From Haha to Aha — How Laughing Leads to Discovery LOL
Humor stimulates the flow of ideas.
Did you hear the one about the lady who walked into a barre? She had to repeat her ballet class.
Laugh With Me
It’s practically cliche to say laughter is the best medicine, but cliches often ring of truth. Did you know that there is a science of laughter?
In 1979, physician Norman Cousins published groundbreaking ideas in Anatomy of an Illness, one of which was that laughter could be used as an analgesic. He found that it reduced sensations of pain in his patients.
Since then, it has been discovered in wide-ranging studies that laughter is good for not only our psychological health but also our physiological health.
It’s true: laughter is strong medicine. It draws people together in ways that trigger healthy physical and emotional changes in the body. Laughter strengthens your immune system, boosts mood, diminishes pain, and protects you from the damaging effects of stress. Nothing works faster or more dependably to bring your mind and body back into balance than a good laugh. Humor lightens your burdens, inspires hope, connects you to others, and keeps you grounded, focused, and alert. It also helps you release anger and forgive sooner. ~Laughter is the Best Medicine; article by Lawrence Robinson, Melinda Smith, M.A. and Jeanne Segal, Ph.D. on HelpGuide.org
Creative Laughter
In the opening line of this article, I told a joke. I took the classic “walked into a bar” and changed bar for barre, a ballet term. Then the punchline was delivered with the latter meaning.
In print, we might guess the punchline based on the spelling of the word, but if we heard the joke audibly, the element of surprise might catch us laughing. Some things make us laugh, simply due to the element of the unexpected.
Sometimes we laugh, in spite of ourselves. Even then, the laughter can be a boon to our mood.
Things that make us laugh often combine two things that don’t normally go together, creating an element of surprise. Comedians and cartoons do it all the time. Things that don’t normally go together also open our minds to creative possibilities.
Can you imagine how people laughed at the idea of a mainframe computer being held in the palm of your hand? Do you recall, just in the last two decades how people laughed at the idea of decentralized currency? Pay attention to what people laugh at. Creative ideas often lurk there.
Laughter Reduces Stress
Nothing closes our creative minds like stress. Studies have shown that most of our waking days are in a beta state, with some indication that much of it is in the high beta stress-ridden state.
Mid-range beta waves are associated with increases in energy, anxiety, and performance while high beta waves are associated with significant stress, anxiety, paranoia, high energy, and high arousal.
Constant media streaming, multi-tasking, and lack of restful sleep are just a few of the things that keep us in this less-than-ideal state of mind.
When we are stressed, we tend to have tunnel vision. Our minds struggle to find solutions, and we respond by pulling from deeply rutted habits and unconscious memories that often make things worse.
When the prefrontal cortex shuts down due to stress, the fight or flight mechanisms of the amygdala kick in. Laughter lights up the ventromedial prefrontal cortex which helps us regulate emotion, or in other words, manage stress.
Even though sitting in front of the computer writing an article for Medium doesn’t equate to escaping from an attacking bear, if I am stressed and unrested, the implications are important. The quality of my focus suffers; the quality of my work suffers. Fight or flight might save my life, but it does little for creative output.
Under stress, we experience a dearth of ideas and a lack of energy.
According to a Science Direct article, a positive mood is one way to open the mind to more innovative solutions. Laughter is not only an indication of a positive mood, but it is also a universal language.
Ella Wheeler Wilcox, an American poet known for upbeat and optimistic writing, says it best,
“Laugh, and the world laughs with you.”
Runa Heilung is an Old Soul Alchemist and dream archaeologist. She works with dreams, oracles, and the imagination to help people rediscover their Inner Wisdom.