Not a fan of jokes? Become one. Recent studies show that indulging your sense of humor can help you live a longer, healthier life. Laughing not only eases stress, promotes social bonding, and lowers blood pressure, but it may also boost your immune system. Plus, humor becomes more important for people as they age, and it’s associated with a more satisfying life, according to a new Swiss study. Want to learn more about the healthy side of humor? MEN’S HEALTH magazine shares these surprising facts about the healthy side of humor.
#1. You’ll Breathe Easier
“Ninety percent of laughs involve deep exhalations,” says Dacher Keltner, Ph.D., a professor of psychology at the University of California at Berkeley and the author of Born to Be Good. “When you exhale, your heart rate and blood pressure go down and you enter a calmer state. This effect may very well be the reason you feel a sense of relief from laughing.”
#2. You’ll Bond Better
Partners who tell kind, lighthearted jokes and share laughter to defuse tension tend to have better marriages, says psychologist John Gottman, Ph.D., of the Gottman Institute, a relationship counseling center in Seattle. It could be as easy as establishing a word or phrase that’s funny (and random) enough to automatically end any argument—like “pork chop!”
#3. You’ll Beat Stress
Just the anticipation of laughing decreases the stress hormones dopac, cortisol, and epinephrine by 38, 39, and 70 percent, respectively, according to researchers at Loma Linda University in California. And when researchers at the University of Maryland showed short movie clips to study participants, those who watched funny films experienced a 22 percent increase in blood flow to their hearts..
#4. You’ll Stay Healthier
Not only does a chuckle release tension, it also keeps you healthy. People who laugh 10-25 times daily face fewer diseases than those who laugh outside that range, according to a 2009 study in the International Journal of Medical Sciences.
#5. You’ll Do Better Work
Maybe it’s a dreaded TPS report like in Office Space. Or perhaps your coworkers remind you of the Dunder Mifflin employees on The Office. Whatever the scenario, according to a Men’s Health survey of nearly 600 men, 73 percent said that having a sense of humor made them better at their jobs.
The Bottom Line: A guffaw is good medicine. That’s why while we take our jobs seriously at Crossroads Bootcamp, we always want to make it fun. Did you hear the one about the duck who walked into the bar?……..
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