Mirthmaking...It's A Distance Thing

Dissecting the meaning of mirth is like dissecting a frog: nobody really enjoys it and the frog dies. So let’s save a frog and get to the point.

Mirth is gladness accompanied with laughter. You gotta have both of those ingredients for mirth….gladness AND laughter. If you just have one, you really have nothing. Imagine Abbot without Costello, peaches without cream, or reality shows without idiots. Break these duos up and they don’t work. The same goes for gladness and laughter.

Mirth gives you distance. Distance allows you to see the whole picture. It gives you perspective. Is the glass half empty or half full? From a mirth perspective, it’s neither. The glass is too dang big! Get a smaller glass and it’ll be full. That’s the mirth perspective…you see all the angles. You can only do that with distance. Distance gives you perspective because it gives you distance from problems and daily stressors and in case you didn’t know, life is much easier to handle (and lots more fun) when you can see things from a distance. A problem can be overwhelming when the problem is all you see. Your heart rate rises, blood pressure soars, respiration gets poor, and in technical terms, it’s a bad thing. Plus, you’re miserable to be around.

You can create distance if you will occasionally just lighten’ up and be a kid. Kids have open minds. One of my best friends has a four-year-old son who recently asked him, “Was Humpty Dumpty’s mom a big fat chicken?” Only a kid would think of that. Be a kid. If no other time of the year, you have the opportunity at Halloween. It’s a chance to be a kid. It’s a chance to dress up. Last year I was a ballerina. I even had the tights and a tutu. Apparently, many folks haven’t seen a 185-pound ballerina with a potbelly because many small children were frightened and I don’t mean in a spooky way. I mean in a “honey, call the police” kinda way. By next Halloween, however, the restraining orders will have expired and I’ll have another chance to celebrate this fun holiday. You don’t stop playing because you grow old; you grow old because you stop playing.

If being a kid is too difficult for you, I have a simpler solution. In the morning when you wake, wipe the sleep from your eyes, then march into the bathroom and stare at yourself naked. After you cry for a while, keep staring. I guarantee you; eventually you will laugh.

There are many beautiful creatures on this planet, like a white Bengal tiger or a racing thoroughbred, but you and I naked do not fit into the beautiful category. And I don’t care what kind of shape you’re in. I’m just being objective and honest. If you don’t believe that we are funny looking creatures, explain that spare hair that is on my back (same goes for my Aunt Myrtle). I ain’t beautiful when I’m naked. Okay, enough of the naked talk. What am I saying? I’m saying that you need to laugh at yourself occasionally. You are a wealth of comedic material and you do laughable stuff all the time, it just means you’re normal. Have you ever called someone and when they answered the phone, you forgot whom you had called? Sure you have. Then you have to ask, “Who is this?” And you hear, “It’s your mother.” Or how about when you’re looking for something? While you’re in the process of looking for it, you completely forget what you are looking for. What do you do then? You just keep on looking, don’t you? Do you think you’re just going to bump into it or something? Or how about when in you get in your car after it’s been sitting out all day in cold weather? You know the engine is cold and you know the heater takes a while to warm up, but you will still immediately turn the heater fan on “high”. Now you’ve got a wind chill factor in the car. We do goofy stuff all the time and this is a great way to make mirth….laugh at yourself. I’ve been watching people a long time and there’s one thing I know for sure. We’re all idiots at times. That’s how I know if you’re normal. If you do silly stuff…you’re normal.

So let’s do a brief review.
Be a kid.
Look at yourself naked.

Pretty simple, huh?

Seriously, it is pretty basic. Keep things in perspective by making a little mirth. If you don’t believe me, just ask the frog.