Had it occurred to you is it easier to smile or to frown?
A popular Internet adage claims that it takes 43 facial muscles to frown and only 17 to smile. This has always been cited to persuade us to smile more often.
I find this intriguing and I conduct my own research.
The scientific answer according to a renowned plastic surgeon is that smiling takes 12 muscles and frowning surprisingly takes just 11.
I bet this won’t be the reason you start finding smiling is harder to do.
When I told my Thai boxing friend about this, he had this to say.
If someone insults you, don’t even stretch the 11 muscles to frown when it takes only 4 to extend your arm to punch the swine.
This brings me to “Pencil a Smile”.
If you think that there is a grammatical error in the title. I have checked with our grammarian. He has confirmed that the word pencil, besides being a noun for pencil, could also be used as a verb.
The title does sounds like I am going to talk about how to draw a smile with a pencil.
This is simple. Take a pencil.
First, draw a black circle, ideally with a yellow background.
Then, in the upper middle section of the circle, draw 2 oval black dots representing the 2 eyes.
And finally in the lower middle section of the circle, draw a smaller semi-circle, from the 3 o’clock to 9 o’clock ‘positions, representing the mouth.
There you go, pencil a smile.
When do we smile? Why do we smile? We smile when we are happy or because we are amused.
If what I say tickle your funny bone, you are amused and you smile; if your partner gives you a surprise, only a pleasant surprise, you are happy and you smile.
This seems logical enough. What is interesting is that the converse is also true.
Many behavioral studies have consistently shown that the emotion we experience is associated with our own expression.
The more you smile, the happier you are.
The best thing is that the increase in happiness does not drain away the moment we stop smiling. The effects linger on making us feeling more cheerful when interacting with others and also more likely to remember the happy moment.
But, life is not a bed of roses.
What if I am not happy, having just lost a huge investment, a job or worse a loved one? How do I behave like a happy person? How do I force that smile?
Many self-help gurus have suggested the power of positive thinking that is simply pushing the negative thoughts out of the mind.
Unfortunately, research suggests otherwise. Suppression of negative thoughts is far more likely to increase, rather than decrease, misery. The more you attempt to avoid a topic the more obsessed you are with it, the more haunted you are by it.
Another approach proposed by many psychotherapists is to share your pain with someone who is empathetic. This is -”the problem shared is the problem halved approach.
Most of us will find this approach intuitive and many of us may have actually tried this approach.
Ironically, research shows that talking isn’t as effective and we are better off penciling our way out of misery into a smile.
Research actually shows that writing an account of our deepest thoughts or our feeling about an unhappy or depressing or traumatic event is more effective to return us to physically better health and emotionally happier mood.
This sounds bizarre. Why talking isn’t as effective as writing?
The reason is talking can be somewhat unstructured, disorganized and thus confusing. In contrast, writing encourages putting down a structured story line that help people make sense of what has happened and work towards a solution.
Other research has also shown that by writing a note expressing gratitude or affection could significantly enhance our likelihood of smiling and thus our state of happiness.
There you go again, pencil a smile.
What if you are like me neither good at penciling a smile nor writing down the feelings, there is still another way that always guarantees you a smile with a pencil.
Take a pencil with you right now. We shall do the warm up first.
Stretch your mouth like this, moving from the left to the right and repeat it several times.
I introduce this step to prevent you from suing me in case your face suffers a cramp from extended smiling.
Now the crucial step, please open your mouth and then hold the pencil between your teeth.
It is important that your lips do not touch the pencil. Or else, your smile would turn into a frown.
Here you go again, pencil a smile.
You have heard me. By now you should be able to apply the three techniques on pencil a smile: draw a happy face; write out your feelings; hold a pencil between your teeth.
A popular Internet adage claims that it takes 43 facial muscles to frown and only 17 to smile. This has always been cited to persuade us to smile more often.
I find this intriguing and I conduct my own research.
The scientific answer according to a renowned plastic surgeon is that smiling takes 12 muscles and frowning surprisingly takes just 11.
I bet this won’t be the reason you start finding smiling is harder to do.
When I told my Thai boxing friend about this, he had this to say.
If someone insults you, don’t even stretch the 11 muscles to frown when it takes only 4 to extend your arm to punch the swine.
This brings me to “Pencil a Smile”.
