How to Fake a Smile

A smile can change anything.

It can make someone's day, it can change someone's mood, it can open up a new relationship.

something so simple and so easy, something so powerful.

I smile more than I feel it, I smile more than I want to really, for everyone else.

A genuine smile is something so happy and careless, something that can make a moment or a whole day better for someone else.

So how do you do it?

I know that might be a silly question to ask; how do you smile?

This isn't an article for someone whose face muscles have stopped working. There will be no exercise plan or pill to magically force your face into a show-stopping grin.

This isn't about the actual act of smiling; it's about the energy to get there.

There are days when pulling myself out of bed feels heavier than it should. When the world isn't just falling apart around me but feels like it's crumbling from within too.

Those are the days that feel like a smile would knock me down. As if the effort of lifting the corners of my mouth might be the final straw, the last thing I could do.

That's where the faking comes in.

Because I'm not really faking it for myself, if I could, I would stay in bed. Ignore everything else I had to do.

But I can't.

The world wouldn't stop without me, people would go about their day and probably not notice.

But one day could turn into more. And I hope I've been living my life in such a way that people might miss my smile, fake or not.

But I don't want to miss out on the things the world has to offer, which means I have to get out of bed. I have to try.

So I try, I do my best, and sometimes it's not good.

And sometimes, just to get through the day, I fake it.

I fake the work, I fake the energy, I fake a laugh.

And I'll fake a smile.

Sometimes I think it's because if I do it enough, I might be able to trick myself into it. Fake it 'til you make it, right?

But most of the time it's for other people. The strangers and half aquaintances in my life. The sorta friends, and the people so close to me that it takes to much to fully explain why I feel this way.

Because I don't want them to know how bad it is sometimes, I don't want them to hurt too.

Alot of it is that. For whatever reason making everyone else around me happy comes first.

And it's small, but I smile because what if they feel it too? What if it helps them?

There's no way to know completely. No way to look into their minds or their lives. So I fake it because sometimes a smile can brighten someones day or a moment in their life. And sometimes that can mean alot, even if it's fake. Because they don't know that.

So sometimes the corners of my mouth hold the weight of the world. Sometimes bringing everyone up with them is too much. But I try, I pretend it works. Because it's better than nothing, it's better than giving up.

It might take too much for some people to fake a smile, I get it. Sometimes it's hard. And when those sometimes become more frequent, it's almost impossible.

But even if you can't fake it for others, do it for yourself.

You deserve a smile.

And maybe you can fake it 'til you make it.

I hope so, because sometimes that's the one thing that keeps the corners of my world lifted up.