General Education For Laughter Professionals
- The 10 Keys To Happier Living (published by the Action For Happiness non-profit organization)
- Huna exercises: Ho’oponopono to Heal Your Inner and Outer Worlds
- Beautifully put, Sue Carter Ansari: "Laughter, an exaggerated form of breathing, whether deep or shallow, engages the diaphragm. Engaging the diaphragm also signals the parasympathetic nervous system to kick in, telling all systems to slow down. Cortisol, heart rate and blood pressure levels all fall. Additionally, engaging the diaphragm creates a negative pressure within the thorax which literally sucks in the lymph, creating a flow 10-15 times its normal rate of speed, which then significantly improves immunity by creating more T and C lymphocytes, etc, etc. It is all one beautiful domino effect."
- The secret of happiness? Learning to love being stuck in a rut. Forget big life changes – it’s tiny tweaks that bring joy. To be happy now and for the rest of your life, you need to remove the classic blocks. You know the ones: ‘I will be happy when I get that pay rise. . . when I’ve got a washboard stomach . . . when I’ve climbed Mount Kilimanjaro.’ The best way is to write a list of simple pleasures that make you happy and cost little or nothing: a deep bubble bath; a tight hug; crawling under a fluffy duvet at the end of a long day; completing a difficult crossword; the smell of fresh coffee or woodsmoke; a great book; watering the plants on a summer’s evening…
- 52 ways to manage stress
- Group discussion (initiated by Sharon D Montes): I’m committing to do 3 min of laughter daily for next 45 days. Can someone please provide suggestions.
- All about depression: Online Cognitive Behavioral Therapy Training. More similar (free) trainings are available at https://www.coursera.org
In the news
- Improve Health, Wellness and Happiness with Laughter. (Written by Laughter Wellness Teacher Karen Siugzda for the South Jersey edition of the free mag Natural Awakenings. Why not do something similar?)
- Faced with an uncertain future, refugees in camps and shelters need laughter to remind them of hope.
- World’s first ‘Museum of Happiness’ opening in east London.
- The reader digest is back at it (global circulation of 10.5 million people): 9 Weird Facts You Never Knew About Laughter
Just for fun
Miscellaneous Blogs
- 5 simple ways to practice mindfulness during your daily routine. Bringing mindfulness to daily routines is a simple way to calm and focus the mind. We’re often too distracted to appreciate the many fleeting moments that make up the day, which means we’re missing out on entire segments of our lives.
- 4 years of posting appreciations online every day.
- What Jerry Lewis thinks of laughter. (his comments on laughter start at 50:47…which is where the video below should start as well)
- How to establish a daily practice of almost anything in six steps (set your intention, establish a cue, round up your supplies, do your practice, reward yourself, track your progress)
- Straight from the doctor, five tips for a long, healthy life: 1. Get enough sleep. 2. Move your body throughout the day. 3. Eat well — a healthy assortment of foods. Mostly plants, and not too much. 4. Interact socially. Isolation is not good for the body, soul or mind. 5. Take some time to reflect on what you are grateful for.
- Wake Up Laughing – Joe Hoare outlines a five-step course in bringing joy into our lives.
- How to nurture your four most important friends: Research shows that you can count on just four friends in a crisis – so here’s how to keep those relationships rosy
- The selfish side of gratitude. Practising gratitude shouldn’t be a self-congratulatory navel-gazing exercise that only makes you feel good: When you’re grateful for what you have, it’s also easier to connect with and contribute to society.
- A regular guy’s guide to improving your life with simple mindfulness habits. A self-proclaimed “regular guy” experiments for two years to find behaviours and activities that would lead him to more happiness, productivity and motivation. In the end, he recommends five things. Why not give them a try? (Gratitude, Positive Affirmations, Thought Tracking, Behavior Tracking, Highlighting Wins.)
- The positive benefits of creativity
Videos
- Laughter Therapy in Ethiopia
- The 21 day laughter cleanse
- 12 hours of laughing sound effects
- For people with lots of spare time: The Best Videos on the Web – Safe for Office and Family
- The road to wellville: Dr. John Harvey Kellogg’s laughter exercises in the early 1900’s at the Battle Creek Sanitarium in Battle Creek MI. Fortunately, laughter was one of his better "therapies"!
- Laughter flash mob, Taiwan style
Science Corner
- Older people and social isolation: A review of the evidence
- Current estimates of the prevalence of social isolation in community-dwelling older adults indicate that it is as high as 43%.
- One study suggests that lonely older adults are 45 percent more likely to die than seniors who feel meaningfully connected with others.
- Science, on the importance of eye contact
- News from way back when (early 1800): Natural laughter really is constituted by the association of m. zygomaticus major and the inferior part of m. orbicularis oculi.
- The general idea is good, but the science is sadly poor: Scientists say that LAUGHTER can help tone your abs better than sit ups and improve cardiovascular health.
- The way you sound affects your mood. Researchers have created a digital audio platform that can modify the emotional tone of people’s voices while they are talking, to make them sound happier, sadder or more fearful. New results show that while listening to their altered voices, participants’ emotional state change in accordance with the new emotion.
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