¶ … Personal Belief This I believe: when a person sings or smiles while singing -- which can be done -- that person is going to raise her level of happiness and make others happier. Scientific research verifies the idea that smiling lowers the blood pressure, relieves stress and makes humans more appealing to others, among other benefits. Research also shows that singing in a choir is a way to change one's mood and gives a comfortably warm feeling with a sense of close emotional involvement with other people in the choir. Singing alone is beneficial for many reasons but the actual scientific benefit is in the production of endorphins that occurs when a person sings out in a strong song. Endorphins interact with receptors in one's brain and that takes away the sense of pain.

I believe in smiling and singing because I have had first-hand experiences with those actions. When they are self-directed they can be powerful mood changers. For example, I was alone the other day and had been procrastinating doing my assignments. I was feeling some tension because my grades and my success is important albeit sometimes...

I smiled at the fact that I was a bit flat but since no one heard me I didn't care. Music has been an important part of my life since I was in youth choir in our church, up through adult choir and singing in college.
ETHOS: We do tend to believe people for whom we have respect. The choir director for our youth choir in church was actually a professor of music, and he could be a bit impatient (he hated it when the last word of a hymn ended with an "R" and we held the "R" out… 'rrrrrrr"), but he was really good at teaching us. He said many times that music can made a sad day glad, and make a dark dreary day alive and bright with "human sunshine." I believed him then and I do to this day, not just because he was an expert in music, but because he had charisma as well, and he could create…