A number of years ago, I was looking for a new project to do. I like to do things like knit and cross-stitch, but I wanted to try needlepoint. I looked online for a place close to me that specialized in needlepoint but didn’t find anything closer than the next state!

A couple of weeks later I was running an errand and stopped in at a hair salon that sold a product I used. I noticed the store next door had handcrafts in the window so I went in. It was a needlepoint store! And it was only a few minutes from my house. I browsed through the shop and visited with the helpful and friendly owner as I asked her questions about needlepoint.

I mentioned that I had been looking for a store like this online and hadn’t found it when I searched. The owner said that her husband was supposed to get a website up and running, that they had the domain name, but that he hadn’t finished it.

I didn’t say anything, but in my head I was saying stuff like: That’s ridiculous! In this day and age, if you don’t have a website, you might as well not be in business.

At the time, I had a website. Was it current and driving people to find me and my business? Nope.

The next time I looked at my website I realized that everything I had said about this other business owner’s lack of a website, applied to me.

So I found a software program, downloaded it, then reconstructed and updated my website. Much better.

Since then, I have noticed that every time I have a strong “judgment” about someone or something, it always applies to me, too. This has been a very useful observation.

Here’s how it usually goes:

Step 1: Notice something and judge: “Tom never picks up after himself.”

Step 2: Immediately see that it also applies to me: “Well, I don’t always pick up after myself, either.”

(Notice how Tom “never” picks up after himself but I “don’t always” pick up after myself? So much easier to judge others.)

Step 3: Decide to pick up after myself first and once I have done that completely and totally (It’ll never happen!) I will ask him to pick up after himself.

This three-step process, which is fairly automatic these days, has saved me a lot of time stewing over insignificant (and some not-so-insignificant) things that used to bother me. Now, I often spend only a few nanoseconds in resentment mode, rather than the hours I used to spend when I was younger. Once in a while, though, it still takes me a while to realize that I am judging someone else so strongly because I see a flaw in myself. I’ll repeat what I said earlier: It is so much easier to judge others than to judge ourselves.

The next time you judge someone—and we all judge, all the time–notice where the judgment also applies to you. Then do what you thought that someone should do. Once you have done that perfectly, then you can return to judging them.

I bet you’ll never go back.