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rx
principles (Mind/Body)
healing power of humor
psychospiritual approaches
definition
"Humor in the darkest of places is a sign of emergence from grief and depression, an indication of embracing life and healing. Humor can minimize suffering by giving us power in what appears to be a powerless situation." (Klein, p. xxi)
Psychological Benefits:
Humor gives us power:
We transcend our predicaments and are lifted above our feelings of fear, discouragement, and despair. Bill Cosby has said, 'if you can find humor in something, you can survive it.' People who can laugh at their setbacks no longer feel sorry for themselves. They feel uplifted, encouraged, and empowered. (p. 4)
Humor helps us cope:
As Hans Selye said, "Nothing erases unpleasant thoughts more effectively than concentration on pleasant ones. Humor helps us cope because it instantly removes us from our pain. Much of the suffering we experience is not a result of our difficulties but how we view them; not so much the event as our relationship with it. By focusing our energy elsewhere, humor can diffuse our stressful events. It releases built-up tension of emotions such as fear, hostility, rage, and anger. Psychoanalyst Martin Grotjahn, author of Beyond Laughter, noted that "to have a sense of humor is to have an understanding of human suffering and misery." (p. 7-9)
Humor provides perspective:
Humor lends a fresh eye. It expands our picture frame and allows us to see more than just our problem. 'Life is a tragedy when seen in close-up but a comedy in longshot,' as Charlie Chaplin once quipped. (p. 10-13)
Humor keeps us balanced:
One of the most compassionate things we can do for ourselves is not take ourselves and our imperfections too seriously. When we can find some humor in our losses, those things that we push away, then we are 'honoring our imperfections and chipped edges.' (p. 17)
Physiological Benefits:
That humor is beneficial to our physical well-being is not a new idea. Voltaire has said, 'the art of medicine consists of amusing the patient while nature cures the disease.'
(p. 17)
Norman Cousins calls laughter 'inner jogging.' When we are engaged in a good, hearty laugh, every system in the body gets a workout. As he reported in Anatomy of an Illness, 'I made the joyous discovery that ten minutes of genuine belly laughter had an anesthetic effect and would give me at least two hours of pain-free sleep.' (p. 18)
William Fry, Jr. has studied and reported on many of the physical effects of laughter. He indicates that laboratory studies have shown that mirthful laughter affects most, if not all, of the major physiologic systems of the human body, and is much like aerobic exercise. The cardiovascular system is exercised as heart rate and blood pressure rise and fall again. The heavy breathing creates a vigorous oxygen exchange in the lungs and works the respiratory system. Muscles release tension in the tightening and subsequent relaxation of laughter. And opiates may be released into the bloodstream, resulting in a further sense of well-being. (p. 19)
There is a connection between laughing and crying. Each provides a cathartic cleansing. Each is an important mechanism for releasing stress and tension. Crying is an important part of pain, loss, and grief. We must give ourselves permission to cry, both tears of sorrow and tears of joy. Kahil Gibran once wrote, 'The selfsame well from which your laughter rises was oftentimes filled with your tears.' (p. 20)
Techniques for Creating Laughter:
Spotting life's set-ups:
Look for setups of life and be ready to handle them with humor. When you encounter one of those not-so-great times, have a funny familiar punch line ready. Like a humor mantra, you'll be able to meet the disturbance with your own stock punch line. (p. 42, 46)
Joke-Jitsu:
This will help to turn upsetting situations into humor. There is the standard joke setup using a 'good news/bad news' formula. Try lightening problems by reversing the formula: state your bad news first and then turn it into good news. For example, 'the bad news is that my suitcase fell apart as it came off the airplane, the good news is that it was the first out of the baggage chute.' (p. 48, 53)
Exaggerate:
It helps to exaggerate your feelings until they become so absurd that you begin to laugh! If you are having a bad day, then really have a bad day; complain endlessly. (p. 54, 65)
Laugh while the irony is hot:
To find irony, look at the relationship of how something started and how it wound up. See if you are able to see any absurdity in it and if you can, at least chuckle about it. (p. 71)
