Darryl Davis - How to Design a Life Worth Smiling About

Copyright 2014 by Darryl Davis. All rights reserved. Except as permitted under the United States Copyright Act of 1976, no part of this publication may be reproduced or distributed in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior written permission of the publisher.

ISBN: 978-0-07-181987-9

MHID: 0-07-181987-8

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T o everyone at McGraw-Hill who has worked on this project: Your support and understanding have been incredible. You are truly an extraordinary team of people, employing incredible skills to help authors through the process of writing a book that they can be proud of.

To all of my students who have been so supportive during the journey of writing this book: You truly have been my inspiration. Each day that I sat down to write, I thought of you. Thank you for all your love, caring, and support, and for opening yourselves up to me.

To my Uncle Jack: Thank you for being my prayer warrior. Your dedication to our faith and your unwavering commitment to staying healthy are truly an inspiration to me. I thank you for all your love.

To my Aunt Nancy: You are so full of love and passion for life that you inspire me to be a better person. Thank you for always being there for me, and for being such an important person in my life and to our entire family.

To Erica, thank you for always being such a great mother to our son, and for being so patient with me.

To Stu Kamen, one of my oldest and closest friends, and my secret weapon in writing: Thank you for the invaluable contribution youve made to this book. I know you had to make many sacrifices to meet our deadlines, and I cant thank you enough for all of your hard work and talent.

To my best friend, Steve Harney: They say that if you can count all your true friends on one hand, youre a lucky man. Well, Id say that Im the luckiest man in the world because the support and encouragement youve given me are equivalent to those of five people. Through the years, time after time, you have shown me the true meaning of friendship. I cant thank you enough for your commitment to always being there for mewhether its for guidance, advice, a good laugh, or just an ear to listen. The term best friend doesnt adequately describe how important you are to me. And I thank you for being patient with me and helping me discover my calling in life.

To my son, Michael. You are the one who truly puts a smile on my face, especially when I come home from being on the road. You have grown into such a wonderful young man, and I couldnt be prouder of you. I am the luckiest father in the world because of you. There have been so many times when thinking of you, our relationship, and who you are as a human being has inspired me while writing this book. I believe most parents hope that their child will be a better person than themselves, and you have already accomplished that at your young age of 17.

And to the love of my life, April. I cannot adequately express how lucky I feel to have found someone as wonderful as you. My feelings for you are so deep that it would be inappropriate to write in this book what those feelings are, so I will just say this: thank you for your selfless support, your caring about me more than about yourself at times, your abundant love, all you do for our family, and showing me how to live a life worth smiling about. And of course, thank you, honey baby, for all your wonderful contributions to this book. I could not have done this without you. Thank you for helping me make a difference in the world.

Last, but most certainly not least, to my Higher Power, whom I call God. Keep showing me the path you want me to walk, and thank you for never giving up on me.

I know what youre thinking. Smiling doesnt seem like a typical topic for a business book. It doesnt seem as important as leadership or goal setting, or even how to use Microsoft Office. And besides, everyone knows that its better to smile than to walk around looking angry all day. So, why should I read a 200+ page book to learn what I already know?

Well, frankly, Id have my doubts, too, if this book were nothing more than a long-winded piece of advice telling you to smile more frequently. Luckily, theres a bit more to it than that.

First of all, what if I told you that smiling more actually does help you to succeed? (The first chapter, The Science Behind Your Smile, goes into that in great detail.) And, what if I further told you that if you know what you truly want in business and in life, get clear about whats stopping you from having what you want, and then take specific actions to get precisely what you want, youll wind up with more things to smile about? Its kind of obvious, right? And self-fulfilling. (Back to that concept at the end of this introduction.)