Laughter as a Universal Language

Megan Weisenberger -

 

A few weeks ago in London I got an ad for "laughter yoga" run by someone who goes by "Lady Haha". And while I didn't have the time to partake in Downward Facing Chortle that week, I did go on a deep dive to see what this practice is all about, what its benefits are, and why we all need to give ourselves more forms of release. 

The following is a conversation I had with the very lovely Soren Russow - a Laughing Yoga Leader in Victoria, British Columbia. 

M: Hi, Soren! What's your story? How did you arrive at laughter yoga? 

 

S: Well. I first did laughter yoga in Santa Fe, New Mexico, in the middle of a plaza with all the people from a friend's wedding party. And so, yeah, it was really fun, and it caught my interest. 

But the actual reason is that 21 years ago, I was diagnosed with a heart condition called atrial fibrillation and, at the time, I was taking life way too seriously. A doctor checked my heart rate, and it was at 220 beats per minute too fast. They ended up shocking my heart with paddles to reset it - and the doctor told me that I needed to be on a bunch of medications.

And I was only 31 years old at the time and I said, thanks but no thanks. So, instead, I went and tried all these different things – meditation, Qigong … and laughter yoga. 

M: What was your first session like? 

 

S: Well, it was very welcoming and warm. A feeling of grace and lots of big smiles. 

But - to be honest - at first I was kind of like … this is weird. But as I started to ease into it, I realized that laughing for no reason is really effective. 

Laughter yoga was started in 1995 by a medical doctor who left his whole practice to start a little laughter club in a park in Mumbai, India. And, at this point, it's grown to over 110 countries in the world, and over 30,000 clubs. 

At its core, you get into a group and through movement and eye contact, simulated or playful laughter becomes real laughter. But a great secret of the universe is that it actually doesn't matter, physiologically speaking, when you laugh, especially deep down from your diaphragm, if you're laughing "for real". 

When you laugh in any way - but especially deeply - it sends endorphins and oxytocin throughout the body - all these feel good chemicals that our body needs. And when those are released in the body, they're mutually exclusive to stress hormones like cortisol - the things that make you physically feel bad. 

So what happens when you laugh from the belly and you have the full exchange of oxygen, it pushes away all of that stress that you're feeling, so it allows you to bring yourself back into more of the parasympathetic nervous system. 

I'm not sure if you're familiar with the difference between parasympathetic nervous system and the sympathetic? The latter is what's called the fight and flight. When we're under stress - whether perceived or an actual stressful thing that we're experiencing, we react just like we'd react to, you know, a cougar that's about to come and attack us, right? So what happens is: it's good to be in that mode when a cougar is attacking you, but a lot of people spend a good portion of their day in our modern world in that extreme stress pattern. And we feel it in our bodies. 

The parasympathetic nervous system, on the other hand, is the rest and digest. So: it's the relaxation part, and we need a balance of both those in our lives. Laughter yoga gets us to that other underused nervous system that leads to less stress in the body and really just feeling more innate joy. 

M: Love it. What does a normal session look like? 

 

S: Well, that's the interesting part. A lot of people hear laughter yoga and are like oh, well, I don't want to go and do a bunch of poses. 

We don't actually do poses from yoga. Instead, what we do is incorporate the full exchange of oxygen through balloon belly breath. We take the balloon belly breathing technique in yoga, so when you're breathing in, you're expanding the belly and it's filling up like a balloon, and when you breathe out, the belly comes in and tucks out into the ribs. So with that full exchange of oxygen, it also helps you come back to relaxation. 

And also, when you're doing laughter yoga, sometimes it can be quite active. You're moving around, you're engaging with other people,and it just makes you feel good to be in a group, you know? 

It's a key component of it all to know that we're not laughing at each other, we're laughing with each other. 

A lot of times when you feel nervous and anxious about diving into something,the most important thing is to just … do it. When you stretch out of your comfort zone a little bit, you're building a resilience in your body and mind and spirit. 

M: How do people talk about it after they've been to a session? 

 

S:  People say that they just feel calmer, more relaxed – full of a lot more gratitude and ease than when they arrived. They feel they can express more of themselves, and more love and compassion toward others. 

Afterwards, when we sit down, we do a little check in to see how we're feeling. And those tend to be the words: relax, ease, compassion, gratitude. 

Things most of us feel a little short on these days. 

M: Can you tell me a story of a session that really stuck with you? 

S: I did a conference that was composed of mostly palliative care nurses. And what they're experiencing day to day is HEAVY. 

And what was expressed after the class is that several said that they hadn't given themselves permission to express joy. When you're around people on their way out, it's very difficult to grasp the idea of making the experience joyful. 

But it really helps people cope with hard things. I also think about how helpful it is for people who have dealt with trauma, like PTSD. 

Once I met a person named Chris Limford - who wrote a book called Warrior Rising - and he said something really interesting. 

I said: "Is anyone ever cured of trauma?"

And he said: "There's never really a cure, but you find ways to cope with it."

That's what laughter yoga is to me. A great coping mechanism, to help with the heaviness of the everyday.  

M: Why do you think we all need laughter so badly right now?

S: There's a famous doctor who once said 80 to 90% of illnesses out there are stress related. 

So: if we can find ways to reduce the amount of stress we feel during the day, then we can live a longer, healthier and more vibrant lifestyle. 

Laughter Yoga can combat those heavy stresses that manifest physically in the body.

And I find too that laughter is a universal language.

I've been in groups where a lot of them can't speak English, but we could still laugh together, right? And express that feeling of joy and community. 

No matter what language we speak, laughter is a release. You need to release all your pent-up emotion and make space for something new. To give your soul a little room to breathe.