Key to Happiness #3: More Laughter

When did we all get so serious?

I know, living is serious business. We have work and obligations. We have mortgages and children. The people we love get sick. We get sick. The roof leaks. A jerk cuts us off on the way to work. We face global pandemics and economic crises. We live in a world punctuated by racism, inequity and social injustice. We lose our jobs, we hate our jobs. We hurt our backs picking a box up off the floor or stare down a root canal. We experience loss and grief and heartbreak.

And if we are thinking people, we know that those things are possible. If there are people we love in our lives, we know that the heartbreak is coming. We pretend like it isn’t. We push down the looming fear of loss, but we know it’s there.

Living is a serious, scary business. And yet somehow, we have to remember to laugh because laughter is a key to happiness and a gateway to wellness. In fact, according to the Mayo Clinic, laughter reduces stress, stimulates your heart, and fires up your endorphins. A good laugh can boost your mood and reduce your pain. ‘Sides, laughing is fun and that is valuable all on its own.

Last night, Eric and I were laying in bed watching a sitcom, something we rarely do. We are more sci-fi people -- aliens, vampires and demons, oh my. But for some reason, this silly sitcom captured our attention. The husband and wife were getting ready for bed, both wearing old-school pajamas, the kind that button up the front with tidy, little collars. They didn’t match exactly, but they sort of did.

“Hey, I have an idea,” Eric said laughing. “Let’s get pajamas like that and walk into Maddie’s room together to say goodnight.”

I burst out laughing. He didn’t have to explain why that would be funny -- we are more old t-shirt to sleep people and the look on our daughter’s face if we started wearing matching, old-school pajamas would be priceless. It makes me smile just picturing it now. We laughed until there were tears in our eyes.

Okay, so here’s how that happened.

First, we choose to watch something silly and lighthearted. Not the news, not a police procedural, not something dark and post-apocalyptic … something light.

Second, we were willing to think silly thoughts and imagine silly things.

Level three would have been to actually execute the plan, but we realized that it would only work if we could do it completely straight-faced and there was just no way we were going to be able to pull that off because it was really just too ridiculous.

This morning, I had work to do. A lot of work (probably too much work because I wrestle with Key #2: Be the Right Amount of Busy), but my dog Moose just came over and asked me to play. He did so by walking over to his toy bin, pulling out his favorite pink squirrel and dropping it at my feet. Then he sat there and stared at me. So I stopped working and started playing. We played tug war, wrestled, we rolled around the ground together and we laughed. And you know what? I feel happier.