I was irrevocably betrothed to laughter, the sound of which has always seemed to me the most civilized music in the world. — Peter Ustinov
I could probably stop this blog article right here and will successfully have made my point, but I’ve spent too many years in Corporate America to be that brief .
Years ago, when I was homebound due to an illness, I made the time pass by writing plays. My brother and sister were fellow actors, and we would present these plays to my parents and, sometimes, the neighbors. I was eight-years-old, so this was no Twilight screenplay. Oh, wait, maybe it was :).
Before Twilight fans get angry I read every book and enjoyed them thoroughly. The movies, not so much.
Anyway, one of the first plays presented was about a picnic. My brother, sister and I had only practiced for about 4.5 minutes, so we were having trouble delivering our lines. This created large gaps of silence. Our parental units were probably in more pain than we were, but we plodded forward. The dog, I’m sure out of sheer pity, came and sat in the middle of the picnic blanket. She sat directly in front of me, at which point I choked on some food.
When I starting coughing it was right in her little face. The hair on her face blew back, and we all started to laugh. The parents laughed, my brother and sister laughed, and the neighbors laughed.
Even though they were guffawing out of sheer relief, I discovered the joy of making people laugh. From that point forward every play, every dance, was flawed, just at the right time to generate a laugh. As I was the sick kid at home for almost a year, those moments of laughter brought me joy and made me feel healthy again, if only for a moment.
I think laughter is the greatest gift we can give each other for these three reasons:
- Laughter cleanses the soul. Think about the last time you were really uptight about something and then someone made you laugh. It literally feels like a storm has passed and the sun is shining again. You feel lighter.
- Laughter is contagious. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a person laugh alone. Even if no one in the room knows what they’re laughing at, if someone is doubled over you’ll see others begin to laugh as well.
- Laughter makes us better people. Watch an audience that leaves a funny movie. People are smiling and letting each other out into the aisle. There is a general camaraderie created by laughter, and it’s a positive one.
So, I hope you laugh.