what we actually want. The more we can,
and I know my dear listeners, I know this is a tall ask, okay? I know it’s
a tall ask, but the more we can grow our ability to approach things in a
way that we are seeing them as we’re sitting next to them, not above them,
we will get better results. It will go better for us. We will feel better
about it and we will get more of what we want.

Even if that means seeing that this person, even when we brought the very
best of us forward is still not willing to sit next to us, that they will
go above, they will go below, they will not sit next to us. This is stuff
we need to know. Okay? The impact on the relationship from judgment is a
slow corrosion that’s going to create a barrier to vulnerability, to trust
and to open communication.

Who wants to talk to another person if they always feel like they’re in
trouble or if they always feel like they have to guard every word they say?
No one, right? And what this can lead to as well is when people are
flip-flopping on who’s shaming who, you can get into what’s called a shame
spiral where both partners feel stuck in a cycle of blaming and resentment
and guilt. They go back and forth.

This time this person feels that, then this person feels that and we get
nowhere. To really heal, we’ve got to be able to sit there next to each
other as two individual self-respecting people who can see each other and
meet each other eye to eye as humans in a human experience. This does not
absolve the person who’d betrayed from accountability, big-time
accountability, from really owning things, from really showing up, but what
it does is it makes it really so much faster when we are not constantly in
that dance of flip-flopping between judgment and shame. Okay?

Now, what do we do when we so quickly go into judgment? It’s so easy to go
there. Right? I know. It’s so easy to go there. There’s two things that can
burn judgment down, that can break it apart, that can soften it, empathy
and self-compassion. We will never be able to fully understand why anybody
does anything, not fully. You know why? Because we are not that person. We
have not walked in their shoes. We have not lived their life.

We have not experienced every single thing that they have experienced. This
is the same for siblings, people who are raised in the same home. Right? We
will never fully understand, but what we can do is try to understand. I can
see how you might have felt this way. It takes enormous maturity to be able
to get to this place where we can have empathy for the situation of another
even if it really, really hurt us.

This is big-time maturity. But when we can practice empathy and trying to
understand and meeting people where they are, it moves us right out of
judgment and right into sitting next to each other. I want to make a really
important point right now. This exact thing, everything that I’m saying is
applicable even if you know you’re leaving your marriage. Once we have
collected the data, which is something we talk about all the time inside my
program is what is it that I need to be looking for?

How do I acquire it? How do I grow into the person that can get that
information and manage myself and be kind to myself and hold onto myself
when I’m hearing things that might be challenging, right? Anyway, sometimes
once we’ve collected the data and seen the data, we can see that it is not
good judgment to stay with this person, that we will never be fully equal,
that we’ll never be able to sit next to each other in a way that is truly
reciprocal and we decide to leave.

Leaving from a place of empathy and leaving from a place of judgment feels
very different inside our body. Even though we might have every right in
the world and anybody can tell us that they agree with us and, “You go,
girl,” whatever that may be, you still have to carry the weight of judgment
inside your body and guess what? It doesn’t feel great. It doesn’t feel
great. Try on empathy. It is really sad that this person is making these
decisions.

It’s really sad to me. It’s disappointing. I wonder what is broken for this
person to continue to do things that are sabotaging themselves, keeping
themselves from healing. Right? Empathy goes a long way in healing. I know
it’s so easy to just be like, “They don’t deserve it. They don’t deserve my
empathy.” But let’s talk about you and what it can do for you to feel
empathy rather than judgment. What if it’s for you? It’s not for them. It’s
for you.

It’s for you to get more of what you want. The other big tool for working
with judgment is self-compassion. Self-compassion and self-forgiveness for
both parties. Okay? Self-compassion is such a gift in softening our
experience with ourself and recognizing where these stories came from that
are so loud and so painful. Self-compassion can help us to really
understand why we keep going to judgment and why it’s pretending to keep us
safe and is it actually keeping us safe, is it actually working.

I recently was talking with a client and she was telling me how she is
keeping herself at arm’s length from her spouse, really just keeping her
distance. And I asked her a very important question about how she’ll know
when it’s time to let her guard down and her answer. She thought about it
and then her answer was that she has done it. She’s gone all in, given it
all again after the betrayal and then there’s been subsequent lies. And so
with her, this is not going into a place of judgment.

