Many years ago, Norman Cousins was diagnosed
as “terminally ill”. He was given six months to
live. His chance for recovery was 1 in 500.
He could see the worry, depression and anger in
his life contributed to, and perhaps helped cause,
his disease. He wondered, “If illness can be
caused by negativity, can wellness be created by
positivity?”
He decided to make an experiment of himself.
Laughter was one of the most positive activities
he knew. He rented all the funny movies he
could find – Keaton, Chaplin, Fields, the Marx
Brothers. (This was before VCRs, so he had to
rent the actual films.) He read funny stories. He
asked his friends to call him whenever they said,
heard or did something funny.
His pain was so great he could not sleep.
Laughing for 10 solid minutes, he found, relieved
the pain for several hours so he could sleep.
He fully recovered from his illness and lived
another 20 happy, healthy and productive years.
(His journey is detailed in his book, Anatomy of
an Illness.) He credits visualization, the love of
his family and friends, and laughter for his
recovery.
Some people think laughter is a waste of time. It
is a luxury, they say, a frivolity, something to
indulge in only every so often.
Nothing could be further from the truth. Laughter
is essential to our equilibrium, to our well-being,
to our aliveness. If we’re not well, laughter helps
us get well; if we are well, laughter helps us stay
that way.
Since Cousins’ ground-breaking subjective work,
scientific studies have shown that laughter has a
curative effect on the body, the mind and the
emotions.
So, if you like laughter, consider it sound medical
advice to indulge in it as often as you can. If you
don’t like laughter, then take your medicine –
laugh anyway.
Use whatever makes you laugh – movies,
sitcoms, Monty Python, records, books, New
Yorker cartoons, jokes, friends.
Give yourself permission to laugh – long and loud
and out loud – whenever anything strikes you as
funny. The people around you may think you’re
strange, but sooner or later they’ll join in even if
they don’t know what you’re laughing about.
Some diseases may be contagious, but none is
as contagious as the cure. . . laughter.
By Peter McWilliams
From “Chicken Soup for the Surviving Soul”
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