Prime Time - Jane Fonda [59]
I interviewed 104-year-old Rachel Lehman for this book; she told me about creating “an epidemic of love” by smiling at everyone who came her way, especially the sourpusses. Remembering this, I started experimenting with a smile. It began with yoga. I would put on a slight, Mona Lisa–type smile as I held the poses. I would try to maintain the smile while I meditated. And sure enough, it would make me feel better, lighter. Even if I didn’t feel like smiling, I would put a smile on my face, and it would make me feel more buoyant. I found this to be similar to the effects of good posture. When I pull my shoulders back and make sure my head is right on top of my neck and not jutting forward, I feel stronger, more powerful. And, just as with smiling, I look better, too.
I’ve since discovered interesting research showing that the physiology of smiling creates a biochemical response, activating neurotransmitters, hormones, and endorphins, and releases nitric oxide that makes you feel better.
Dr. Rollin McCraty, executive vice president and director of research at the Institute of HeartMath, says,
Research shows that the brain functions as a complex pattern-matching system. The messages it receives from the heart, facial muscles, and other bodily organs are some of the many input patterns that the brain is constantly processing. An important point is that as recurring patterns of input to the brain become familiar, the brain attempts to maintain these familiar patterns as a stable baseline, or norm. This occurs even if a familiar pattern is one that is ultimately detrimental to our health and well-being, such as living with constant stress. This mechanism actually provides a psychophysiological basis for understanding why chronic stress can be so difficult to change: The brain learns to recognize the stressful patterns as familiar, and thus attempts to maintain and reinforce them, even though they are unhealthy.
However, just like resetting a thermostat, it is also possible to introduce a new set of patterns, which, by repetition, become familiar to the brain and become established as a new baseline. So, if we consciously make efforts to smile and activate positive emotions, eventually the brain will recognize these coherent, “feeling-good” patterns as familiar and will reinforce them and they become much more a part of our natural state.
Dr. McCraty adds that having this new, more positive baseline pattern makes it easier for us to bounce back when we do experience stress or challenges.
Elan Sun Star, a photographer, writer, and teacher at Global Creative Networking Media, has written extensively about the power of the smile. He says, “So, what do you do when you don’t feel like smiling and you don’t even feel like faking it? Well, you can be grateful that you are not being forced to smile, and that may make you smile. Of course we must realize that there are authentic smiles and inauthentic smiles, but we can also realize there is an authentic try at being happy, and an authentic try at smiling.”
In 1862, the French neurologist Guillaume Duchenne mapped one hundred facial muscles. He demonstrated that false or even halfhearted smiles involve only muscles of the mouth, but that authentic, deep-from-the-heart smiles activate the muscles around the eyes as well, causing the skin around the eyes to crinkle, the eyelids to drop a little, the cheeks and corners of the mouth to lift.
Mr. Sun Star suggests standing in front of a mirror and practicing putting on a Duchenne smile that crinkles up your eyes and turns up your mouth. Think of it as a new workout, and work those smile muscles! Breathe while you do it and stand up tall. Happy, erect posture adds credibility to the smile. I don’t associate a happy, empowered, smiling person with someone slumped