Journey entry 1

The way you judge other people is the way they will judge you. While not a very religious person, this is one of the teachings of Jesus that I remember from my childhood. The whole idea of judging people based on what you see them doing is a tricky business. Sometimes we attribute a person’s actions to a certain motive or personality trait without stopping to consider that there might be context in the situation we are unaware of. This is called a fundamental attribution error. Making this type of mistake can lead to misunderstandings between loved ones and hard feelings between coworkers. Making fundamental attribution errors is very easy to do. All it requires is the belief that everyone is basically just like you. If you view others only through the lens of your own understanding and experiences, you will start to attribute motives to their actions that are similar to the motives that would cause you to behave in that specific way. It is especially easy to judge another person when you feel that they are basically like you and then they react in a situation that is different than the way you feel you would have reacted if placed in the same situation. In your mind, what they did was wrong. Exercising this sort of judgment opens yourself up to making fundamental attribution errors because you are not taking the broader view of the context of the person’s actions. In my life, I know that I have made this mistake when judging other people. I have been on the receiving end of other’s fundamental attribution errors as well. One of these happened fairly recently. Being on active duty in the Air Force is an exciting career. I am lucky enough to currently be stationed in Japan. Seeing the world is something I have always dreamed of and now I’m getting a chance to do it. I did not think this possible at one time because I am a single parent. Having all of the responsibility of raising my child by myself is difficult, and I often wish I had someone to help share the load, but I have found that careful planning and prioritizing my life make being a single parent possible. Recently, my co-workers and I were in the middle of a big inspection. I made a dentist appointment for my daughter in the middle of the inspection because that is when I would get her to see the dentist. My co-workers accused me of scheduling the appointment so I could get out of the inspection. They said I wanted to avoid answering questions about my job. What they didn’t know was that I was going to be deployed in a few weeks and my daughter would be returning to the States to stay with my parents. Her dental records needed to be updated before she could fly back to stay with her grandparents. My co-workers thought I was avoiding work, but what I was really doing was taking care of my highest priority, which is the care and keeping of my daughter.