“A cheerful look brings joy to the heart,
and good news gives health to the bones. “
(Proverbs 15:30 NIV)
Recent studies have found that the contagion of joy is so powerful that when we see even a picture of someone smiling – a “cheerful look” – we tend to smile back. Smiling and laughter produce relief from stress by releasing pain-killing, euphoria-producing endorphins, enkephalins, dopamine, noradrenaline, and adrenaline. Proverbs turns out to be true at the most physiological level.
“A merry heart does good, like medicine.”
(Proverbs 17:22)
“A merry heart makes a cheerful countenance,
But by sorrow of the heart the spirit is broken.”
(Proverbs 15:13)
W. H. Audem wrote, “Among those whom I like or admire, I can find no common denominator, but among those whom I love, I can: all of them make me laugh.”
A child laughs 400 times a day on average, while an adult laughs only 15 times a day.
The expression of authentic happiness is what researchers call a zygomatic smile. It takes its name from the zygomaticus muscles that produce it. The signs of a zygomatic smile are the lip corners turning upward and also crow’s-feet showing around the eyes. Here is where the connection between the human body and the human spirit is truly amazing. We can show a polite grin or a camera smile at will. In such cases, people make their lips go up, but no crow’s-fee are visible.
The polite smile can be manipulated; that is why the smiles that people put on their faces for photographs often look forced. But the zygomatic smile is hard to fake. It is a smile that goes all the way up to the eyes. This distinction begins early; five-month-old infants show the eye-muscle smile when the mother approaches, but a smile without the eye muscle when a stranger approaches.
People who don’t take themselves too seriously give a great gift to those around them. In contrast, joy-challenged people face a serious handicap in trying to live in community.
It’s an amazing truth: Being fully right rarely brings as much life to people as simply being human. Sometime ago a psychology journal published an article entitled “The Effect of a Pratfal on Increasing Interpersonal Attractiveness.” The surprising conclusion: “Seeing someone you admire do something stupid or clumsy will make you like him more.”[i] People are hungry for joy-bringers. We are about thirty times more likely to laugh when we are with other people than when we are alone. Research indicates that people in good spirits may laugh one hundred to four hundred times a day. (Go ahead and take a quick review of your day.) Other folks may go through a day without a single smile.[ii]
q On average, how many times a day do you laugh?
It is commonly quoted that it takes 17 muscles to smile and 43 to frown.
Meditate on,
“A cheerful look brings joy to the heart,
and good news gives health to the bones."
(Proverbs 15:30 NIV)
“A merry heart does good, like medicine.”
(Proverbs 17:22)
“A merry heart makes a cheerful countenance,
But by sorrow of the heart the spirit is broken.”
(Proverbs 15:13)
Action: Give random smiles to people at work and public. Go out of your way to release Life, Love & Laughter.
[i] “The Effect of Pratfall on Increasing Interpersonal Attractiveness”” Article by E. Aaronson, B. Willerman, and J. Floyd in Psychometric Science 4 (1966).
[ii] John Ortberg, Everybody’s Normal, 114, 116.
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