Happiness Break: Smiling From The Inside Out - podcast episode cover

Happiness Break: Smiling From The Inside Out

The Science of Happiness
Jul 10, 2025•6 min
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Episode description

Just a soft smile and a few minutes of breath can shift your mood, lower stress, and deepen your sense of connection.

How To Do This Practice: 

  1. Settle In: Find a comfortable seat, rest your hands gently, and soften your gaze or close your eyes.
  2. Breathe and Soften: Take a few slow, deep breaths. In through the nose, out through the mouth, relaxing your face, jaw, and neck.
  3. Form a Gentle Smile: Let a soft, effortless smile form at the corners of your mouth. Think of something or someone that makes you smile.
  4. Turn the Smile Inward: Imagine that smile radiating inside your body, through your face, throat, and chest.
  5. Send the Smile Through Your Body: With each breath, guide the smile to your heart, lungs, digestive system, and spine, acknowledging and appreciating each part.
  6. Close Gently: Let the smile spread throughout your whole body, take one final deep breath, and slowly open your eyes, carrying the smile into the rest of your day.

Scroll down for a transcription of this episode.

Today’s Happiness Break Guide:

DACHER KELTNER is the host of The Science of Happiness podcast and is a co-instructor of the Greater Good Science Center’s popular online course of the same name. He’s also a professor of psychology at the University of California, Berkeley.

Related Happiness Break episodes:

Take a Break With Our Loving-Kindness Meditation: https://tinyurl.com/2kr4fjz5

A Meditation on Original Love: https://tinyurl.com/5u298cv4

Embodying Resilience: https://tinyurl.com/46383mhx

Related Science of Happiness episodes:

Are You Remembering the Good Times: https://tinyurl.com/483bkk2h

Make Uncertainty Part of the Process: https://tinyurl.com/234u5ds7

Why We Should Seek Beauty: https://tinyurl.com/yn7ry59j

Follow us on Instagram: @ScienceOfHappinessPod

We’d love to hear about your experience with this practice! Share your thoughts at happinesspod@berkeley.edu or use the hashtag #happinesspod. 

Find us on Apple Podcasts: https://tinyurl.com/2p9h5aap

Help us share Happiness Break! Leave a 5-star review and share this link: https://tinyurl.com/2p9h5aap

Transcription: https://tinyurl.com/s4wk4x4y

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