Attitude = whistle a happy tune:
Know that you have a choice between the Voice of Doom and optimism. Although we may not have control over what happens to us, we do have a choice about how we see it. Every moment of life you choose which pair of 'attitude glasses' to wear. If you always wear dark ones, everything will appear to be dismal. One can either cling to circumstances and wallow in suffering or alter one's attitude and change the outlook, and perhaps the outcome. Affirmations and visualizations help to plant the seeds of attitude changes. (p. 74, 76, 82)
Reminders - the power of props:
The use of humor reminders, humorous decorations, and amusing props are very important to help steer oneself in a lighter direction since our surroundings play such an important part in the way we feel. Props are great in traffic jams - a clown nose, a jar of bubbles, a pair of Groucho glasses, a rubber chicken, lots of possibilities here. How about little notes posted around home and work as reminders to ease up on our seriousness; like, ' are we having fun yet?,' or 'if you are too busy to laugh, you're too busy,' or ' never wrestle with a pig; you both get dirty and the pig likes it.' (p. 86, 89)
Let a smile be your umbrella:
'A smile is a curve that sets everything straight.' (Phyllis Diller) (p. 95)
It provides an instant connection between you and someone else. On a deeper level, you also trigger less serious memories within your body, which in turn can trigger a mood change. Smiling, or even looking at a smile, gives us 'life energy.' It can raise our 'serum fun levels. People with chronic pain often don't do things they would normally enjoy. They feel they can't because of the pain, but it's often the other way around. Their pain actually persists longer because they don't have any fun.' And smiling, like laughter, is contagious. (p. 96)
Child's play, i.e. making molehills out of mountains:
As adults, we lose sight of the fact that play, be it mental or physical, can once more help us deal with our world. Play can change our energy, provide relief from problems, and even help us find solutions. Making a game out of a difficult task or situation turns it into play. Dr. O. Carl Simonton is so convinced of the value of play, he teaches juggling to cancer patients. Play, games, and imagination are the key elements, along with a beginner's mind.
(p. 101, 107)
Add some nonsense:
'Like a jump-cut scene in a movie, a little bit of nonsense introduced into a problem instantly switches the picture and changes the focus.' If you can play with your problem, some distance is created between you and the difficulty, and you can begin to let go.
'A little craziness once in a while prevents permanent brain damage.' (p. 109)
Wordplay:
Renaming your experiences can alter the way you view your upsets. Simply christening something with a new name causes a shift which may have a major impact because it reframes the upset. For example, the author, when he accidentally pressed the wrong key on the computer, erased a large section of type. For the next few weeks, he told everyone he met he was no longer a writer, he was now an eraser. Another wordplay technique is literally interpreting what people say, which can be done unconsciously or intentionally. (p. 120-2)
Let go:
Letting go involves developing an attitude of noninterference so that you can step back and watch an event instead of getting involved in trying to control it. The more you pull and the more you struggle, the more tightly you become trapped. The trick is to relax. When we do not let go or our upsets, difficulties, and disappointments, they become burdens on our shoulders which prevent us from laughing. In order to get more levity in life, we need to stop struggling with our circumstances, let go, and accept what we have been given. (p. 127, 132-3)
He who laughs first:
When you can laugh at yourself or your situation, others are more likely to laugh with you and not at you. Laughing at yourself allows you and others to acknowledge the situation in a way that eases it and may even improve self-esteem and respect. It is not the same thing as putting yourself down, which makes others uncomfortable and undermines your self-esteem. Woody Allen, for example, jokes about being a loser; he flunked milk in kindergarten. Phyllis Diller makes fun of her looks; she tells of a peeping Tom who asked her to pull her window shade down. When Stephen Douglas accused Abe Lincoln of being two-faced, Lincoln replied, 'If I had two faces, I certainly wouldn't wear this one.' Similarly, laughing at difficult or embarrassing situations in your life can take the sting out of them. In so doing, they cease to have power over you. (p. 134-5, 140)
