For some reason, this little cartoon made me smile this week! Hope you found something or someone who made you smile too!
7) Humor Welcomes
Have you ever noticed that humor is a unique way of showing hospitality? Perhaps the easiest way to get people to feel at home is to make them laugh. You know that a social gathering is going well, and that people feel at home when laughter breaks out. Humor helps people relax, to feel comfortable, to let down their guard. Laughing with others tells them that you enjoy their presence. Humor welcomes!
8) Humor is Healing
Physicians, psychologist, and psychiatrists have show how laughter helps the healing process. Laughter releases endorphins, powerful chemicals that relax the body, reduce stress, relieve feelings of frustration, and produce an overall feeling of well being. Jordan Friedman, a professional "stress reducer" who lives in New York, wrote The Stress Manager's Manual. "Humor and laughter are potent and plentiful stress reducers and spirit boosters, because they simultaneously help us physically and emotionally. Laughter strengthens the immune function, decreases muscle tension, and increases our tolerance for pain. Humor breaks negative thought cycles and release feelings of anxiety, sadness, and fear."
An elderly woman, a "wonderful lady", had a husband who was living with Alzheimer's. When one member of a couple suffers from this illness, it is always a difficult situation for the spouse. This "wonderful lady" was able to share a funny story with fellow church members and it shows her ability to recognize humor admidst pain.
The woman said her husband had reached the point where he was unable to recognize her. One day she visited him in the nursing home and asked, "Do you know who I am?"
Her husband said, "You're my wife."
She was delighted that he had remembered.
Then he pointed to the nurses' station and said. "And I've got four more over there!"
When her pastor tells this story he is always tells people that his mother also had Alzheimer's, so that others know that he is not trying to make light of anything. His lesson from this story is this. If a person in the midst of tragedy could tell a funny story that helps them, then it helps him too!
A cheerful heart is a good medicine, but a downcast spirit dries up the bones. -Proverbs 17:22