How To Smile When Stress Slaps You In The Face

FIRST, TO LAUGH. Loudly, open-mouthed, so you can taste and feel the tears better.

Life is often like all the flowers, beautiful with a variety of colors and scents (half of them smelling unpleasant, true enough, but at least they look nice). And sometimes, life is simply just like the blooms of a flower you think will open... and then they die. So much for life being like a flower. 

You’ll be missed, my unopened flowers 💀 

Or maybe I’ll go find some better flowers, that actually open, look pretty, and smell nice. 🧡 Maybe I never needed those false blooms.

AND THEN TO CRY 

Because tears always follow laughter, right? 

Ah, but not always. Sometimes you merely want to cry. 

Instead. Instead. You must become THE SMILING ROBOT. 

You must take your heart out for a moment, staring at it, wonder why it's so actively trying to get you to stay still or run away when duty calls you toward something most horrible. 

Toward the children who need you, even as they say they'd like to cut your throat and watch you bleed. 

Toward the people who have so much to say, and always more to say, because stress has decimated your brain.

Toward loud, angry, hateful noises. But you smile. You tell your fingers to hang loose, for your body to not shake, for your heart to know that what is needed is love.

How do you smile when stress slaps you in the face? 

You just do. 

And then you cry afterward. 

Ah, how salty tears sweetly soothe. 

If only promises never were broken, if all buds blossomed, if all men told the truth when they looked into a woman's eyes, if all children felt love to be safest. 

(Began in Stuttgart, Germany 2019)