Waiting Room Encouragement

There is nothing I like more than making people smile. It isn't hard to do. All it takes is a smile to receive one in return. I think I may get a high return on my smile investment because I take care of my teeth. I like to use dissolving white strips - they sit on your teeth and taste like peppermint patties and glue as they melt away the previous day's indulgences of Diet Coke and caramels that left their yellow insignias behind.

But even if my teeth were as yellow as a banana peel, I would still flash a smile at everyone I meet. A smile lets the recipient know they were noticed. A lot of the people I meet along my path tell me that they often feel invisible, as though they could disappear and no one would notice. We all feel that way at times. But when you are going about the boring tasks of your normal routine, and a random stranger looks directly at you and smiles, you either look behind you to make sure they are actually smiling at you, or you smile back. Sometimes you do both.

No one should ever believe for a moment that a smile is not meant for them.

I recently spent a lot of time in waiting rooms at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota. It's an amazing place. The air is thick with equal portions of hope and expectation. People go to Mayo Clinic when everyone else tells them there is no hope.

While waiting for appointments, sitting in well-lit, spacious, comfortable waiting rooms, I met a lot of incredible people. One woman was especially talkative, and she told me about all her ailments and woes. I listened intently and offered her encouragement. When she was done giving me her medical history, I asked her what she likes to do in her free time. She looked at me and said, "I am sick, so I don't really like to do anything in my free time." I smiled at her, cocked my head to the side, and said, "so you just lay in bed and do nothing all day but think about the fact that you're sick?" She seemed a little angry for a minute, and I know she thought I was being insensitive, so I added, "have you ever sat and worried about something for so long that you started to feel your heart race and your hands shake and your body ache from the stress of worrying?" She replied that she had, when her daughter was very sick a few years prior. I smiled and asked, "how is your daughter now?"
"Oh, she's doing great!", the woman replied. I smiled and nodded.
"When we think about something negative all the time, it affects our physical well-being. The best way to trick your body into feeling better is to distract your mind with fun and positive activities."
"I needed to hear that", she told me. I smiled at her again as my pager signaled it was my turn to be seen by the doctor. "You should give talks to people!" she yelled as I rolled toward the waiting nurse.
"Naw!" I hollered back, "I prefer to sneak up on people in waiting rooms!"
I can still hear her laughter.

A listening ear, a kind heart, a positive outlook, and most importantly, a smile, can have such an impact on someone. So get out there and start giving away smiles! You'll be glad you did.