November 6, 2025

Article highlights:

• Laughter burns 3x’s more calories than exercise
• It’s better than coffee
• It’s the gateway to happiness

I just want to laugh today.  Like all the little kids when Mary brought her lamb to school. Laugh and play.  Laugh and play. To help you move in that direction too, I’ll share some factoids I searched out about laughter.  But then it’s up to you to provide the laughs. Deal?

A few surprising facts about Laughter

1. Want to see a rat laugh? Then tickle it. Rats laugh, chimps laugh and so do dogs. But rats aren’t laughing at jokes. They laugh when they’re playing, in the same way humans do, to show that they’re happy and to encourage bonding.

The rats that played more, laughed more. And the ones that laughed more preferred to be around other rats that laughed. (excerpted from article by Neuroscientist Sophie Scott, University College, London, taken from the BBC News online magazine, Oct. 26, 2014)

2. Can’t get going in the morning? Laughing shortly after rising has been shown to have better effects than drinking a cup of coffee. 

3. The levels of two stress hormones – cortisol and epinephrine – which suppress the body’s immune system, do actually drop after a dose of laughter.

4. Researchers found after watching an hour-long video of slapstick comedy that the “natural killer cells,” which seek out and destroy malignant cells, more actively attacked tumor cells in test tubes. And these effects lasted up to 12 hours.

5. It doesn’t matter if your laughter is genuine.

6. Laughter burns calories!

Unconvinced?  Especially about points 2, 5 and 6? Try these two quick videos  for proof.

Laughter Videos

Click to watch “How laughing burns lots of calories”

Click to read published article from Aug 17, 2014   A Research study was conducted at university of Exeter, Cornwall, UK. They compared 10 mins. of cycling with 100 laughs … 100 laughs burnt three times more calories than cycling.

Click to watch “Laughter is the gateway to happiness” 

Did you know? You can even become Laughter Yoga certified!  Here’s a link I found about that, right here in Oklahoma! Ellen Mercer, an Oklahoma Laughter Yoga teacher.   

A Laughter Practice

You might even consider a laughter practice like a few Zen monasteries, where every monk must start his morning with laughter, and end his night with laughter.

I tried it this week to see what I though. It was great. I’m a low blood-pressure type and can be slow to get going in the morning.  For 5 days I did a fun 6-minute practice: I started with 3 minutes of Smile Meditation where you sit quietly with a Mona Lisa smile – the Buddha smile.  Then I moved into 3 minutes of laughter, beginning by giggling, which was so silly it got me really laughing every time. 

The 6 minute practice actually cleared my mind, brought my systems up, and made me feel ready for the day.. and it worked a lot better than coffee! Try it and see what you think. I’m going to keep it up.

I did fake laughing this morning though I sure didn’t feel like it.  Nor did I feel into it while laughing.  I was tired and sort of grumpy, and I had a neck ache because I slept wrong.  I felt dull and full of sighs.  And I DID NOT want to start fake laughing.  

I made myself do it though and even against my will it worked.  The morning fog lifted, my mood changed, my neck even quit hurting.  So.  OK.  I give in. I now agree: laughter is there for us when we need it most… when we don’t feel like laughing at all.

I’m lucky enough to have three friends who consistently seek out good laughs and share them with me. So I generally get more than one good curated laugh from each of them in a day.  It really does help keep me going.

Go forth and have a good laugh, make it a belly full.  

As usual I’m sending you lots of love, but with an extra dose of mirth and joy today,
~XOMayet and LOL