April gave me kudos the other day on sharing this link about accepting things without judgment. It’s very good advice and it’s one of the reasons I shared the post on Google Reader.
It doesn’t stop there though. There is more to talking about good and bad than accepting things as being.* Those two words are unproductive. They shouldn’t be in your vocabulary at all.
When I was back in school, Janeann wouldn’t let us critique pieces using those words. It was an excellent rule and one that was surprisingly difficult to break the habit of. We evenually got there and it was amazing to see people really consider their words when you can’t use such vague, subjective terms.
Same program, the year earlier: I was working on an installation project with a bunch of classmates. The topic morphed into “good vs. evil.” Seriously, this was the theme. And the discussions and debates we had over what images should be used drove the instructor insane. With excellent reason: I played devil’s advocate and decided the letter “a” was good and “z” was evil. Things that were smooth were good; jagged was evil. What is this? It’s nonsense. And we knew it; we were in on the joke.
But the reality is that the words means nothing to anyone but you. They don’t help you communicate anything worthwhile.**
Keep in mind that things simply exist and the judgement you attach to them does nothing to change them. It’s the actions you take. But go even at step further (closer?) and realize that even talking about things in such ways doesn’t help anyone understand you. It doesn’t help anything change or improve. Be explicit, clear and honest. And find ways to improve those things you disagree with.
* For most of my professional life, until sense was somehow beaten into me, I was accused of being negative. In reality, in my head, I was simply pointing out reality. Even worse, I was usually proven correct once the future caught up to us. In the last year or so, I’ve tempered this quite a bit and have learned to pick my battles.
** I have to check my movie reviews to see if I have been lazy by saying, “This movie was good.” I hope I haven’t and shame on me if I have.