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Ok, so maybe ultimate is stretching it a bit.
I mean there is fierce competition out there. In addition
to the conventional visits to the doctor and your garden-variety
pharmaceuticals, many of us have access to meditation instruction,
yoga, massage therapy, aromatherapy, and other various
practices. People talk or boast about how they are able
to practice sitting mediation for hours without thinking
or how they inhale various “medicinal” plants
to help clear their minds. In contrast, it is not often
that you will hear someone say, “Peyote? Oh, no thank
you. I prefer ingesting a couple hours of Cosby with some
spontaneous tickling thrown in.” As it turns out though,
humor may be one of the most effective and inexpensive
forms of holistic therapy.
So how can humor be holistic, or even therapeutic?
The word “holistic” has
become so popular that it’s lost some of its meaning.
Everyone uses it from the local chiropractor to the neighborhood
streetwalker: “$20, and I’ll make you feel good
all over.” For our purposes, holistic refers to the
perception that our ailments and illnesses are affected
not just by our physical condition, but by our mental/emotional
states as well as our spiritual states. By referring to
humor as holistic, I’m suggesting that humor can be
used to alter one’s mental, physical, and spiritual
conditions.
Humor being
Therapeutic
MIND:
How often are you angry or upset over the events of the previous day? Or, how
many times do you find yourself driving in your car on the way to work
worrying about your next meeting or a possible confrontation with a boss,
coworker or client? In our minds many of us prepare for battle, engage
in warfare, and bury ourselves in our own graves before ever stepping out
of the car. The stresses of our everyday modern lives hold many of us captives.
We relive painful memories of past relationships, past failures, and past
decisions only to find ourselves next worrying about future relationships,
future failures and future decisions. Here, the most obvious effect of
humor is its use as a distractive mechanism, distracting us from our own
harmful thoughts. In simple terms, it forces us to look at our present
situation in such a way that we feel good. We are either able to see the
world in a different context and are able to not take it so seriously,
or we are able to laugh at ourselves. In either case a humorous outlook
can help us relax when the stresses of the world seem overwhelming.
BODY:
The human body has evolved to include natural responses to the environment.
When confronted with life threatening situations, such as confrontations
with wild animals, our ancestors developed the ability to quickly change
their heart rates and increase their adrenaline in preparation to either
run away or gear up for battle. This is of course known as the Fight-or-Flight
response. However, while our minds have evolved to bring about a more complicated
and technically advanced civilization, this fight-or-flight response still
remains with us. It is very rare to be faced with a bear attack while placing
an order at the McDonald’s drive through window. Yet, the stress we
feel while driving there, or the stress of having our orders screwed up
still initiate the same body chemistry reaction as if we were in the face
of life threatening danger. The fight-or-flight response is still active,
but instead of being activated once in a blue moon, it’s activated
when we wake up dreading going to work or school, or when we drive in rush
hour traffic, or when we can’t find parking, or when we’re late
for an appointment, or when we’re worried about our finances, etc… This
constant stress on our body chemistry results in a weakening of our immune
systems. It creates an internal toxic build up that we typically do not
have a release mechanism for (unless of course you take the term “drive
thru” literally and decide to use your vehicle as a battering ram).
Now imagine being told that you are sick or that you’ve been diagnosed
with a horrible disease. Wouldn’t you be even more stressed out, thereby
worsening your body’s internal defense systems? That’s why humor
can be such a helpful therapy. Not only can it be used as a distraction
to ease your mind, but also studies now have shown that being exposed to
humor can help boost your immune system. In addition, laughing out loud
provides a release for your tension. It ain’t throwing a punch at
a grizzly, but it’s close. So, at the very least humor dulls the pain
you feel and at its best it may help aid in your recovery. More so, having
a humorous outlook in general helps us defend against the many stress related
illnesses that have become commonplace in our hectic modern lives.
SPIRIT:
The great wisdom traditions of the world, whether they be from Hinduism and
Buddhism from the east, or the three Abrahamic traditions of the west have
very similar notions of the human condition. They have described the typical
human being as fumbling around the world “half asleep“, not being
fully aware of his/her own life and surroundings; living as a bundle of
preconditioned responses reacting unconsciously to worldly stimulus just
as we’ve been brought up by our cultures to do. The symptoms include
valuing material goods as dictated by society, valuing our social status,
and valuing other cultural norms. One day you’re in high school worried
about getting a date for the prom and the next day you’re the proud
owner of two malfunctioning cars, a mortgage, and a job you hate. Ten years
pass by without you even blinking an eye and you’re left wondering
how you got where you are. Many of us “live in the wilderness” all
our lives without ever realizing the world is more than the forest we find
ourselves in. Many of us “look” at the world without ever truly “seeing” it.
Humor is valuable here in a few ways. Some groups, as illustrated through
the Sufi tales compiled by Idries Shah, use humor as a way of “waking” people
up from their preconditioned trance. Through the use of a joke or humorous
story your regular pattern of thought is jolted. That’s what makes
something funny. The farther away the punch line is from what you were
expecting the funnier the joke. Another, and related, value of humor is
it forces your mind to stop neurosing over the past and fretting the future.
Instead, it forces you to live in the present moment. When we stop our
minds from stressing us out over past events or future problems we are
left with the world as it really is in the present moment, not how we imagine
it to be. Take a deep breath. Smell the roses. In our context, relax, pause
every once and a while and laugh. As Jesus said,
“Therefore
I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will
eat or what you will drink, or about your body, or what
you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body
more than clothing? Look at the birds of the air; they
neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet, your
heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than
they?”
If you truly
have faith in any expression or notion of transcendence
in your life, what are you worried about? It seems to me
that living a life lightheartedly demonstrates a greater
faith than living with a heavy, worrisome heart. By laughing
we acknowledge there’s more to this world than what
we normally immediately perceive. By continually trying
to change the context in which we view our everyday predicaments
and focus on a “bigger picture” we can acknowledge
the absurdity of the everyday world of school problems,
job issues, and never ending bills. It does not mean we
ignore reality. In fact, those who live lightheartedly
are able to be more successful since living becomes more
fun. They are more productive and happier since they spend
less time passively worrying and more time actively engaging
the world head on. As Carlos Castaneda’s Yaqui Indian
teacher Don Juan would say, one’s life becomes their “controlled
folly”. Or using a basketball analogy, they shoot
their free throws as if it were practice rather than if
the game were ever on the line.
Conclusion
We here at My
Hyena hope to provide you with as much inspiration for
laughter as we can. We really do believe that humor can
be used to benefit your life and the lives of the people
you come in contact with everyday. We also encourage you
to investigate the links we have provided on this page
to learn more about the humor-healing connection and to
read about the real life stories illustrating the positive
effects of humor.
So, if you ever find yourself distressed or overcome by a massive headache
at dinner time, even if dinner happens to be a #1 combo meal, just remember
to say grace:
“Rub-a-dub-dub.
Thanks for the grub. Yeaaaaaa God!” |
