“It isn’t any trouble just to smile, if you only take the trouble just to smile.” This old song that we often sang ourselves in primary school and also later taught our students contains a world of wisdom. The power of a smile is both, immeasurable and unimaginable. Both, the giver and the receiver are blessed by a smile.
Take two minutes out of your mad, busy, hectic schedule and you will realize that a smile can work wonders for you and for those around you. The first thing you want to see, when you wake up in the morning to a new day, is a smiling face. If you are fortunate to see a smiling face, you say to yourself, “Boy, today is going to be a great day!” You have already created a positive attitude to face the day ahead with all the challenges it may bring, with all the obstacles that you may encounter. When you enter your workplace with a smile on your face, you are spreading those positive vibes around you and the day ahead, however difficult it might be, promises to be great for all.
What does it cost us to smile? Nothing at all! Paying someone a visit, buying a gift etc takes up some of your precious time, money and probably a great deal of effort. In comparison, a smile costs practically nothing. It might probably cost you a few seconds, nothing more than that.
What are the effects of a smile? A smile brightens up the atmosphere, particularly in a sorrow or gloom charged situation. It triggers off reciprocal smiles from those around. Those in sorrow feel somewhat relieved. Enthusiasm and courage begin to surface.
Fortunately, we can smile as long as we live, provided we have the will to do so. Our stock of smiles will never get depleted. Today dentists are struggling to make better and better toothpastes for our oral hygiene and care. They thus contribute towards making our smiles more beautiful. Many dental clinics today (some aptly named ‘SMILES’) have dental procedures, both for corrective and cosmetic purposes, thereby enabling us to share our beautiful smiles with those around us.
It is very easy to distinguish a cold, formal smile from a warm, genuine one. The first type tells you that the giver of the smile sees you as an unwanted guest in his house or unwanted company at the workplace, but he has to tolerate you for some reason or the other. Therefore, not having any other choice, he smiles at you. The second type of smile indicates to you that the giver of the smile genuinely wishes to welcome you, listen to you, interact with you and probably even help you if he can. He draws you to himself, helps you unwind confidently, is friendly and you feel a better person for having come in contact with him.
Let us then make the time to give anyone who comes our way, that warm, genuine and contagious smile which in turn, will give rise to many, many more smiles and we will have miles and miles of smiles around us. Then definitely we will have done our small bit in making this world a better place to live in.
