The Red Pen That Chases You Everywhere

Ram Dass wrote,

“Let’s trade in all our judging for appreciating. Let’s lay down our righteousness and just be together.”

Everyone hears that as advice about other people.

It is really about the person you judge most.

There is a red pen that follows you through the day.

You know its work.

It marked you this morning, before your feet hit the floor.

Up too late. Moving too slow.

It grades your sentences while you are still saying them.

It reviews your face in every reflective surface.

It scores the parenting at bedtime.

The email, after you send it.

The thing you said at lunch, on a loop, at midnight.

Too much. Not enough. Again.

The red pen never runs out of ink.

And notice the strange part. It is almost funny.

You judge yourself for judging yourself.

Why am I like this?

Underneath, two fears keep the pen in hand.

The first you know.

Without the grading, you would slip. Get careless. Become someone worse.

The second is quieter. But it’s the real ache.

You no longer know what your own company feels like.

Have you spent one ungraded, uncritical hour with yourself!

You’ll discover what nobody ever told you.

The red ink is not what you think it is.

Once you see what it is actually made of,

the pen loses its powerful grip on you.

For good.