I remember wandering around the zoo as a young child with my father; my little hand dwarfed in his as I bounced along. As we traveled he asked me to look at the animals and say what I thought they were feeling. I ventured a guess and he responded with clue to make the process easier. It quickly became clear to me that some animals expressed themselves in ways that were recognizable to my child mind and others were a bit more complicated. "Some birds will spread out their feathers when they are scared to try to look bigger," he explained, "jaguars sometimes pace when they are stressed."
The day ended at the dolphin exhibit. "Happy!" I declared, watching them swimming around with their big smiley noses. My father kneeled down, "Jessica, dolphins' faces make it look like they are smiling but that does not mean they are happy inside. They do not have control over how their face looks the way we do, so we have to look really deeply to figure out how they are feeling." That message sticks with me.
Many of us tend to live like the dolphins. We force a smile, a laugh, even some tears - where there are none. This is particularly tragic because our faces are not trapped in a smile, we have a choice. Of course it is not always that simple, there are lots of reasons why wearing our heart on our sleeve is problematic.
Still, I think the world would be a better place if people shared more and hid less.
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