“Your sense of humor is one of the most powerful tools you have to make certain that your daily mood and emotional state support good health” – Paul E. McGee PhD.
Along with a good sense of humor comes laughter. When laughter is shared, it binds people together and increases happiness. Laughter also triggers healthy physical changes in your body. It can boost your immune system and energy, plus diminish pain and protect you from the damaging effects of stress. Laughter makes you feel good and the good feeling that you get when you laugh remains with you even after the laughter subsides. It has been said that humor can help you keep a positive, optimistic outlook through difficult, disastrous, disappointments and loss. All that said, it sounds like we should laugh a lot more.
One good way to laugh is to hear or read a funny joke, like this one – A priest, a politician and an engineer are scheduled to be executed late in the French Revolution. The priest is brought up to the guillotine and made ready. The executioner pulls the cord and the heavy steel blade starts down, then shutters to a stop in the middle of the track. The executioner is a smart guy so he proclaims, “This a sign from God that the life of this priest be spared.” The priest is set free to the delight of the crowd.
Next the politician is brought up and made ready. The cord is pulled on the blade and it again shutters to a halt in the same place. The executioner proclaims that the grace of God is extended even to this politician and the crowd goes wild with joy! The engineer steps up next and as he is made ready, he says, “You know if you tighten that bolt this thing will work.” Duh!
If that didn’t make you laugh try this one – A totally naked woman rushes into a taxi. The taxi driver turns back and stares at her so strangely. The woman asks the taxi driver, “Why are you staring at me that way, haven’t you ever seen a naked woman?” He says, “No, that isn’t it, I just wonder where you have my money?”
You should be at least chuckling by now. Laughter is a physical reaction in humans and primates. It’s a part of human behavior regulated by the brain. It’s used as a symbol of acceptance and positive interactions with others and sometimes considered contagious.
This might make you laugh and is one of my favorites – A wife asks her husband, “Could you please go shopping for me and buy a carton of milk and if they have avocados, get six?” A short time later the husband comes back with six cartons of milk. The wife asks him, “Why did you buy six cartons of milk?” He replied, “They had avocados.”
If you are a woman I’m sure you’re going to go back to read this again. Men will probably get it the first time. It took me three times of reading it to figure out this man’s logic. And by the way, welcome to my household!
Apparently we change physiologically when we laugh. We stretch muscles in our face and our body plus our pulse and blood pressure go up and we breathe faster, sending more oxygen to our tissue. Here is some of the best news I’ve heard lately – laughter appears to burn calories, too. Even though it isn’t very much, 10 to 15 minutes of laughter burns 50 calories.
So if you haven’t laughed yet, maybe these sayings will make you chuckle, which, I think, is part of a laugh.
“If God had intended us to fly, he would’ve made it easier to get to the airport” – Jonathan Winters.
In that same vein, “The first piece of luggage off the carousel never belongs to anyone” – George Roberts.
And this really made me laugh – The guy said, “Someone just honked to get me out of my parking spot faster, so now I have to sit here until both of us are dead.” (I’ll bet you’ve seen some of these people in action in a parking lot.)
Here are two more of my favorites!
Thought – “The trouble with quotes on the Internet is you never know if they are genuine” – Abraham Lincoln.
Thought – What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger, they say … except for bears. Bears will kill you.
I sure hope you’re smiling now and getting those endorphins going. I’ve noticed that even when I smile at a stranger on the street, they almost always smile back at me.
I’ll leave you with this thought – Be someone’s sunshine today, when their skies are gray.
-Melanie Behrens (melb@marysvillejt.com)