Book...open...closed...and judgement

"Do not judge a book by its cover."

So goes the saying.

Wisdom is - we should defer our judgement long enough so that we do not misjudge a  person or a thing. Read the book and then may be develop a judgement. Many times appearances can be very deceiving.

We are also worried about people judging us. We know that everybody judges a book by its cover. So, we try to make the cover as attractive as possible. We dress up very well. We groom ourselves well. We fret about our bodies and its lack of perfection and so on and on. All because we are not sure if our cover is good enough.

Of course, there is nothing wrong about making ourselves look and feel at our best. Regardless of subjective opinion on anyone's bodily appearance, anybody can look at their best and also feel at their best with little investment of time and effort. Keep yourself as healthy as possible. Take care of your appearance to level you can afford to. Spend a little time in grooming yourself. Voila! you look and feel good. No doubt it all. Nothing wrong in it.

But, still we will be worried about people judging us by over cover (i.e. our appearance and mannerisms).

So, let's think about a minute. If there is a book lying open on a table, what do you think a person who walks to the table going to do? Is he going to judge the book by its appearance? Or do you think the person is most likely to pick it up, glance through it and may be even scan through a page or two?

Which is more likely? I bet the person is going to pick up the book and glance through it.

I think nobody is going to judge an open book as they judge a closed book. Closed book has the cover that draws attention. That attention is going to judge the book by its cover.

On the other hand, open book does not have that liability of cover. It's open. At worst, it gets neutral judgement or at best it gets judged little later with little deliberate effort and thought.

So, how about if we start making ourselves like open books?

Does that reduce our worry about being judged based on our cover?

May be to some extent.

Living a life that is akin to an open book is the best policy. That way people can read you and judge you for what's in the book than its cover.

Living an open life does not mean you have to wash all your dirty laundry in the public or  have to fess upto all your itty bitty details. Most of them are inconsequential or have a very limited shelf life.

Bigger thing is being you own self all the time. Not acting like someone that you really are not. Being totally comfortable in your own skin.

Ask yourself. How often you identify phonies? Very often. As soon as you find somebody acting artificially, you can easily find that out. At least most of the time. That is very repulsive.

So, just be thyself and enjoy. Let people read you if they are interested. If not, they can judge you by cover or inner cover or dust jacket or whatever. Why do we care?

Cheers!

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