Here is a universal truth. It is so easy to judge. It is so easy to take our own experiences and apply them to others, assuming that their circumstances are much like ours. We know what parenting is, we have children. We know what marriage is, we have partners. We know what loss is, we’ve lived it. The list goes on and on.

The real truth is that, as my mother used to say, we don’t know what goes on in other people’s houses, we have no idea what their life experience is like and yet we think we do. We wonder why someone is having a struggle with their child when they are “such a nice kid.” We judge an adult child who does not visit their parent enough, “Can you believe he/she never comes to see their mom/dad?”

I remember vividly a conversation with a member of the clergy when I was making some changes in my own life. Rather than accept that, after decades of marriage, I knew what I needed to—and I knew how difficult it was and would be, this person took it upon herself, in a public setting, to tell me all the ways in which she thought I was not only doing the wrong thing, but that I also had no reason to want a divorce. I had not confided in her nor did I intend to do so. But she decided that she knew the details of my life—and that she understood them better than I did. It was embarrassing, offensive and inappropriate and it changed my view of her, and whatever relationship we had, from that point forward.

As human beings, we are not strangers to pain, especially emotional pain. We grapple with it, we struggle with it, and, for the most part I believe, we really try to do the best that we can. Only we know the circumstances that we are dealing with, the complexity of the emotions, the challenges that exist. Unless you truly do walk in someone else’s shoes, you cannot possibly know.

It is easy to think we know. It is much harder to recognize, remember and remind ourselves that we don’t. It is easy to judge and much harder to withhold judgement. If we believe in living with a full heart and we let that full heart lead the way, then we will not be peering behind other people’s doors but, instead, accepting and respecting their truth.