Cultivate laugh lines

at my wedding.

^{I think they’re going to be nice.}

the more I smile and laugh and live well, the fewer lines I seem to have. :)

I’ve been using the Morale-O-Meter widget on my 43T profile since early on. In the beginning, some of you may remember, I was working that soul-sucking job, but I was also falling in love so there were wild fluctuations in my morale. It was almost never “average” – I had awful days and I had wonderful days. Average, I imagined, would be somewhere in between. I remember trying to be more optimistic, so even when I had a really bad day, I tried to keep it around the 2-3 level, maybe even a 4 if there were some redeeming moments (assuming the 1 would be reserved for the death of family members or similar tragedies). Still, I definitely had some of those days quite often back then. Other days, weekends for the most part, were perfect 10s.

For nearly a year and a half now, my level of happiness has been quite different. I’m starting to think those bad days I had back then were worse than I thought. Or maybe what constitutes an average day for me has shifted. I’ve been thinking about what “average” means. As someone who was never an “average” student and who always felt pressure to compete and be the best at everything, a 5 to me has a negative connotation. At some level, I equate “average” with unacceptable.

But why? I’ve noticed that TajLV rates his morale at 5 most of the time – truly and literally an average day for him. I also recently read an old post of his about this very subject that really got me thinking about it. Namaste, Taj. I continue to learn so much from you.

At first, I figured having all my days higher than average was just balancing out that period of my life when most of my days were rock bottom, and maybe that’s true to some extent. I certainly know that things can be a lot worse than even my bad days now. But I also wonder if I’m ready for a new definition of “average”. What if my average day were pretty good, and my bad days were still not that bad (reserving the very bad day designation for any disasters) – and then what if my good days, my perfect 10s, kept getting better and better? In other words, the scale is expanding – my concept of a really awesome day is getting better and those bad days I used to have are dropping even further below average.

I think my life is changing – or I am changing – to the extent that I can conceptualize my average day as a happy one in which I am at peace and smile often. Could this be the secret to laugh lines and so many other goals of mine? :)

So if you notice my morale is shifting down, don’t be alarmed. I’m not unhappy; I’m simply raising my standards.

‘Nuff said.

I’ve developed my first wrinkles. They’re forehead wrinkles, but from raising my eyebrows, which I do when I laugh or tell jokes or listen to interesting stories (not the vertical ones from frowning)... so I think I’ll count that as progress. ;P

Big smiles, big joy, big love.

It was so hot here Friday night…. We had some drinks at a local bar with a big open-air section, much cooler than our apartment! It was so hot when we came back. C took out the old spray bottle he used to use for his ferns and filled it with cold water. We took off our clothes and took turns spraying each other and standing under the fan. For some reason I thought this was hysterically funny. I laughed until my stomach hurt.

In light of today’s events, I find this article from The Onion pretty freakin’ hilarious…

We went out to Anzo Borrego and hiked up to the palm oasis. The desert is in bloom right now. Many of the cacti aren’t in full bloom yet, but lots of other shrubs and smaller plants are blooming. We smiled and laughed a lot.

This discussion is enforcing some laugh lines. Oh, yes. I love my fellow 43Ters.