If you think that there is a grammatical error in the title. I have checked with our grammarian. He has confirmed that the word pencil, besides being a noun for pencil, could also be used as a verb.
The title does sounds like I am going to talk about how to draw a smile with a pencil.
This is simple. Take a pencil.
First, draw a black circle, ideally with a yellow background.
Then, in the upper middle section of the circle, draw 2 oval black dots representing the 2 eyes.
And finally in the lower middle section of the circle, draw a smaller semi-circle, from the 3 o’clock to 9 o’clock ‘positions, representing the mouth.
There you go, pencil a smile.
When do we smile? Why do we smile? We smile when we are happy or because we are amused.
If what I say tickle your funny bone, you are amused and you smile; if your partner gives you a surprise, only a pleasant surprise, you are happy and you smile.
This seems logical enough. What is interesting is that the converse is also true.
Many behavioral studies have consistently shown that the emotion we experience is associated with our own expression.
The more you smile, the happier you are.
The best thing is that the increase in happiness does not drain away the moment we stop smiling. The effects linger on making us feeling more cheerful when interacting with others and also more likely to remember the happy moment.
But, life is not a bed of roses.
What if I am not happy, having just lost a huge investment, a job or worse a loved one? How do I behave like a happy person? How do I force that smile?
Many self-help gurus have suggested the power of positive thinking that is simply pushing the negative thoughts out of the mind.
Unfortunately, research suggests otherwise. Suppression of negative thoughts is far more likely to increase, rather than decrease, misery. The more you attempt to avoid a topic the more obsessed you are with it, the more haunted you are by it.
Another approach proposed by many psychotherapists is to share your pain with someone who is empathetic. This is -”the problem shared is the problem halved approach.
Most of us will find this approach intuitive and many of us may have actually tried this approach.
Ironically, research shows that talking isn’t as effective and we are better off penciling our way out of misery into a smile.
Research actually shows that writing an account of our deepest thoughts or our feeling about an unhappy or depressing or traumatic event is more effective to return us to physically better health and emotionally happier mood.
This sounds bizarre. Why talking isn’t as effective as writing?
The reason is talking can be somewhat unstructured, disorganized and thus confusing. In contrast, writing encourages putting down a structured story line that help people make sense of what has happened and work towards a solution.
Other research has also shown that by writing a note expressing gratitude or affection could significantly enhance our likelihood of smiling and thus our state of happiness.
There you go again, pencil a smile.
What if you are like me neither good at penciling a smile nor writing down the feelings, there is still another way that always guarantees you a smile with a pencil.
Take a pencil with you right now. We shall do the warm up first.
Stretch your mouth like this, moving from the left to the right and repeat it several times.
I introduce this step to prevent you from suing me in case your face suffers a cramp from extended smiling.
Now the crucial step, please open your mouth and then hold the pencil between your teeth.
It is important that your lips do not touch the pencil. Or else, your smile would turn into a frown.
Here you go again, pencil a smile.
You have heard me. By now you should be able to apply the three techniques on pencil a smile: draw a happy face; write out your feelings; hold a pencil between your teeth.
2 comments:
Adapted 70% from Chapter 1 of 59 second by Prof Richard Wiseman.
Delivered as Project 3 on July 7 with short notice. The lesson drawn is that before offering to be the reserved speaker, I should have rehearsed couple of times.
Time : 7 minute 18 second. (overrun by 18 second)
Problem: pausing too often and too mnay times trying to recall the lines.
Look out: body unonsioucly shifted whilst standing to deliver
Evaluator is Paul Breen.
Just on the topic, I was reminded of 2 ideas which I have tried and am convinced they work.
The first one is that happiness or otrherwise is not a fact, it is an opinion. Our emotions repond to the opinion we hold. And our body express or react to the opinion by smiling or frowning.
Obviously, this implies that different people can have a different opinion on the same fact. So happiness or unhappiness not an absolute. In fact, if we change our physical response we can change our mood: so if you feel unhappy for reason or no reason - try putting a smile on your face (or pencil a smile on paper). That triggers positive emotions which can reverse our negative opinion on a given situation or fact = and unlocking us from our unhapy feeling.
The other idea is even simpler, it always works, and I tell my children this also. I got this from a story someone was telling about his mother. whenever he was feeling unhappy or angry, his mother used to tell him "if you are unhappy, go help somebody."
So if you feel darkness, be the light.
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