The Healing Power of Laughter

"A person without a sense of humor is like a wagon without springs. It's jolted by every pebble on the road." -Henry Beecher

For the last several years, I've been compiling info and working on a few-hundred-page book about the healing power of chocolate, wine, and country music. I was recently trying to explain this book to a friend I hadn't seen since college. So I must have been talking about this book for 10 minutes when my friend says excitedly, "So who's doing the illustrations?" I didn't understand. He continued, "It's a children's book, right?!" Granted, in college I had a reputation as more of a red-headed Bob Marley than as an aspiring author, but still -- clearly my friend didn't think I had it in me.

So y'see...I had two ways to respond. ONE: I could have gotten pissed off and offended. TWO: I could have laughed. It was a great lesson in the shock-absorbing abilities of laughter.

Which brings us to country music. More than any other genre, country music pokes fun at life. So many country songs can make you laugh. Take Brad Paisley's song "Ticks." He's got a strange and funny way of comin' on to his girl:

'Cause I'd like to see you out in the moonlight
I'd like to kiss you way back in the sticks
I'd like to walk you through a field of wildflowers
And I'd like to check you for ticks.

Studies have proven that laughter and humor are effective medicines for stress and depression while elevating mood, lowering blood pressure, and boosting the immune system. Here are some examples of how humor can save your day:

1. Laughter Brightens Your Spirit A "Los Angeles-based country music singer" kinda seems like a contradiction in terms. LA is the land of flash and celebrity, NOT country music. But LA-based country star Cynthia Ford sells out her local gigs, and her hit song, "California Country," pokes fun at her very own LA lifestyle. She sings:

I've got my straw hat and my BMW
I sip my soy latte and listen to the news
The traffic is awful
But it will be just fine
Cuz 10 minutes late is right on time

2. Laughter Brightens Your Struggles Everyone plays the hand they're dealt in life differently. You can choose to ride out and laugh off your struggles or fight and resist them. In his song Mama, Don't Let Your Babies Grow Up to Be Cowboys, Waylon Jennings pokes fun at cowboys' tendency to brood all alone:

Cowboys ain't easy to love and they're harder to hold.
They'd rather give you a song than diamonds or gold.
Lonestar belt buckles and old faded Levis,
And each night begins a new day.
If you don't understand him, an' he don't die young,
He'll prob'ly just ride away.

3. Laughter Brightens Your Yoga Although I'm a yoga teacher, I have a stocky body unlike what you'd expect from a yoga instructor. One time I was a student in a yoga class in New York City. We were doing a pose that's difficult for someone with my build. I'd practiced yoga for more than a decade, yet the teacher ran over to me exclaiming, "Oh, is this your first time?!"

I love yoga because while I'm not the world's finest physical specimen, I still get so much peace from the practice. While you'll never find my stocky body on the cover of the yoga magazines, I still dream about what it would be like to do some fancy poses. I've superimposed my face on this photo. Feel free to dream with me...