Your Smile is Your Light: How to Bring Joy Into Every Room

Maricho Dumale
2025年12月15日
読了時間: 2分

更新日：2025年12月17日

People often ask me about my smile. Did I ever train how to smile? The answer is no—not really.

But during my time in drama school, I learned three golden rules to make it in show business:

Hit your mark.
Show up.
Turn your light on.

That third rule—turn your light on—isn’t about pretending or putting on a fake smile.

It’s about awareness: realizing you’re sharing space with others and choosing to bring your light, your presence, into the room.

When you wear a grumpy face or carry stress, people around you unconsciously mirror that energy. But when you smile, you start the opposite ripple. Your smile invites others to smile.

And suddenly, your presence changes the room.

But for me, smiling didn’t always come easily. I remember being around ten or twelve, at my ballet school’s recital. As I waited in the wings, I watched my senpai — an older, more experienced dancer I deeply admired — perform onstage.

Her radiant smile lit up the entire theater. I remember thinking, I want to be like that.

Yet no matter how hard I tried, my smile never felt natural.

Growing up, I was often told to be serious, to behave, to look proper.

Comments like,

“Your mouth is too big,” or “Don’t laugh with your mouth open,”

echoed in my mind. Somewhere along the way, I started holding myself back—not just from smiling, but from feeling free.

It wasn’t until later, after years of ballet and performing, that I realized something profound: I wasn’t learning how to smile. I was learning how to allow myself to smile, release the tension, stop worrying about how I looked, and let joy show.

That’s when everything changed. My smile wasn’t forced anymore—it was simply me being more me.

So if you’ve ever felt self-conscious about your smile, know this: you already have everything it takes to smile.

It’s not about creating something fake. It’s about removing what blocks your light—the overthinking, the pressure, the old voices telling you to shrink.

Here’s a little smile exercise you can try:

Know what makes you smile. We all have joy keys—simple things that instantly lift our spirit.