Do you always know who’s watching what you do?
As much as many of us would rather sink than swim through the current of people that carries us around, the truth of the matter is that someone’s eyes are probably always going to be on us, whether they just catch us in the corner of their gaze or hold us steadily in their vision.
This image they have of you will probably be fleeting and they might forget you within the next ten minutes, because you’ll probably look like everyone else — rushed, scatter-brained, lips pursed as you impatiently elbow through the crowd, refusing to acknowledge the other people you think get in the way of you arriving at the place you want to be.
I’m very familiar with this look. I find myself dawning it all too often.
What I want to remind others [and myself] of is that the façade you put up is the same one put up by those around you.
You don’t know who it is you’re standing next to. Maybe the front they’re putting up says otherwise, but in their private life, they could be convinced that they’re not pretty enough, that they’re not intelligent enough, that they’re simply not good enough.
And while they’re thinking those things of themselves, what you’ve failed to know about yourself is that one expression on your face — that brief glimpse that anyone can get of you — can change something [or even everything] for someone else.
As I’ve mentioned, that one frown on your face can make you blend in with anyone else that walks in the same direction as you. But I’ve found that if you smile at someone else, it gives him or her something to think about.
You stay inside of their head and it can even bring their mood up, because it’s been proven that expressions and emotions are often mirrored from person to person.
If you know the person well and are speaking with them about negativity, then they themselves will start to feel the weight that’s upon your shoulders. But laughter among friends, unless it’s at someone else’s expense, can lift someone up for hours to come.
To make other people happier, you have to make yourself happy, first. In order to do so, don’t think about where you want to go, but where you are now.
You’ll get to the future some day but, for now, you are where you are, which can be a beautiful place. No matter if you’re stuck in a long line at a cash register or getting your cheeks pinched at a family reunion, tell yourself to be grateful for the things that are available for you to buy and be glad that the family members you have love you.
Some people aren’t so lucky.
But even those people, who don’t have physical things or family members who pay them any attention, have the physical world — the same sun, the same moon, the same sky.
And what else could be on top of clouds besides tall, golden castles and bridges painted with reds, blues, greens and yellows?
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