"Faking Happiness Is Effective Way to Feel Better Faster" promises the headline in the latest issue of McCall's magazine.
"At first it may be difficult to force yourself to act like you're happy," Randy Larsen, associate professor of psychology at the University of Michigan, says in the article, "but the more you do it, the more natural it becomes."According to Larsen, "optimistic posing" not only brightens one's mood but is attractive to people of the opposite sex and "makes them feel good about you."
Although I am personally cheerful to the point of irritation, I have some unbelievably grumpy readers, not all of whom are older than 65 years of age and/or live in Ontario. So, as a public service to them, I decided to conduct a little experiment. For an entire day, I pretended to be happy in order to see if "optimistic posing" would brighten my mood and make me more attractive to the opposite sex.
Here are the results of my experiment:
6:30 a.m. - Spring out of bed and bounce cheerfully into kitchen to give "good morning" kisses to wife, son and pug.
6:33 a.m. - Help startled wife mop up spilled coffee; apply Band-Aid to puncture wound in ankle where terrified dog sunk teeth.
6:45 a.m. - Smiling bravely through throbbing pain in ankle, ask wife and son if they would like me to fix them breakfast.
6:47 a.m. - Ten-year-old sucker-punches me in solar plexus, demands to know what happened to "real daddy."
6:48 a.m. - Smiling gamely, I crumple to the linoleum, gasping for air. While fading in and out of consciousness, I ask myself if my mood has brightened or if I feel more attractive to the opposite sex. Answer: Not yet.
8:15 a.m. - Limp blissfully to car and happily turn key.
8:16 a.m. - Happily turn key again. And again.
8:17 a.m. - Discover, to my glee, that the car's battery is dead.
8:25 a.m. - Joyfully call wrecker service; learn, to my delight, that it will be at least an hour before truck arrives.
10:05 a.m. - Skip merrily into office and spy red-faced editor yelling into telephone. Make mental note to send him copy of McCall's article about faking happiness.
10:30 a.m. - Elatedly call up voice mail messages on answering machine. Learn, to my jollity, that the test results have come back and my doctor would like me to come into his office for a "little talk."
12:10 p.m. - Break perkily for lunch. Gum-snapping waitress named Wanda takes order for tuna salad on rye, lettuce, no tomato. Smiling as genially as possible with mouth full of tuna salad, ask Wanda if she finds me more sexually attractive than usual.
12:15 p.m. - Fly giddily through door of restaurant after being "bounced" by angry manager. Make mental note to send him copy of happiness-faking article as head smacks good-naturedly on pavement.
2:30 p.m. - After lighthearted visit to emergency room, blithely return to work to finish column.
4 p.m. - Learn, to my effervescence, that editor thinks column is sophomoric and in questionable taste. Wonder, hilariously, if it would be possible to get a bulk rate on happiness-faking article.
6:10 p.m. - Return sunnily to house and greet family with cheery, "I'm home!"
6:15 p.m. - Convivially apply antiseptic to puncture wounds in other ankle where terrified pug sunk teeth.
6:30 p.m. - Drop, not the least bit optimistically, into bed, making mental note to write nasty letter to McCall's in the morning.