A friend of mine once said that people on their death beds don’t feel remorse for not having purchased that 52-inch television they always wanted. So true. It is in such humbling moments that our minds unravel just enough to recognize life’s truly wonderful treasures: friends, family and all the beautiful people out there who would be worthy of our love if only we had the time.

Finding that state of mind is no simple thing, but it is worth striving for. Much stands in the way. The author Dalton Trumbo noted during the Vietnam war that “numbers have dehumanized us. Over breakfast coffee we read of 40,000 Americans dead in Vietnam. Instead of vomiting, we reach for the toast. Our morning rush through crowded streets is not to cry murder but to hit that trough before somebody else gobbles our share.”

How can we be so careless with one another? Hold that thought. Nobody chooses their family at birth, but somehow, the vast majority of us come to love our family members in stronger terms than can be scribbled on pieces of paper.

There is no law of nature dictating that we must love family members. No, that love comes from a humbled approach of forgiveness and kind understanding when all of our inadequacies are laid out on the table. It comes from knowing our family members’ delightful quirks and unique qualities that set them apart from other people.

But we don’t choose our families. Our families are all composed of those “other people” we’ve been fortunate enough to have gotten to know over the years.

Yes, that’s right: All those people you pass along the sidewalk possess such loveable qualities as those seen in your dearest ones. Every stranger you see in the store, for perhaps only a blinking moment in your long, long life, has beautiful stories to share if only you would listen. Every single person in this world understands something unique and has a worth of their own.

The only things separating us from human enlightenment are patience and kind, listening ears. Although it isn’t realistic to think we can share close, personal space with everyone like we have with our families, we can use the knowledge of people’s inherent goodness as a basis for more healthy relationships.

Another friend of mine speaks warmly about understanding others through empathy. He says that however confusing a person’s behavior may appear, their actions are based on a mountain of personal experiences that we don’t, and can’t, know about simply by looking at that person. They are the type of experiences unknown to us on the street, yet understood by that person’s family.

Some people refer to this tolerance as “giving the benefit of the doubt.” That friend of mine says it is hard to hate someone, knowing we would probably make the same decisions as that person, if walking in their shoes and having experienced their years in this little world of ours. Just as we are cumulative products of our environment, so too, naturally, are the decisions we make.

Empathy is the bridge between strangers and the gentle, forgiving nature of familial relationships. All it takes is a shift in perception.

Go ahead and observe the people around you. Listen to their conversations (it’s OK if your intentions are honest). Listen to their amusing stories, and feel for them for the tough times they are going through.

Remember what it was like for you or for a loved one in a similar position. Would you be more likely to respond unkindly simply because they are not blood-related to you?

Life’s too short for all the wasted emotion of judgment and intolerance. We shouldn’t wait until life has passed us by to begin viewing people as the beautiful creatures they are.