The Dalai Lama has told young people they are the "force of our hope" and we should put aside our artificial differences and realise we are "all the same underneath".
His Holiness made the comments while addressing a conference on tackling intolerance at the London School of Economics (LSE) on Wednesday. He urged his 1,000-strong audience to think about fellow humans as brothers and sisters as "then you are happy".
"For example, if I think of human beings with suspicion then you create mistrust and ultimately I suffer and I become lonely," the Tibetan spiritual leader said.
"We are the same human beings - mentally, emotionally, we are the same. We are a little different on the outside sometimes. Some fat, some thin, some big nose. But we are all the same inside."
He added it was important to see life through "both eyes", joking as he had a cataract in one eye, he could not see different perspectives.
The Dalai Lama spoke at LSE on Wednesday
His Holiness emphasised the importance of looking past materialism and having more compassion as it "creates calmness in the mind".
"Whole-heartedness creates self-confidence. This brings inner strength. We must make distance between loving kindness (based on reason) and attachment. Lack of understanding and knowledge creates long-term problems.
"In many cases humans act like animals - relying on sense and not thinking deeper," he added. "We need to distinguish between immediate pressure and deeper issues.
"We are facing a lot of problems including global economy crisis, and huge gap between rich and poor and damaging the environment. We need to consider the real importance of immediate benefits and satisfaction."
The 76-year-old advocated the need for recognising the "oneness of humanity".
"We forget this and so divisions are created by race, believers, non-believers - you all have the same fate.
"If you think about the rest of human beings as brothers and sisters then you are happy."
The Dalai Lama also said we needed to learn from the previous century's experiences and said human intelligence and emotion combined to "create a lot of problems".
He urged people to take action, saying: "Just wishful thinking will never make this [better] future world materialise. Peace never comes through prayer. Change comes through action."
When asked by a member of the audience, His Holiness said Chinese people have "every right to know their reality" and the judicial system had to be brought up to international standards.
But, he warned, "sometimes injustice is much more forceful than justice".
"You have only two choices: either accept God and lead your life honest and truthful or forget God and worship money - go that way."
And, to round the occasion off, the Dalai Lama was presented with an LSE baseball cap, which he duly sported for the rest of the presentations.
His Holiness swaps his usual red cap for an LSE special number