What causes smiles in your life?

Saving or improving the life of a marginalized, oppressed, ethnically/racially prosecuted, or impoverished person .... no matter where it is in this world.

The best smiles are the ones that come suddenly and unexpectedly. I love to laugh, and I love to smile.
I have read that smiling causes an immediate change in your body's chemistry, so even if I am alone, if I start feeling down, I force a smile on my face. Sometimes it works, and I start to laugh. Maybe I am only laughing at how silly I am to be smiling at nothing, but who cares?

Liz! You made me smile this morning! For me, many things make me smile as well. You can see it in my picture here...:-)

Oh I always smile on photos, I don't know why!!!

Last night - it was 10pm Friday night - the end of a rough week at work and in some friendships. And I was at the airport picking up my husband (who has been home 18 hours in the last two weeks) and my two sons (almost 17 and 7.5) And my 7 and half year old saw me walking towards them and broke out into this huge grin. "Mum!!!" and he just flew to me, arms outstretched. He's too big for me to able to lift easily and spin around the way I used to - but I gave it my best shot ...and smiled!

Good music, the antics of my crazy dog, chocolate - just the start of the list.

Meeting a selfless person in America.

Liz, this does bring a smile to my face. The intricacies of personal pleasure. Jami Joanne, I suspect alot of people smile when presented gifts of chocolate or ice cream. Sonja, small children usually do cause smiles in thier enthusiastic excitement of new experiences. Nancy, I'm not sure that smiling releases endorphins, or whatever, but smiling is contagious, and does spread. Lily, such altruism. Maybe this is what causes Saul to smile.

I agree with Liz. Love making can produce big smiles. Just seeing my sweetheart's pretty face or body causes me to smile. I'm sure she will blush as much as I am but when I walk into the room at night and she is asleep in any of various positions the site of her beautiful body brings out the biggest smiles.

I smile when I see my daughter reading or watching a musical or on stage. I smile just thinking about her.

My 2005 Nissan 350Z Convertible Grand Touring sports car makes me smile, especially while "merging" onto 70mph highway traffic!

When I get any news about any of the three guide dogs I raised for Guide Dogs for the Blind. Last week I got a letter from Clarabelle's human life partner (Clarabelle is the black lab in my icon). They are doing very well together. What a heart warming thing that is.

I smile at pretty woman. I am not a hopeless flirt, but beauty makes me happy. I smile at babies. I smile at men, woman, or children who do something kind and unselfish.

I've been smiling all day since the 9th (which just began here) is one year since the first time I saw my ex-highschool sweetheart after 22 years apart. The rush of emotions I had that night were mind boggling and thinking back on this love at first sight experience makes me smile.

Remembering the wonderful deeds and the great times I had with my late-wife Cyndi makes me smile, or cry, or both.

Interesting topics on Gather.com make me smile.This is one.

I have been a depressive personality, a worrywart, and an expecter-of-doom kinda person most of my life. But I have worked for years now on enjoying life, on seeing and expecting good things, on letting go of controlling and just living in the moment, 24 hours at a time. It works! And now I smile a lot, especially at myself when the old thoughts creep into my mind and I realize how silly they are.

truly speaking the stuff at gather has brought a smile on my face. i have always been suffering from an inferiority complex, dont know the reason exactly, but that has always caused me pain.
In addition to that, i was being forced into doing things which i hate, that has always led to the mental stress since 4 years and which will continue for atleast 4 years.

But interacting with people and reading the things which give me relief bring smile on my face and this is only because of gather.

thx to gather.

A loving note makes me smile - a lot!

That's a good one Julie. There are so many things that make me smile, I wouldn't know where to start. Life makes me smile-how's that?
Thanks for the article and thoughts.