One could argue and argue about the age of various religious ideas, how long human beings have had the religious impulse, whether the religious impulse is innate, the wildly dubious nature of applying some kind of wonky social Darwinism to religious ideas (certain monotheisms came after certain polytheisms and are therefore the stronger, better and more advanced religious concepts! Uh huh), etc. etc. But no matter how much you wanna wrastle over the meaning of it all, one thing is (I’m gonna say it!) universally true. Laughter is good. Of course, one could say that laughing at the expense of another is not good, and they would be right, but this is again that villain civilization corrupting a human good. For a moment, let’s say that I’m talking about free, gut-shaking, side-splitting, earth-joy-manifesting, arms-wide, tears-in-your-eyes, ow-ow-my-face-hurts-but-I-can’t-stop laughter. This is good stuff.
I was in the park last year, laying on the grass following some rockin’ frisbee-throwing with the intrepid partner, and in the distance a young couple was playing ball with each other and with their little 3 or 4 year old girl. At one point, the girl picked up the ball and threw it with everything she had – the ball went about a foot – and she immediately shrieked with pure unadulterated joy. My immediate, unbidden response was to laugh – the kind of wonderful laughing that comes from a beautiful day and an adorable kid in a crazy knit hat feeling the thrill of Being with her whole self.
I was reminded of the amazing power of laughter this week by a couple of items I found skootching about the web:
1. Let’s for a moment forget how ridiculous is it that someone provided funding for other people to make the amazing “discovery” that laughing is actually contagious (next – do we really breathe in and out all day long?), and instead simply relish the information. Laughter is contagious (and now clinically proven, so it must be true!). Infect somebody today!
2. Through the (scientifically validated!) reality of contagious laughter, the miracle of Laughter Yoga is made possible. You may have already heard about this – groups of folks getting together on a regular basis to laugh with purpose. And I’m sure you’ve heard all the reports that laughter is good for your body physically and good for you emotionally and spiritually and everything. Yet, it sounds corny. And yeah, it feels corny at first. But really, it rocks. I participated in a mini-laughter workshop with a summer youth program I was working with a few years ago. The exercises felt awkward at first – mostly we eyeballed each other weirdly as we repeated “ha ha ha! ho ho ho! hee hee hee!,” but in almost no time at all, we really were laughing. Because it was hilarious. We walked around, shaking hands and laughing with each other, at each other. We laughed at laughing. You know – it was completely awesome. And the teenagers we worked with, initially convinced that this was the dorkiest thing they’d ever heard, all left the workshop chuckling and talking and happy. This is the miracle of laughter.
So my friends, my wish for you today is some spiritually uplifing, soul-inspired, wyrd and loud-ass laughing. If nothing strikes you as particularly amusing, I encourage you to fake it ’til you make it. The miracle of infectious laughter makes it possible for this to work.
Some say that the world laughs in flowers. I say that She also laughs through us. When we laugh, the World is laughing.
