Letters to the Editor
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well done
Thanks to the LW for being up front, and thanks to Cary for answering so elegantly and helpfully. It's easy to sit there and judge, hard to wade into the muck and offer help. The LW is in a prime position of strength. S/he should use it.
Also, as someone who's fucked up many, many times, I can tell you that judgment reeks of fear. We can smell it. It comes off you in waves. Help us out, LW. Ask questions. Don't just sit there in your glass castle. Some of us are dying for someone to know what's going on.
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Tobbar is exactly right
LW can also think "lucky and smart me!", everytime she confronts another dumb numbskull.
She can comfort herself with the thought that she will be sitting pretty, retiring early probably in a nice place, while these dunderheads will be stewing in their juices wondering where they went wrong, or worse yet, where others PUT them wrong.
There IS justice in living a decent life.
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Yeah, give it up for more stupid advice
Help us out, LW. Ask questions. Don't just sit there in your glass castle. Some of us are dying for someone to know what's going on.
Yeah, that'll work. Then she will be the perceived 'know-it-all' who can't but rub it in.
One thing I finally learned, people do not WANT to be helped and they will DESPISE you for trying to help them.
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Unchallenged
First, I commend the LW for her wish to be less judgmental, although one could describe her reason ("I tell myself that I need to stop passing judgment because one day I'll make a huge mistake in life and I wouldn't want people judging me") as a bit selfish. She's afraid of what goes around comes around and of the judgment of others.
Don't confuse living straight and narrow with choosing a life that has presented few challenges. And being lucky.
You were lucky enough to meet your life partner in high school, someone who loved you back enough to marry you, thus sparing yourself one of life's major opportunities to fuck up. If you are lucky, you'll be spared that pain. You don't mention a career (I'm talking about doing something that has meaning for you as opposed to something done merely to bring in a paycheck) or kids, but those are also things that can bring great satisfaction or bite you in the butt.
I married my college sweetheart--who also was my "first"--and he proceeded to cheat on me twice (that I know about) during the first 12 years of our marriage. I divorced him after discovering affair #2, and to this day I don't know for sure if it was the "right" thing to do or a mistake. That relationship will always color future ones, as I will probably never completely recover from the heartache (it's been 20 years, and perversely, a part of me still loves him). The point is that it was his behavior that forced my hand. I made a couple of very bad decisions in the turmoil of that time. Divorce, job loss (the company went under) and a move cross-country to be with a man I thought I loved (a big mistake), and another major relocation (for a job and to get away from that rebound relationship) led to debt (for the first time in my life). In short, a mess, triggered by the fact that the love of my life had fidelity issues. I absolutely admit I made some bad choices, but those choices would likely have never have come up had my ex not cheated on me, because I really loved the guy with my whole being.
Oh, and the job with company that went under? It was with a startup that had appeared to be a reasonable risk. I had left a "safe" job I loathed for a position that was, for me, pretty close to my dream job. The startup company told me they had the financial backing to keep the company going for at least a year--but then that backing pulled out and the company folded in under 3 months. Was that a bad choice? In the short term, sure--it was a financial catastrophe for me, as I was in the process of divorce and had very little savings. In the long term, it was a professional experience that was probably an important stepping stone to other, better jobs some years later. So did I make a bad choice, or was it just one of life's curve balls?
The point is that my life might have turned out very differently had these 2 events not happened. Had my marriage remained intact and the company flourished, I would have been spared terrible heartache and a period of debt that took me about 3 years to remedy. Bad choices? Or simply rolling the dice of life and taking my lumps?
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LW, go on being judgmental
Those criticizing you are themselves being judgmental-- and hypocrites. Maybe you just have standards. Keep them.
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Mistakes
I have known a few people who would say they "are just too sensible" for mistakes. And I've found that while passing judgment, they are often in the midst of what I would consider huge mistakes, but not of the sleeping with a married man or buried in debt variety. The most prominent of these mistakes is the continuing in a serious relationships with a man/woman who is not emotionally available, etc., but with/through whom family ties have been made as well as practically unbreakable habits and routines. These friends have been "too sensible" to get the hell out, and the mistake won't rear its ugly head for decades, perhaps, but by then the town harlot will have worked off her credit card debt and settled down with a loving, non-married individual who enjoys motorcycling in the Tyrol in summer.
Lots of times, sensible=rigid. Folks with the idea that there are wrong and right ways of doing things live and think in black and white. I agree mostly with the idea that they tend to pass judgment in fear of the possibility that a big mistake is just waiting for them. Don't fear it! Keep living sensibly, knowing that a big mistake now could be a worse mistake 20 years from now, but the outcome isn't necessarily so bad. These things work themselves out. Is a life without mistakes worth living? Well, sure, I guess. But I'm not sure I know anyone who isn't swimming in something unpleasant.