I’ve become a better “fake smiler” in the last year. A really good one.

It is a lot like the real thing – the cheek/jaw muscles hurt if you do it a lot, no one can make out you’re faking it, people around you become happy and smile back, if you do it enough yourself, you’re happy too.

But I know it’s fake because a lot of people I meet are such complete dolts that it is impossible to not feel pity for their level of intelligence or common sense. And it is damn near impossible to produce a genuine smile when your brain is distressed hearing these people talk. People are stupid.

And because I don’t want to be rude to them – these are human beings after all, my own species and I’m a sucker for giving someone the benefit of doubt – I fake my smile. To me it feels like I’m not being untruthful to myself and am not being mean to “people” either. A safe fence-sitter because my need to belong triumphs all else. And instead of telling myself that I have to endure this inane talk from stupid people and be stoic and take it in my stride, I just deliver the fake smile.

Practice it on your family and closest friends first. If they can’t detect it, no one else ever will.

And don’t forget what your real smile feels like. Forgetting THAT would be a tragedy.

Someone asked me what professionalism meant to me.

I didn’t have an answer right away because to me, professionalism is more a matter of words like integrity, passion, etc., which aren’t really definitive words for most people. These words are more like ideals that are unattainable in “real” life, as I’ve been told countless times. So I wanted to think of a much simpler way to define what I think constitutes professionalism.

For me, professionalism means not lying or telling the truth. A combination of courage and kindness.

What this means, as an example, from a recent experience, is that if you are not going to hire me, you tell me as much. You get brownie points of sharing your reasons and even more chocolatey gooey brownie points if you can deliver the news in a humane fashion. Courage plus kindness.

Professionalism isn’t about capability – whether, as a photographer or designer I can deliver what a client asks for. But it is about whether I am being utterly truthful with the client – if I can deliver their requirements and what I charge and how much and what they will have to compromise on if they bargain purely on a price point. Or if I am unable to deliver and can refer them to someone else without being a bitch.

Truth + Courage + Kindness = Professionalism.

As David on Twitter shared, “Opinions are like assholes, everyone has one. Sometimes, though, the unwanted opinions are coming from an asshole.”

As far as I’m concerned, ALL unwanted opinions appear to be coming from someone who is either always an asshole or someone who is being an asshole in that moment. Yes Mom, sometimes, you too.

It appears that everyone, at some point in their lives, and hence at every point in your own life, is trying their best to make you doubt your own self and embed it into your head that you don’t know what you’re doing.

In junior high, I had a “best friend” who told me I wouldn’t be a successful person in life because I had no morals & principals and because I did not have an opinion. I thought about that statement for years – one of the downfalls of that “best friend” was that I never made many close female friends – and eventually, I realized that it appeared to her that I had no opinions or beliefs because I did not think it to be my birthright to share them at every opportunity I could force.

So seriously, people with opinions, shut the fuck up. If you have facts, lets talk.
Or even better, if you can tell me something that the majority of the population believes to be a fact but is in fact an opinion, please invite yourself over for a drink.