Humor in the Workplace5 Reasons Why You Should Laugh More
Stress
is Funny Some
of the funniest scenes on film and TV are those where the main
character is caught in some kind of a stressful situation. From
Charlie Chaplin to Eddie Murphy, comedians know that stress
makes people laugh, as long as it�s happening to someone else. Chaplin
demonstrates this in his movie Modern Times about a factory of the
future. Every newfangled gadget in this factory seems designed to
cause the hapless Chaplin character loads of stress. Eddie Murphy is
another sultan of stress. In movies like The Nutty Professor,
and Dr. Dolittle, Murphy milks the comedy out of every
stressful situation his characters encounter. Chaplin
once said, �Life is a tragedy in close-up and a comedy in long-shot.� He
clearly understood the importance of gaining perspective (or seeing
the big picture) during a stressful event. So
how do we learn to get perspective and really laugh at our own stress? Start
by dissecting one of your own angry
outbursts into its most humorous elements: flailing arms, stomping
feet, the verbal tirade, the angry pout, the martyr routine, walking
away mad, foaming at the mouth and imaginary steam blowing out your
ears. Except for this last two examples, these are things - as
funny as they might seem - that really happen when we get angry.
Recall
one of these times in detail. Write down any specific details that seem funny.
Did you jump up and down? Did you throw things?
Did you make a spectacle of yourself? Now that you have this
story firmly planted in your mind, see if you can make someone laugh
by telling it to them.
Remembering
one of these times and turning it into a funny story is one of the
most satisfying ways to heal yourself from the pain of a stressful
event. It can also help put these events in perspective because the
people you share them with will invariably share similar stories with
you. Sometimes
you can keep your stress in perspective by actually imagining it
was happening on a big screen - to someone else - not you.
For example, how would George or Kramer from the TV show
Seinfeld handle your stress? How
would Porky Pig or Elmer Fudd deal with the situation? Just imagining
this for a moment can give you enough mental distance to keep the
stressor from getting under your skin. Constantly remind yourself that
most stress is trivial and you�ll barely remember it the next day.
So why wait until tomorrow when you can laugh at your stress today? Most
people make the hilarious mistake of thinking they can somehow avoid stress
altogether: that the bus will always come on time; that the
kids will never dawdle; that the car will always start
and that your checks will never bounce. And the funniest thing
of all is we fall for this gag every single time. So
just when we�re in the biggest hurry one of the above seems to
catch us by surprise and guess what:
We become the star of our own personal sitcom and make fools of
ourselves in front of the kids, our co-workers or even perfect
strangers. Why? Because we�ve lost our perspective. We�re
seeing it in close-up. The
next time you make a scene, remember to keep your perspective� see the
situation in a long-shot and laugh now or as soon as you can
afterwards. Let�s face it, life is a comedy and you are the
star of the show! Humor
Your Way to Health The
scientific definition of a laugh is �a
psychophysiological reflex, a successive rhythmic spasmodic expiration with open glottis and vibration
of the vocal chords, often accompanied by a baring of the teeth and
facial grimaces.� That doesn�t sound very funny, does it? Humor can only truly be understood by those who laugh: An
old man walking down the road sees a frog jump in front
of him. The frog speaks to the man in a very seductive voice:
"Kiss me and I'll turn into a beautiful princess and do anything
your heart desires." The man picks up the frog, puts it in his
pocket and continues walking. Soon the frog speaks again, now a bit
surprised. "Aren't you going to kiss me?" �No,�
the old man replies, "At my age, I'd rather have a talking
frog." A
woman runs into a psychiatrist's office screaming. "Doctor, you've got to help me.
I keep thinking I'm a deck of cards.� The doctor angrily shouts at
her, "Get back in that waiting room. I'll deal with you
later." An actual
announcement in a church bulletin read:
"This being Easter Sunday, we will ask Mrs. Lewis to come forward
and lay an egg on the altar." If
you laughed at any of the above, you probably didn�t realize that
about four-tenths of a second after you read the punch line - but
before you laughed - a negatively charged wave of electricity swept
through your cortex. The interesting thing about this electrical wave,
reports Peter Derks, Ph.D., professor of psychology at the College of
William and Mary, "is that it carpets the entire cerebral cortex,
not just one region." "This
means that all of our higher brain may play a role in
laughter with the left hemisphere working on a joke's verbal content
while the right hemisphere tries to unravel the incongruity which is
at the heart of most humor."
Laughter
is a motor reflex, requiring the coordinated movement of 15 facial
muscles. It changes your normal breathing pattern and causes skeletal
muscle contractions. In addition, laughing stimulates hormonal
activity that has a beneficial effect on your immune system.