Finding the advantage in your disadvantage:
Laughter can turn any disadvantage into an advantage. Looking for some positive aspect is one step, gathering resources to see it as an opportunity is taking it even further. People can achieve remarkable feats in spite of an ordeal, if one focuses on what is gained from these new circumstances rather than what is lost. Maintaining a sense of humor in spite of the disadvantage enables us to keep enough distance not to get caught in our own melodramas. It allows us to disengage from the predicament. In hindsight, many report that looking back on a crisis, it provided a turning point in life and allowed a deeply needed rearrangement of priorities. (p. 142, 146)
The world as your laugh lab:
' Life is filled with absurdities, look for them, they are laughable. One of the easiest places to find these is in your mistakes, those bloopers that are an inevitable part of being human. Make a commitment to get more laughter in your life and your losses. Unless you begin to incorporate some of the techniques suggested here for getting more humor, laughter, and play in you life, the knowledge you have will not do you any good. Be gentle with yourself, start slow, try a smile at first, then maybe a chuckle.' (p. 151, 158)
The Last Laugh:
We can also learn to take the processes at the end of life - illness, death, and grief - less seriously. Laughing in the face of death provides the same much-needed physical and psychological benefits, and can help survivors stay both mentally and physically healthy. Humor during moments of illness, grieving, and death benefit both the person and those around them; family, friends, care-givers. being overly serious in the grieving process can be deadly to the balance of the immune system. One study showed that the immune systems of grieving spouses had lower activity levels of T cells. (p. 164)
Chinese proverb: 'You cannot prevent the birds of sorrow from flying over your head, but you can prevent them from building nests in your hair.' (p. 165)
Dr. Bernie Siegel: 'You can grieve for a loss, yet still keep yourself from losing all perspective, all appreciation for the good things that remain in your life.' (p. 165)
Rabbi Kushner in "When Bad Things Happen to Good People": 'Ask instead the question that opens the doors to the future: Now that this has happened, what shall I do about it?' (p. 165)
Norman Cousins believes part of the responsibility for humor lies with the patient. When Cousins was in the hospital, he says, 'The nurse came in with a specimen bottle when I was having breakfast. While she wasn't looking, I took my apple juice, poured it in the bottle, and handed it to her. She looked at it and said, "We're a little cloudy today, aren't we?" ' Taking a swig from the bottle, Cousins answered, "By George, you're right; let's run it through again." (p. 169)
'Humor gave them (the seriously ill) a choice. It showed them that they did not have to be so stuck in their predicaments. It showed them they did not have to be blinded by pain and suffering.' (p. 165) 'In the dying process, humor provides two additional benefits. It helps us cope with the anxieties we have about our own demise, and it helps those involved with the dying come to terms with the loss.' (p. 169) 'In order for family, friends, health-care workers, and the patient to see some humor in their trying times, they need to look for the absurdities that frequently occur during intense death-related situations.' (p. 170) 'Humor validates the fact that although someone may be seriously ill or in the process of dying, for the moment at least, he or she is still alive.' (p. 178)
Stephen Levine: 'As long as death is the enemy, life is a struggle. . . . Keep your heart open in hell.' (p. 209)
(Klein, p. 4-21, 42, 46, 48, 53-4, 65, 71, 74, 76, 82, 86, 89, 95-8, 101, 107, 109, 120-2, 127, 132-5, 140, 142, 146, 151, 158, 164, 165, 169, 170, 178, 209)
see:
attitudinal healing
Ayurvedic healing
compassion and healing
healing belief systems
healing power of meditation
healing power of prayer
holographic consciousness
human energy fields
Kahuna healing
mind beyond body
Native American healing
psychic healing
quantum healing
search for god
state-dependent learning
Sufi healing
Tai Qi as a healing art
the shadow and physical symptoms
yogic view of the human body
footnotes