A young couple moved into a new neighbourhood. The next morning, while they were eating breakfast, the young woman sees her neighbour hang the wash out to dry.

“That laundry is not very clean,” said the young woman to her husband, “she doesn’t know how to wash correctly.”

Every time her neighbour would hang her wash to dry, the young woman would make the same comments. “I can’t believe she lets her family wear those dirty, dingy clothes.”

Several weeks later, she looked out that window, and the clothes were just as bright and clean and beautiful as could be. She was so surprised. She called her husband and said, “Look! The lady finally learned how to wash. I wonder what happened.”

The husband smiled and said, “I got up early this morning and cleaned our window.”

The problem was not that the neighbour had dirty laundry. The problem was the window she was looking through was not clean. She was seeing everything through a tainted filter.

And so it is with life: How dirty our neighbour’s laundry is depends greatly on how clean our own window is. Before we criticise, it might be a good idea to ask ourselves if we are ready to see the good in others, rather than to judge them.

If you can’t ever see anything right as you walk down the road, but only see the traffic and construction and potholes and never the beauty; or you only see the scratch in the floor and never the amazing house; if you never see what your parent/sibling/friend does right but only what they do wrong, you need to clean your window.

When we’re constantly critical, we have to realise that the problem… is with us.