After
the laughing subsides, a brief period of relaxation ensues. Muscle tension
decreases, your heart rate slows, blood pressure decreases and blood
oxygen levels increase. As
Norman Cousins, author of the book Anatomy of an Illness puts it, �hearty
laughter is like an internal jog.� Cousins should know; he was
diagnosed with a painful arthritic condition known as ankylosing
spondylitis. With his doctor's reluctant approval, he checked himself
out of the hospital and began watching hours and hours of old comedy
films. The
author found that he got two hours of pain relief for every 15 minutes
he spent laughing heartily. Eventually Cousins recovered from the
illness that his doctors had said was incurable. Researchers
from Loma Linda University Lee Berk and Stanley Tan confirmed what Cousins had
suspected: laughter can boost the body�s
immune system. In carefully controlled studies, Berk and Tan
found that the production of helper T-cells and natural killer cells
(which fight cancer) was markedly higher in the group that watched a
comedy video compared to the group that didn�t watch one. So
the next time you feel like laughing, go ahead. It�s good for you. 5 Ways to
Replace Stress With Joy If
you�ve ever seen a child skipping across a parking lot, you know
what unadulterated joy looks like.
But do you know what it feels like? When was the last time you
jumped in a puddle, or in a pile of leaves or even off a diving board,
for that matter? Sometimes it seems like children have a monopoly on
feeling joyful. Most adults complain about having too much stress but
maybe what they really should be complaining about is a lack of joy!
Little by little, adults sacrifice their opportunities to
experience joy. So here
are five ways to counteract this not-very-funny problem.
Laughter Test Read
each of the following ten statements. In the column to the right of
each statement, write a number from 1 to 5 representing the phrase
below which best describes your feelings about each statement. Choose:
1 for strongly agree; 2 for agree; 3 for sometimes; 4
for disagree;
TOTAL ___ 40-50
You're
not laughing nearly enough. Start
a humor library. Check out resources on humor from the library or on
the internet. From
Pain To Perspective And From Grimacing To Giggling... Steve
Allen Jr., M.D. (son of the comedian Steve Allen) once said that comedy
equals tragedy plus time.
Why? Because time creates distance between you and the
so-called �tragedy.� Distance
brings about objectivity. With objectivity comes perspective.
And with perspective comes acceptance. When you finally
arrive at acceptance, your sense of humor returns and you feel whole
again. The time it takes for you to go from tension to tranquility is
what will determine your SQ (suffering quotient). Let�s
say you spend a harrowing morning at the motor vehicle department
trying to help your elderly aunt register her car. You wait in the
wrong line. You don�t have the proper identification. And to top it
off, the clerk is rude to you. In other words, you�re having a bad
day. If
you can convert this stressful encounter into a funny story by that
afternoon, then your suffering quotient (SQ) is very low. (Obviously,
that�s good.) If it takes two weeks for you to laugh about it, your
SQ is high. Look at the following chart to determine your SQ. DETERMINING YOUR SQ
In
the spaces below, you�re going to monitor your feelings about five
stressful situations that leave you feeling angry or upset. Jot down a
short description of each event, the date it occurs, and why it makes
you upset. Then jot down the date you first laugh about it, who you
are with at the time, and a little bit about the context, i.e., where
you were and how or why you shared your story.
To determine your SQ, count the number of days between the date
the event happened and the date you laughed (up to 14 days).
If you laugh on the day it occurs, give yourself a 0. If it
takes five days, give yourself a 5 and if you never laugh about it
give yourself a 14. Add
up the total and divide by five.
That�s your SQ. Event
Date
Felt
stressed because:
Laughed on:
Laughed with:
Where: Got a flat tire 3/19
I was late for work
3/22
John J. & Sally W.
Lunch at work ________ ____ ________________ _________ ____________ __________ ________ ____ ________________ _________ ____________ __________ ________ ____ ________________ _________ ____________ __________ ________
____
________________
_________
____________
__________ Number
of days later you laughed for each event: _____+_____+_____+_____+_____=_____
5 =________ (SQ) Once
you know your SQ, you can work on lowering your average. See if you can cut your SQ in half. Learning to turn stress into laughs is a great way of
learning to let go of anger. You�ll
be astounded at how cathartic it can be to make people really laugh
over a stressful episode you have had. If
laughing over past upsets seems too difficult, just try telling the
story - as if it had happened to someone else - so that you remain
objective, then see what develops.
Sometimes other people will provide the humorous perspective
for you. The names that
appear in the 5th column on this chart are your �go-to guys.�
When times get tough, they will also help you to see the humor
in life. Using
Humor Caringly When
humor is used caringly, no one ever has to ask, �What�s the
matter, can�t take a joke?� As Emily Post (the famous expert on
manners) once wrote: �The joy of joys is the person of light but unmalicious
humor.� In the work
place, this is especially true. But trying to be funny is risky
business. Here are some rules for reducing your downside exposure. Rule
#1.
