Smile, it's raining!
After weeks of waiting and anticipation the heavens opened and the rain came. With it came some cutting reminders for annual maintenance and also plenty to smile about.
The Week That Was: #96. Reading time: 2 min 38 sec
The sky drew a grey blanket across its girth as the wind puffed and blusted. Thunder grumbled and cracked and lightning seared across the heavens. We held our collective breath. It had apparently been flooding in the south of the city. Would it? Could it? And it did! At long last the rains came.
Chantal was at the local park on a walk with a friend. It wasn't so much the wind, which blew bits of sticks and leaf particles into their eyes, that sent them scurrying back to shelter, but rather the lightning which is indiscriminate in its enthusiasm. Just in time as the heavens opened and waterfalled down.
Back home Matthew was scrambling around fishing leaves and rubble out of gutters and getting scratched and bashed, and very wet, in the process. The first tank of the rainwater harvesting system was overflowing instead of the water being pumped up to the larger tanks. Clogged downpipes and a spider web congested pump were to blame. Note to self (Matthew in particular): ensure gutters are completely cleared and the pump checked in September before the first rains. (Yes, he has been put in the calendar for next year!)
Plenty to smile about
In spite of the dashes and the bashes we were all smiles about the rain. This week's podcast is all about the benefits of smiling.
In the world of mental and emotional wellbeing the focus is so often on negative and difficult emotional states and how to alleviate them. Stress, anxiety and depression put their hands up like eager classmates each time we venture into this arena so it was time for a change of pace.
Earlier this month it was World Smile Day. This inspired us to record a podcast episode about the science of smiling. Smiling makes us feel better and is good for us. Remember when we could not see each other's smiles? The already tense situation brought about by the crazy restrictions and the fear around the virus was made more uncomfortable by the inability to calm each other down by smiling.
Smiling in infectious
Did you know that children smile on average 400 times a day? Isn't that amazing? That's part of the reason it is so satisfying being around them. But this number drops significantly as happy adults smile 40-50 times, and the average adult only 20 times a day. What a sad statistic and a clue to how serious we become as we age. We can change that and we should.
Smiling is contagious, try not smiling back at someone who smiles at you. It is almost impossible. Now here is the challenge for this week: we dare you to smile more and to see how many people you can get to smile back. We've already tried it and it works! Makes for a sunnier experience going out and engaging with others. And it makes us feel better too!