Tuesday, June 01, 2010

The business of laughter




Few people would deny that laughter is enjoyable and that it makes us feel good
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Not many though are aware that it is a powerful transformation tool
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Laughter has benefits not only on our physical health but also on our mental and emotional health
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Maybe more surprisingly deep healing can take place through laughter as laughter releases blocks in our energetic field
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A good laugh can go a long way in reducing pain.
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Laughter also can be used to change our experience of all sorts of suffering.
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When a person can laugh at their situation, their experience becomes different. they become different.
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It may help a person who has had a heart attack
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One reason why it can be difficult to believe that laughter is so powerful is that we think that we laugh because some thing's funny.
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Yet research has shown that only one in five laughing occasions involves any humour.
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Babies laugh around three to four hundred times a day
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Sadly by the time we are adults we've learned to laugh only around fifteen times a day.
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Most people also believe that laughing is something we only do because we are happy.
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In reality it's the other way around, we become happier by laughing.
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We laugh for lots of reasons: anger, frustration, fear, nervousness, boredom. and joy of course.
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If we did but know laughter helps protect us from colds and viruses
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Because it increases the levels of antibodies or immunoglobulin A in the nose and respiratory passages it increases levels of natural killer (NK) cells and antibodies to boost the immune system
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Laughter also reduces the stress hormones epinephrine and cortical
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Sadder than the fact that we do not appreciate how important laughter is that in the 1950s people laughed eighteen minutes a day on average
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While today people laugh on average only around six minutes per day
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There is a clue here the more you laugh the more benefits you give yourself
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And the more enjoyable life becomes
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A win win situation if ever there was one

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