Smile Like You Mean It!: Smile Like You Mean It

The phrase is an homage to my mother, and perhaps some of the best advice I have ever been given.

My mother is from Panama, and a secluded part as well. But she was raised with the values that have been passed on to me: be good to yourself but be better to others, don't be a pest, if i can't lift something - get stronger, no whining, no frivolous laughter, and no matter what happens - put on a pretty face.

What she meant by that is - always show a pleasant face on the outside, and don't let your personal problems show on a frowning face, because you never know who you are going to meet at any given moment. People will want to be around you more if you are pleasant to look at.

I have seen this advice at work. My mother, being in a foreign country with 5 ankle biters who constantly bickered, and my father who worked alot to provide for the single income family, had very little to smile about at times. She had to smile through so many instances when i knew she felt differently: Company Christmas parties where she knew no one, and many of the other adults didn't understand her in her thick accent. Football games. PTA meetings. Camp Fire campouts. And everytime, in every single instance, my mother always came out as a really classy lady with the brightest smile that lit up her face and made her eyes sparkle.

This advice BY FAR has proven the most valuable, and has shaped the way people respond to me, and i to them. When i started working at 16 in the field of modeling, it was my mask. Smiling through scenarios and situations where I knew i was out of my depth and uncomfortable opened more opportunities and more people responded to me - i was always pleasant. A happy laborer. Someone who didn't mind working long hours, or being asked to do more... always with a smile on my face. Even in character on set with a serious look, the spell would be broken as soon as there was a small break and my smile would emerge like the sun after a quick rain. Here i am! Mona Lisa smile.

To this day - its the best thing i have learned in my life. I do enjoy my work, even after tromping for four hours through a leech infested jungle to shoot wild orangutans - my smile is there to show that i am having a good time, and its ok to have a good time too... my mother's smile.

Look ma! No leeches!

There were instances of course when i was not on guard. Once when i was working a holiday job in the Grapevine Mills Mall, i was managing a store kiosk. It was lunch, and i was not in my usual jovial spirits. Things were not great with my then boyfriend. It was the holidays so no modeling jobs, and another one of my employees quit out of job dissatisfaction. Family issues were weighing on me. And in full view of some 200 strangers who were shopping and eating and not noticing this skinny withdrawn tall girl who looked like she was going to cry into her lunch tray - 1 person did notice. i finished my meal, and a stranger approached me. He said, "Excuse me. You don't know me. But i want to give you something." He slipped me a piece of paper and walked away. I opened up the piece of paper and it read, "I'm sorry you are having a bad day. I hoped this note would cheer you up." I considered it for a bit. I looked around, but the man was gone. How could i have forgotten my mother's advice? Someone was watching and when my guard was down, they noticed me not smiling. I don't want to be remembered like that. I didn't want to make an impact like that. Immediately that little smile crept onto my face - and its been there ever since.

When things turn bleak, when arguments or conflicts at work arise, when friends' trials and tribulations weigh on my mind - my smile can disappear. After so many years of practicing it, my muscle memory in my face can pull right into it.

Is this to say my smile is fake? not at all - a smile can be a powerful thing. it can calm others in an intense situation, it can convey that i'm open and ready to listen to friends who have problems, and it always makes my son brighten as well. But it also can mask a secret, or cloud the exact truth. But it always always saves the day and makes a bad situation better.

So as difficult your situation may be, no matter if you really don't feel like it - you never know who is watching who can change your fortune. So always smile like you mean it. :)