Hello. Welcome to the Laughter Yoga course. What is Laughter Yoga? This is a concept where anyone will laugh for no reason without relying on humor, jokes or comedy. Laughter Yoga combines laughter exercises and deep breathing. Except we'll just do one deep breathing exercise since this is a very short module. But you do a number of breathing laughter activities and I also have some things like affirmation, which is very good for stress management. The essence of this course is to really help you to have another resource tools and activities to help you manage difficult times. Laughter Yoga was developed by a doctor in India, Dr. Madan Kataria. He's known around the world for Laughter Yoga. Laughter Yoga has spread to over 100 countries with 20,000 free social laughter clubs in 110 countries. So I hope you can find one near you, if not in person online. Laughter Yoga is tied to the essence of who we are. It's built in with us. Children as young as six months old are laughing without being taught. Laughter activities are then based off of childlike fun. We resort to those childhood times where we laugh silly while having fun. All those gleeful time and happiness that comes right out. So we want to resort to that. We want you to relax for these activities, so we want you to benefit from the many things that laughter does, like relieving stress and help us manage fear and worry and we want to be playful and fun. So a few exercises will do. We're going to mimic sounds to simulate laughter, engage in rhythmic clapping and chanting between each activities. We're going to do a bit deep breathing exercise and we're going to do self affirmation, and affirmation to love one again, just to reinforce that positively in and a positive frame of mind. We end with their rhythmic clapping and chanting. What are the benefits of laughter? So before we get into that, I'm going to change my attire. I hope you find this amusing. I always like costumes. I just find it makes it more playful and fun. So what are the benefits of laughter? Scientific studies show that the body cannot differentiate between real laughter and voluntary laughter, if done willingly. One gets the same physiological and psychological benefits where the laughter is real are simulated as stated before. Laughter brings more oxygen to the brain, makes one feel more energetic and healthier. Norman Cousin's wrote in his book, "Autonomy of an Illness," that 10 minutes of genuine belly laughter had anesthetic effects and would give him at least two hours of pain free sleep. So you want to go find that laughter clap or a laughter activities you can participate in online to help you. Clinical research done in the US and India has shown that laughter lowers the level of stress hormones in the blood. So I want to bring attention to one of the activities we're going to do that's going to help the body. So when you put your hands together, just like children hood and bring your palms together to clap, it stimulate the internal organs as the reflexology points and meridian pathways exist in our hands. Let's begin. This first activity that you're going to repeat three times is where you're going to make the vowel sounds; ho, ho, ha, ha, he, he. I'm going to start off, and you follow, and then you can continue this even outside of this class, you can practice this, because keep in mind that you are stimulating laughter and the brain cannot distinguish whether this is real laughter or not. It's effortless. Let's begin, bind our hands together. Ho, ho, ha, ha, ha, ho, ho, ha, ha, ha, ho, ho, ha, ha, ha, he, he, he, he, he, he, just like children we want to put our hands up in the air. Let's do two more. Ho, ho, ha, ha, ha, ho, ho, ha, ha, ha, ho, ho, ha, ha, ha, he, he, he, he, he, he. One last one. Ho, ho, ha, ha, ha, ho, ho, ha, ha, ha, ho, ho, ha, ha, ha, he, he, he, he, he, he. Let's do another similar activity. Except this time we're going to mimic laughter sounds. We're going to do each of these activity three times, and at the end, we do with me clapping and chanting. For this one, we're going to say, berry good, berry good, yeaaaah. Notice that you're going to say "Berry" instead of "Very" just like children here. For this one, you're going to do with the mouth wide open to say, ha ha ha. Imagine you get that funny laugh and it's so funny that you're going to go on for a bit to say, ha ha ha, and you're going to open your mouth, and then laugh out loud. Let's begin; ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, so let's stop. Now you realize you're laughing out too loud and you want to curb that laugh, you want to laugh more hesitantly, so it's not so obvious. You're going to shape your mouth like a funnel for this one and you're going to say, hu, hu, hu, hu, hu, hu, hu, hu, hu, hu, hu, hu, hu, hu, hu, hu, hu, hu, hu, hu, hu, hu, hu, hu, hu, hu, hu, hu, hu. Laugh at yourself for being so silly. Let's do the last one. This time now, maybe you're at church or maybe you're somewhere where it's business like or you're at work or in the class. You don't want the professor to see you. Let's do that. Make a grin sound. We're going to grin loud, smile and we're going to say he, he, he this time. Okay, so let's try to curb or a laugh by grinning. We don't want no one to notice too much that we're laughing. Let's begin. He, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he. You're trying so hard to hold and laugh. Let's try again. He, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he. Very good, very good [inaudible]. Very good, very good [inaudible]. Very good, very good [inaudible]. Let's go to the affirmation. We don't do this enough but it's so important when we think about positive psychology and how it's important for us to say positive things, being positive. We're also going to give off positive energy. We want to affirm others and show them that we care as well. Let's start with yourself. I'm going to affirm myself and I want you to do that as well. Pick three items from here, maybe you have your own that you want to use and you're going to call out your name. Let's do this together. I'm going to say, "Heather, you are incredible. Heather, you are compassionate. Heather, you are resilient. " Very good, very good [inaudible]. Very good, very good [inaudible]. Now let's think of a loved one. Someone, it could even just be a friend or someone you recently met that you see with all these great qualities in them. Not only are you going to affirm it, you're going to make a point to tell them as well. I'm going to choose my loved one, Michael, my husband. "Michael, you are supportive. Michael, you are innovative. Michael, you are resilient." Very good, very good [inaudible]. Very good, very good [inaudible]. Let's do some deep breathing now. This activity is taken from a framework that we use at University Help Network I mentioned in the other module. This activity is from the BRITE which means building resilience within institution together with everyone. It's for teens or individuals to do micro practices on the goal or while they work to help build resilience. The S. T. O. P practice is one of them, and I mentioned the gratitude practice in the gratitude module. With this one, you're going to take a moment. Let's relax the shoulder, feet planted to the ground, and we're going to stop and take a moment to pause. We're going to take 3-5 slow, deep, nourishing breaths. Right now we're going to do three. You could do five on your own when you repeat this course. Observe your experience by becoming aware of your current thoughts, emotion and body sensation, and you could repeat this immediately after this course. Make sure you gaze down or you close your eyes, and that tends to make one more focus. Practice this throughout the day even before you go to bed, I tend to do it when I'm in the shower while I wait for the elevator or if I'm going to get into a very tense discussion or in uncomfortable situations. Thank you. Laugh more. Remember, you're going to get the same benefit whether the laughter is real or simulated or you could call it fake. Revisit these activities or join the social laughter club near you or online. Let go and be happy. Very good, very good [inaudible]. Very good, very good [inaudible]. [inaudible] Thank you, [inaudible]