This is going into a place of self-compassion into recognizing, “This is
how I’m going to take care of myself. This is how I’m going to protect my
heart and this is very intentional. This is not judging him, it’s not
judging me. This is me using really good discernment to know that right now
it is not in my best interest to open my heart back up.” Often we think
that compassion and self-compassion means being boundary-less and I want to
say that that is not true.

Letting go of judgment does not mean excusing or dismissing the betrayal.
It actually means approaching it with honesty, accountability and respect.
This is difficult to pull off. It requires a lot of maturity and it will
set you free. This is what will help you heal. Being able to set boundaries
and learn how to do it in a way that’s respectful for both parties without
being in judgment. Okay, so how do we pull this off? As mentioned, first of
all, empathy. Second of all, self-compassion.

Now, let’s look at what this looks like in real time. This looks like open,
honest, I bet you know what I’m going to say, communication. It means
talking openly without judgment. It means telling the truth even if it’s
hard to say, even if it’s hard to hear. Right? This can look like coming to
your partner and telling them that you feel really vulnerable, sharing what
you’re about to share and that you recognize that it might be really hard
for them to hear, but that in an attempt at connecting and healing, you are
going to say the thing that’s in your mind and in your heart.

This can be done by having daily check-ins of just like, “How’s it going?
How was your day? What highs and lows? What was good? What was hard?” Of
course, expressing appreciation. Okay? Sometimes if it gets too difficult,
you might need to call in a third party. It could be seeking professional
help to help you learn how to do this. I want to let you know that this is
the work that I help my clients do every day inside my program, Get Your
Life Back After Infidelity.

That is a group coaching program for women where they are learning how to
be bold communicators, strong communicators, how to sit with empathy and
kindness while also having boundaries and taking their time inside my
program to give themselves the gift of growing themselves so they can bring
all of that to their relationships. I also work with couples who are to a
place where they are really wanting to see if they can make an honest go of
it, but know that they don’t have the tools.

I do this as well. If you want more information about these things, go down
to my show notes. You will find it there and you can reach out and we can
talk more about working together. Your way through to connection,
especially connection with yourself is through dropping the judgment. Even
if you know you’re leaving, when we have these really harsh judgments of
what happened, really harsh, definitive, “He just was this, he just was
that. I just wasn’t enough.

I just wasn’t good enough.” You’re going from judgment of him to judgment
of you. You cannot heal in that space. You cannot heal there. We have to be
able to see more, see the humanity in each other, see where people came to
where they are. Even if we can never fully understand it, trying to is
going to open things up so you can heal.

It’s going to open more space inside of you to heal. Okay? Couples who do
this work and who find a way to get through the judgment and soften into
seeing each other in their wholeness as this is somebody who’s capable of
this thing and they also are a lot of other things and being able to see
that in each other. My spouse is not who I painted them to be to the affair
partner.

These were things that were hard in the marriage, needs that I had that
were not being met that I blamed my partner for that I never communicated
to them. Having compassion for your spouse that you never went to them and
said, “Hey, I want more of this. Hey, I’m not happy in this way.” Right?
That’s what it looks like. I want you to know that I understand that this
is difficult. I understand that it requires a lot of growth, a lot of
healing, a lot of discipline, a lot of intention.

I also know that you can do it. I also know that you’re capable. You would
not be here listening to this podcast if you did not have at least in part
some kind of mindset around your ability to grow. I believe in you fully.
One last thing here. I invite you to just listen and take stock and
inventory on where you are judging others and where you are judging
yourself, and I want you to offer yourself alternatives.

I want you to know what it feels like in your body when you are judging and
when you are in judgment of others, in judgment of yourself and offer
alternatives of what you’re going to try instead. Practice self-compassion.
How can I be kinder to myself? What else am I missing here? What am I not
giving myself credit for? Right? Compassion for the other. What am I
missing? What am I not seeing? What else is true besides this piece that
I’m going all in on? Right?

All right, my beautiful people. I appreciate you being here. I hope you
find this helpful and I will talk to you soon. Bye-bye.

Thank you for listening to the Heal from Infidelity podcast. If you would
like to be kept in the know about upcoming free classes, new podcast
episodes, and other ways of working with me, go subscribe to my weekly
email. You can subscribe at andriagiles.com/lies-about-infidelity/. Again,
it’s andriagiles.com/lies-about-infidelity/. I will see you next time.