My heart fixes fast when it feels a similar spirit. It won’t force or fit to what does not pair, but when it senses another like itself, it desires strong to learn its company. I used to think I was messed up, that my affinities were first to the flesh, and that—because I saw beauty in a smile—there must be defect in my attraction to the whole. I didn’t see then that a smile was an expression of the soul, and that a beauty in it was signal to a greater beauty within. I did not understand then my heart sought this inner beauty and not the attraction to its small outward expression witnessed in a smile.
I see it now, across all ages and in all people. I understand a smile is goodness emanating from kind souls, expressed in eyes and face, and that my attraction is towards a love for spirit and not of the body as I perceived in younger years. We show this same beauty in spirit of ourselves when we share our smile with others.
This is the power held in a smile: it’s ability to raise and uplift. A smile is an expression of light within us, fixed and focused in a moment to illume another soul. It is something that I love.