As Maranara says, it is built in. But I have found that a lot I felt as judgmental was actually just other people making observations and I just felt it as negative. We have to listen to what everyone else says, kind of like radar, to find our way around. So, if someone says, "A little more to the left" that is not a judgement about how we are too far right, that is just a helpful statement that in the other person's opinion, we might need to go a little more left. I think of it as two people working together to get a picture hung straight on the wall?

If it is about us and behind our backs we're not supposed to be listening and if it is about another, we let the other person know our opinion, which is that if they have a problem with that person they're talking about, they should share it with them, not us, or we look at what is said and see if we can help in some way. "Susie smells bad" is a social problem and we might be able to help by affirming that we think she does too and we all should figure out how to ask her to bathe more often (my stepmother had that problem in a place she worked back in the 1950's, another woman had poor hygiene and my stepmother was elected to help the woman learn she needed to take better care of herself) or, we might be able to speak up and say, "I haven't noticed that, are you sure it's not your nose?"

But I have been greatly helped over time by people I thought were judgmental/critical, "You don't smile enough" being a case in point. I looked at that information and realized just how depressed and what kind of difficulties I was in and went into therapy soon after. I find that focusing on what is said instead of worrying about what people "mean" by it, if they are being judgmental, cruel, informative, whatever. Their attitudes/moods are not my problem? Best though is giving them the information about how you find their statement, "That sounds judgmental to me" can open the way for a good discussion and help the other person maybe not sound so judgmental or show me where the difficulty is with me and how I take what others say, etc.