How Laughter is Medicine for the Mind, Body, and Soul
January 23, 2024 | Miriam Slozberg
How often have you been in a glum mood and felt uplifted after watching a funny movie because of laughing at so many scenes? You cannot help but feel better in many ways after laughing. That is because laughter is good for your mind, body, and soul, and many scientific studies have found that laughter is great medicine, especially if you are feeling down. However, even if you are not feeling down, laughter can benefit you in many ways, so you want to collect funny books, movies and shows. Laughter also increases blood flow, reduces pain, and improves emotional health. It also strengthens your spirit. On behalf of Belly Laugh Day on January 24th, let’s discuss why laughter is excellent for you.
Why Do You Laugh?
You may wonder why you can laugh because you may not understand its purpose. By the time they are three months old, babies start laughing well before speaking, and apes also laugh. A few scientific reasons have been discovered for why humans laugh and why it serves a social function by signaling someone else to connect with them. That is why it has been found that you are a lot more likely to laugh in a group than you are solo. Even young children between the ages of two and four are likelier to laugh with others if they see a funny cartoon than if they are unaccompanied.
From an evolutionary standpoint, laughter plays a vital role in survival since it is a social signal for connection. Now you see you are likelier to laugh with a group or friend than solo. However, who is to say that laughing is not possible if you were to watch a funny video, movie, television show, or read a funny book solo? You will still laugh because that is how you respond to something amusing. You will want to do that more often because having a good belly laugh has many benefits.
You already know how laughter lifts your spirits if you have been feeling down, and that is why an excellent remedy for that is to turn to comedy. Laughter makes you happier because it increases your happy hormones, which are endorphins, dopamine, and serotonin, while it reduces stress hormones, adrenaline, and cortisol.
The months of January and much of February and March can lower your mood because of winter cold and long nights; you will want to have plenty of laugh-worthy material in your reach so you can watch a funny video, a comedy, or read a funny book to help you get through the rest of the winter.
Laughter Makes You More Creative
Another fantastic benefit of laughter is that it can help promote creativity. Studies show that those who watch many comedy shows can better develop creative ideas and solutions for dilemmas than those who do not. The reason is that laughter relaxes the mind and body, allowing you to think freely. As you already know, laughter will increase the blood flow, increase the brain’s oxygen, and help your cognitive thinking.
Therefore, if you plan to go into a creative field such as writing or the arts, start watching more comedies or reading funny books. You will be amazed at how easy it will become to develop new ideas for your creative work. You may not often struggle with facing creative blockages such as writer’s block.
Laughter Is Great For Forming and Maintaining Healthy Relationships
You know that laughter increases your endorphins, which boosts your mood and can help you better communicate when discussing challenging topics with a more optimistic point of view. That is one way that laughter can help you improve your existing connections and help form new ones. Another way laughter helps with your relationships is that it can help improve intimacy, where people can feel close to one another.
Additionally, suppose a conflict is happening, and you can laugh at a situation without it being at anyone’s expense. In that case, the individual you are fighting with will not be able to help but laugh as well, and that right there can help you resolve the issue by finding common ground.
So why not arrange a get-together, watch a comedy, or tell some jokes? You will have a great time and strengthen your connections through laughter.
Laughter Is Good For Your Breathing
According to research, the more you laugh, the stronger your respiratory function will be. Your abdominal muscles contract when you laugh while your diaphragm moves up and down, which means your lungs will take in more air, increasing the amount of oxygen you take in.
You are also breathing deeply when you laugh, and you breathe rapidly, too. Therefore, consuming more oxygen and expelling carbon dioxide is essential for overall health. You need oxygen to function, and the more you take in, the more positive it will be for your overall health.
Laughter Gives You An Internal Workout
You know how essential it is to exercise. Your internal organs also need a workout, and having a good belly laugh often will give your organs that opportunity—your diaphragm contracts when you laugh while your abdominal muscles relax as this internal movement massages your organs. Your lungs, digestive system, and heart get that workout when you laugh, as your blood flow and oxygenation increase, making it easier for nutrients to make it to the organs to promote their functions.
After learning about how much laughter helps your health, it is unsurprising that it would benefit your heart health, too. That is because when you laugh, those endorphins you release are good for your cardiovascular system. After all, they help lower blood pressure. Keeping your blood pressure at a normal range can help keep heart disease at bay.
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The reason that laughter helps to keep blood pressure low is that it helps widen the blood vessels’ diameter, as it allows blood to flow easily. And that is how it can help improve your heart health. Now, that does not mean you can eat an unhealthy diet of fast food and foods that will increase your bad cholesterol all of the time, as laughter will not cancel out the harm it would do.
However, a healthy diet while giving yourself belly laughs daily will do your heart health a lot of good and keep the odds of staving off heart disease in your favor.
Laughter Is Good For Your Waist
If you want to lose or maintain your weight, you will want to add belly laughs to your daily regimen. Studies have found that laughter can be good for your weight loss or maintenance plans because laughter helps release energy, so having good belly laughs can burn more calories.
If you laugh for about 15 minutes, that can burn anywhere from 10 to 40 calories, which does not sound like much. However, remember that when you are laughing, you are giving your internal organs a workout, which also adds more calorie expenditure, which becomes more substantial.
Another reason that laughter is good for your waist is because, in addition to extra calorie expenditure, it reduces cortisol, and cortisol causes weight gain.
Laughter Is Great For the Immune Function
Another benefit of laughter is that having several belly laughs daily can help boost your immune function as it also increases antibodies, which fight infections. Also, laughter can increase the number of potent cells in your body as it can help keep cancer and other diseases at bay.
Laughter keeps stress hormones low, which also helps strengthen the immune system because too many stress hormones wreak havoc. That is another reason you will want to watch comedies, read funny books, and watch funny videos during this time of year when so many sicknesses are rampant. Of course, it does not guarantee you won’t get sick, but odds are you will have a much easier time fighting it, which means you will likely not be hit too hard.
If you accidentally sprained an ankle, stubbed your toe, or are healing from surgery, grab material that can help make you laugh. Read funny books or watch comedies as you rest and recover because laughter can help lower pain levels. Your body releases endorphins when you do laugh, as they are your natural painkillers. Endorphins block the pain signals from hitting the brain, which can help lower physical and psychological pain levels. Does that mean laughter can help you stay off of Tylenol or other painkillers? It depends on the injury, but only sometimes; however, they work well together if you must take it.
Now you see how well having a good daily belly laugh can be great for your mind, body, and soul, and it is not hard to imagine how laughter can also promote longevity. Having a good belly laugh at any time of year is essential, but it is even more critical to do it when it is dreary and drab with the long nights and cold winter days. It is Belly Laugh Day on January 24th, which means you will want to ensure that you take the opportunity to laugh on that day and any other day. Watch funny videos on TikTok or YouTube, watch comedies on Netflix, and get some humorous books. Remember to get together with friends with whom you can share some laughter, as it is excellent for all of you.
