Hundreds of thousands of faces pass us every day, but have you ever thought about the lives those faces lead? The answer for most is no. People are too selfish and concerned with their everyday woes and worries to understand those around them. At this point you may be thinking, hey I think about others a lot in a given day. Yes, you might but those “others” most likely consist of your closest friends and family. Many never think about or take the time to understand the people they may never meet, the passers-by.

This is what I mean. So, say you are in line at the grocery store and the person in front of you is taking the longest time to find her coupons. You’re late and have to be somewhere so you get intensely frustrated with this annoying woman. Why does she care about her coupons anyway? Why is she taking so long? If she just took a minute to organize her bag then maybe she would find the coupons easier. Many thoughts of annoyance run rampant through your mind until finally, you pop. You make some snarky comment and huff and tap your foot to get your point across.

Let’s look at this story from another point of view. You are a mother of four and are struggling to make ends meet. You have just gotten the news that your husband lost his job; the sole income of your family has now been terminated and you are feeling scared and helpless. You have to put food on the table and try to pull yourself together so that the kids don’t get worried. Today has been a trainwreck and you can barely stop your hands from shaking. While in line at the grocery store you realize you have misplaced your much-needed coupons. Distraught and embarrassed you frantically search through your bag. Meanwhile, the lady behind you is expressing her frustration and annoyance and this makes you all the more shaken. Biting your lip to hold back tears you step away from the line and let the foot tapper behind you go while you continue your search.

Every single one of the hundreds of thousands of faces that pass you in a day has a life. They have families and jobs; they have worries and hardships. Before you get annoyed in a checkout line or frustrated with the car in front of you in a traffic jam, think for a moment about what others are going through. You don’t know their lives, and you don’t know what troubles they may be struggling with internally. Have some empathy and be the one in a million that thinks about the hundreds of thousands.