Smile

“Smile – it confuses an approaching frown.”

Photo:  Stock.xchnge

Laughter Symphony

It’s Spring finally!  The most beautiful time of year.

In my laughter programs I have been leading participants in the flower laugh. 

It’s an adaption of a qi gong exercise where you inhale and pull the energy from the earth up your spine, then exhale and open, expanding your arms out.  The image is of a flower blooming.  We start with a little laugh, working our way up our stem and blooming into a great big laugh.  Beautiful! 

I encourage everyone to bloom at different times and at different rates of growth so the sound of it is like a laughter symphony.  Gorgeous and hysterical.

Ralph Waldo Emerson said “The earth laughs in flowers.”

Everyone is like a flower when they laugh – truly beautiful!

Photo:  Stock.xchnge

Erma Bombeck

“Laughter rises out of tragedy when you need it most and rewards you for your courage.”

Erma Bombeck

Photo:  Wikimedia

Anticipating Laughter

My friend Patrizia and I get together once a month, initially to speak Italian and to visit.  But as we’ve become better and better friends, we speak less and less Italian and more and more English.    Now it’s all English, a bit sad for me as I am trying to learn this beautiful new language.

But irrespective of the language we laugh endlessly.  We’ve developed a stream of running jokes about life, some in Italian, some in English.  So this is always something I look forward to.  A highlight of my month, for one reason, because I know I’ll be getting a lot of laughs.

Drs. Lee Berk and. Stanley Tan, pioneering researchers in the field of laughter therapy, did a series of studies on laughter and the immune system.  They found a significant link and got some interesting results.

If you laugh for a good chunk of time, as we do during a laughter session, it not only stimulates your immune system while you are laughing, but also for a good 24 hours after.

Even more interesting they found that simply anticipating that you’re going to be laughing starts activating your immune system.  One group of their subjects was told they were about to view an informational weather video.  Boring.  The other group was told they were about to view a comedy video.  Funny.  They tested them before, during and after and observed how this boost begins immediately after knowing what’s coming.

It’s good for your health to have some laughter to look forward to.  For my friend Patrizia and I, sometimes all we need to do is look at each other and the laughter begins.  Like Pavlov’s dogs, we know what’s coming…

Photo:  Stock.xchnge

Lord Byron Quote

“Always laugh when you can, it’s cheap medicine.”

Lord Byron

Photo:  Byron Portrait by Thomas Phillips/Wikimedia

Where Have all the Nicknames Gone?

There used to be more fun in sports in those days of playful nicknames.

Dominic DiMaggio of the Boston Red Sox was The Professor simply because he wore glasses. His more famous brother Joe was The Yankee Clipper, a Yankee to the core for his entire career, who was also called Joltin’ Joe, a fun alliteration that was even made into a song.

There was Cookie Lavagetto of the Brooklyn Dodgers, hero of the 1947 World Series and the tall skinny Red Sox slugger Ted Williams who was known as The Splendid Splinter.

Shoeless Joe Jackson of the Chicago White Sox was so poor he spent most of his boyhood in the South barefoot.

Yankee Lou Gehig was the Iron Horse for his iron-willed stamina in playing continuous games.

Who could forget Hammerin’ Hank Aaron, record holder for home runs or Ty Cobb the Georgia Peach?

In Seattle we had our own tall and lanky Rainier’s pitcher Hector Skinny Brown, as well as pitcher Kewpie Dick Barrett so called for his substantially round tummy.

In pro football there was Elroy Crazy Legs Hirsch, the wild runner with his own unique style of legwork. And Washington Redskins quarterback Slinging Sammy Baugh coined for slinging the ball across the field like Zeus hurling his thunderbolt across the sky.

Boxer Joe Lewis was the Brown Bomber who could knock his opponents out cold with one powerful punch.

Argentinean boxer Luis Firpo was The Wild Bull of the Pampas named after the plains of Argentina where the caballeros rode.

Boxer Archie Moore was The Old Mongoose for his crafty dead-on moves in the ring, one swift punch that could kill a cobra.

Jack Dempsey was the Manassa Mauler for obvious reasons.

And of course there was The Babe!

Closer to home we had those wild and crazy hydroplane drivers Wild Bill Cantrell famous for his speed, and the often told story of taking a turn so fast he ended up in someone’s flower bed on Lake Washington, only to be handed a martini by delighted spectators. And Seattle favorite, daring former race car driver and Gold Cup winner Lou Leadfoot Fageol of Slo Mo fame.

It’s true we’ve got a few nicknames now, like The Kid for Ken Griffey Jr.

But it’s just not the same. It’s not so ubiquitous. It’s not so fun-loving.

Fun for us though, we have one in the family: my ex's stepdaughter the champion boxer, Molly The Mauler McConnell, one tough cookie who spars with men and some refuse to fight.

Photo: Shoeless Joe Jackson/Wikimedia

Basyr University

I am currently teaching a class on laughter and laughter yoga at Bastyr University, the nationally renowned college for Naturopathic Medicine. The best thing about it is simply that they asked me to do it. Because it shows you how the world has evolved when a “globally respected” college for doctors wants a class on laughter.

Photo: Dr. John Bastyr