Know your audience. Certain humor
is appropriate for certain audiences. Whether it�s a morbid joke
shared among doctors in an operating room or a ribald joke you hear on
the way to the men�s room, these lines are meant for specific ears.
Don�t make the mistake of retelling this type of joke to the wrong
audience. Also, keep an eye out for the �accidental audience� who
might be sitting in the next cubicle or behind a curtain.
Sometimes groups of people working in close quarters agree to
�allow� a broader range of humor. This kind of
�oral contract� can work well when all members of
the group are in agreement. Remember, this extra latitude, however,
will feel awkward to some members of the group when a nonmember is
present. Rule
#2.
Test the waters. Sometimes it�s best to test the waters first to see if
using humor is appropriate. Nurse (and humor writer) Patty Wooten
always checks to see if a patient is in the mood to laugh with a
harmless joke or quip. For example, when delivering food to a patient
on a liquid diet she invariably says:
�Here is the of speciality of the house: cream of nothing
soup.� If she gets a
laugh, she�ll continue; if not, she won�t. Joking about taxes or
your computer is a good place to begin to gauge someone�s
receptivity to humor. Rule
#3.
Jokes aren�t the only way to make people laugh. Jokes frequently ridicule
and embarrass people. Morbid jokes can turn people off. Ethnic jokes
are offensive and bathroom humor can gross people out. Look for other
ways, especially in the workplace, to make people laugh. Pointing out
ironies, finding an oxymoron, or sharing a funny story are safe places
to begin. Recalling a funny scene in a movie or sitcom you�ve seen
recently the perfect way to start people laughing. Unless you really
know your audience, jokes can be risky. Rule #4. Know the difference between humor that heals and humor that hurts. Humor that heals brings people together; humor that hurts is divisive. Humor that heals decreases tension, while humor that hurts increases it. Humor that heals is almost always enlightening; humor that hurts has no added value. When
you use humor caringly, you won�t step on any toes. Let�s face it:
humor is always a risk, but if you follow the four rules outlined
above, it�s a risk well worth taking. Norman
Cousins: The Man Who
Cured Himself by Laughing In the summer of
1964, Norman Cousins, editor of The Saturday Review, had just
returned from a grueling trip to Russia and found himself in so much
pain he was barely able to walk. He checked into a hospital and
underwent a battery of tests. Cousins�
doctor and several experts agreed that he had an arthritic condition
called ankylosing spondylitis. A one in 500 chance of recovery Cousins
was given a one in 500 chance of recovering. His doctor told Cousins
that he�d never seen anyone recover from this illness.
Cousins took the news as a challenge.
He decided that he would beat the odds and be the �one� in
500 who would recover. He also decided right from the start
that he would participate in his own recovery.
That was a radical idea in 1964! Luckily
for Cousins he had an understanding doctor who was willing to humor
him and grant him what was - at that time - a very unusual request. As
a writer and editor, Cousins was aware of cutting edge research in the
field of psychosomatic medicine and had read many books on the
subject. One of these books was Hans Selye�s The Stress of Life.
Selye, who coined the term stress, also detailed the
detrimental effects of negative emotions on the body. If
negative emotions can make you sick, why can�t positive emotions
make you well? So
Cousins took this research one step further:
If negative emotions could make you sick (as Selye proved), why
couldn�t positive emotions help you get well? This is how Cousins
embarked on his now famous journey back to health. He checked himself
out of the hospital and into a nearby hotel.
In his hotel room Cousins set up a projector and watched Marx
Brothers movies and old Candid Camera episodes. Without worrying about
disturbing other patients, he could laugh to his heart�s content.
Cousins quickly determined that 10 minutes of belly laughter had an
anesthetic effect that could provide two hours of pain-free sleep.
Blood tests confirmed that the laughter therapy was working.
Cousins was on his way to recovery. Cousins
was a famous practical joker Cousins
not only appreciated humor, he looked for opportunities to be funny.
He played a joke on one of his nurses that now has been elevated to
the status of a legend: A
nurse left a small cup beside his bed and asked for a urine sample.
While the nurse looked away Cousins filled the sample cup with
apple juice. When the nurse turned around and looked at the cup, she
said, �We�re a little cloudy today aren�t we.� Cousins
snatched the cup from her hand and while the nurse looked on in
horror, he gulped it down after saying, �By George you�re right,
let�s run it through again.� His
book was way ahead of its time. After
completely recovering from his illness Cousins wrote the book Anatomy
of an Illness, which describes his ordeal in detail. He retired
from his post as Editor of The Saturday Review and, with his
increasing interest in medical issues, went on to become an Adjunct
Professor of Psychiatry and Biobehavioral Science at the University of
Southern California. Imagine
A More Joyful Past
|
Your
Past