CLICK to listen to the audio version of this Daily Paradox

We all know how to smile – or do we? Think of the smiles you have received today. Most will be smiles of affection or humour, a few may be sarcastic, perhaps the odd one downright cynical. There are smiles of joy and smiles of sorrow, smiles of relief and smiles of anxiety. Every smile tells a story.

Mostly we don’t think about smiling – it comes naturally. So if our mood is suitable for smiling we smile. Some people are natural smilers, some not. If we do not naturally smile a lot can we make ourselves and will it help us or someone else? I was very struck, almost hurt, once when a very great friend said “you laugh a lot but seldom smile”. I had thought I was a smiling kind of chap.

Manipulating our personality may not seem to be a good thing to do. Mentees often say to me “oh, but (behaving like) that is not me”. Obvious phoniness is clearly bad but actually we are all manipulating who we are, all the time. Change some aspect of behaviour and you change who you are. Development is always change, change is manipulation.

Smiling is a habit we always encourage at Terrific Mentors and one of my fellow Mentors, Denise Pang, suggested that I should write about its part in assertiveness. Many of the people we help lack confidence and simply telling them to be more confident is like inviting a non-swimmer to do extra lengths of the pool. You do not conjure confidence from thin air.

So we have pondered the role smiling plays in confidence and concluded that it is part of an assertive aspect of communication, reassuring the listener that what we are saying is both credible and acceptable. Like all communication it is capable of misuse but I assume for the purposes of this discussion that what we have to say is backed by our personal integrity of purpose.

Making a mark today is not easy. So many conversations go over the heads – or, rather, the iPhones – of our audience that we need to learn a new language to impress a point of view, change a decision or simply engage with another. Honeyed words and well-turned phrases are no longer enough. That is why the smile has come into its own; it is assertive, however gently expressed.

If you want proof of this try turning away from someone who is smiling at you. It is difficult to do so. A smile shines into your eyes and heart even if it is not a happy smile. So when you need to emphasise a point, to press home a belief, to convince a sceptic of your views, smile. It will bring you rewards way beyond your immediate purpose.

If you do it often, it will bring you some peace, too. Keep smiling.