I am honestly a firm firm believer that a smile can change someones day. Relate it to the age old saying of “laughter is the best medicine” if you wish. Boy isn’t it true, for those that read last weeks writing you will have seen the one liner at the end:
“To smile is to radiate. To radiate is to infect”
This is has been my “mantra” you could say for the last week. However, we have to go back about a month to the origin of this thought process. Setting the scene quickly, I had just returned home from the Philippines and the post holiday high was on the dwindle down I guess you would say. I was sitting on the bench along the esplanade reading my book & enjoying my coffee, hood over my head and to be fair probably looking pretty miserable. I felt the urge to look over my shoulder, as they walked past they just smiled, but smiled genuinely. Its a feeling that is quite hard to explain, it was just something I needed.
These words just came over me, I placed my book upside down and began to write in my notes.
Smile.
For it may be a while.
However, a thing of the past.
Your smile will everlast.
This short little writing is what sat with me so deeply as the smile from a complete random stranger was there, but soon a thing of a past. It stayed with me for the whole day and still to this day it sits with me at certain moments. You can interpret this however you wish but I think its is quite straight down the line and cryptic unlike other writings.
Something I’m trying to do at the start of the week to set the tone for myself and for others, it is to have an open ended question. This week was “What is going to be your new intention this week”, friends asked back and my response was:
“Mines quite simple & may sound weird but its to smile more, especially to people I don’t know, I get so so many people smiling at me whilst I’m running, quite often regulars that I pass everyday, I don’t even know their name but it gets me so good. So it’s my time to return the favour, sometimes its all people need in their day.”
To initiate and invite the process of a smile, some people might shy away from. Initiating something quite often takes courage I believe, we may not have that courage or we may fear the response that we potentially may receive. If you choose not to initiate whatever intention you have for the week then you are leaving it in the hands of something and or someone else.
A smile is contagious, think about looking at someone and trying to keep a straight face whilst they are smiling at you. “You smile, I smile” is a scientific fact as it stimulates our mirror neurons in our body. This is where I link it back to the “To smile is to radiate. To radiate is to infect.” A smile creates the production of endorphins within the body. Now hear me out, grab yourself a pencil and hold it in between your teeth. After a little research (science is not my forte), when smiling you are flexing your zygomaticus & orbicualris muscles, this can actually make us feel better. (a potential little cheat code? fake it until you make it? haha)
When our brain feels happy the endorphins are produced and released, therefor the signals are transmitted to the muscles and we smile. However this also works in reverse! The start of the feedback loop (one of
favourite things). When our mind smiles we smile, when we smile our mind smiles.Question: What is one new intention you are going to have this week?
Think of something that you have been thinking about doing for a while but haven’t done yet, is it something that is too big? break it down into a smaller task or intention.
I have just genuinely enjoyed being surrounded by happy people lately. If I can make one person happy then I’ve done my job for the day. Seems like a big task, but if you break it down into the small step of smiling at a random stranger you could quite simply make someones day.
Thanks for reading once again. I hope you have an epic rest of your week.
Much Love TK
Ps. Stop. You’re doing it wrong. Smile
Straight fire. Beautiful fire!!! Just want to let you know I'm that one person who's day/life you've impacted today and made happy. Big love TK