Paying it Forward: Just Smile

As we move forward into the second month of the New Year, I am glad to see things are finally smoothing out in my life. The first few weeks were the most trying weeks I have experienced thus far. It seemed as though nothing was going right in my life and I began to back-peddle instead of pushing onward. The holidays left my family disconnected, my boyfriend moved across the country and the intensity of school increased exponentially. Upon sitting back and reflecting on the trials I encountered during the previous month, I realized that I learned one important thing about myself and about people in general.
While facing my tough time, I saw an old classmate walking down the bridge to class in University Hall. I recognized her face because we participated in many of the same workshop groups in a previous course. We never hung out outside of the classroom, but I knew her well enough to say hi. As I made eye-contact with her and told her hello, she looked back at me with a huge smile and responded with a hello. I don’t know what it was about that particular interaction, but her smile and warm hello made my day ten times better. I was so frustrated, stressed and barely staying afloat. I realized that in the midst of my chaos and overload of life all I needed was a smile.
It seems odd that not only did the rest of my day get better, but the rest of my week also got better. Her smile rubbed off on me and I wanted to do the same and share a warm greeting and a smile with the next person I saw. I found my classmate, a girl I barely even knew to be an inspirational source in my life during a coarse time. From that moment, I decided I would with a cleverly pay a smile forward. In paying smiles forward, I will do my best to crack a smile at people, whether I know them well or know them at all. I hope to also rub off on someone and for that person also to share a smile with the next person. Smiles can be extremely motivating because you never know what someone may be going through, good or bad. In my situation I did not know what my next step in life would be or how I could even bare getting through the remainder of the day. Suddenly, one person, one smile became the crutch to my broken leg, allowing me to walk again.

Brittnee Wadlington