[Applause]
[Laughter]
so we just shared a moment of
spontaneous laughter so what while you
were laughing your whole brain was
engaged humor generated a cascade of
neurotransmitters which engaged your
prefrontal cortex which processes wit
the limbic system which evokes mirth the
occipital lobe which generates laughter
so what humor is more than just
entertainment it’s so much more powerful
than that the benefits of humor are
physiological psychological social and
spiritual humor has the power to heal
influence connect and enlighten humor is
power my friend dr. Lee Burke is a
leading psychoneuroimmunology who
studies humor in the brain he says if we
took what we now know about laughter and
bottled it it would require FDA approval
while you were laughing there was so
much more going on than what you
probably realize you are literally
healthier than you were when I first
walked on the stage if we had you wired
for brain activity we’d see a flood of
gamma waves more on that later if we had
you wired for physiological activity we
would see
a drop in cortisol a drop in your blood
pressure a drop in your muscle tension
if psychologically you experienced
positive and uplifting emotions even
though you didn’t know why you were
laughing and socially you bonded with
everyone in the room through a shared
emotional experience so what do you know
anyone who suffers from heart disease
from diabetes from memory problems from
depression from memory problems from
stress from memory problems these
conditions are no joke but they may be a
laughing matter
why because humor is power now you’ve
also heard that knowledge is power not
quite it’s the application of knowledge
that’s power I’m a nurse I know how to
perform CPR but if I see you clutch your
chest and collapse to the ground it’s
not going to help you if I hover over
you going I know how to perform CPR no
it’s not in the knowledge it’s in the
application of the knowledge so I don’t
want you to be satisfied when you leave
here today knowing that humor is good
for you I want you to grasp the power
that you have at your very fingertips
but you haven’t taken advantage of and I
want to inspire you to take action I’m a
neuro humorist I know what you’re
thinking
another neuro humorist
for 25 years I’ve lived at the
intersection of humor and the brain for
my master’s thesis
I studied the effects of humor on health
and communication when I was first asked
to share my findings I was thrilled
starting with my fellow academics my
very first presentation I dove into my
research methodology I excitedly
explained the significance of the
p-value of less than 0.05 and I
discovered that people thought I was
funny
who knew from there I went on to share
my findings with local groups and
companies and then national groups and
companies and then international groups
and companies I’d stumbled backwards
into my calling we’re just now beginning
to grasp the power of the giggle the
chortle the belly laugh but it’s taken
eons to emerge for people to recognize
the intentional humor has real power in
the real world let me give you some
context by giving you a brief history of
humor or a countdown 10 200,000 BC of
drops a rock on ooks foot everyone
laughs 9 the ancient Greeks believed
that health was a balance of four body
fluids they called humors eight proverbs
17:22
a merry heart doeth good like a medicine
seven ninth century The Laughing Buddha
appears six the dark ages okay no humor
there
five the Reformation court jesters
through humour tell truths that no one
else dare speak for early 20th century
Sigmund Freud publishes jokes and their
relation to the unconscious and also has
the insight sometimes a cigar is just a
cigar three 1970s Norman Cousins cures
himself of ankylosing spondylitis by
watching comedy films and candid camera
and goes on to write the classic anatomy
of an illness to 1970s 1970s it was
patch Adams who broke ranks with his
fellow doctors by using intentional
humor as a healing modality in hospitals
one today science proves the power of
humor to change humans at the cellular
level zero liftoff in your lifetime you
will experience the power of humor as it
heals disease shapes society and helps
save the world save the world she say
yes it’s already happened once October
1962 the Cuban Missile Crisis is
careening forward the countdown to
nuclear Armageddon is ticking toward
zero for 13 days America and Russia
rattled their nuclear sabers as a
six-year-old girl I wasn’t afraid of the
bomb I was afraid of the fear in my
father’s face that’s what kept me awake
at night negotiations between the two
superpowers are deadlocked a handful of
stone-faced men stare at each other
across a mahogany boardroom table the
tension is palpable as these men
literally hold the fate of our world in
their hands and then one of the Soviet
delegates tells a joke
tells a joke what is difference between
capitalism and communism in capitalism
men exploits men in communism is other
way around
both sides laugh the tension breaks the
talks resume and you know the rest they
didn’t blow up the planet humor is power
let’s shift our perspective from the
global or macro level to the micro or
cellular level science now shows the
power of humor to change human beings at
the cellular level researchers have
discovered positive changes in the
epithelial lining of blood vessels in
levels of cortisol in the immune system
this is great news for people with
diabetes heart disease autoimmune
disorders fertility problems dementia
depression but wait there’s more recent
research shows the power of humor goes
beyond the cellular level studies
conducted on people with diabetes showed
that pro-r in and dropped sharply after
they watched funny films and even bigger
news published in the journal Life
Sciences
laughter normalize the expression of the
pro Renan receptor gene thus
demonstrating the inhibitory effect of
laughter at the onset deterioration of
diabetic complications at the gene
expression level say what in layman’s
terms humor has the power to change your
very DNA you could be passing along
healthier genes to your children
epigenetics this is your future and the
better it gets the better it gets for
the last 30 years neuroscientists have
uncovered bit by bit the secrets behind
brainwaves how Alpha Beta Delta and
theta waves are associated with varying
degrees of consciousness but when they
looked at the fifth kind of brainwave
gamma waves the waves were so fine that
at first researchers thought they were
merely static but over the years
technology improved and ten years ago
researchers discovered that gamma waves
were related to mental states achieved
by deep meditation and mindfulness
states like creativity focus and flow
and then just recently dr. Lee Burke
studied brain activity on people exposed
to humor and discovers that mirthful
humor generates gamma waves too so what
could a better memory improve your
grades would you like your lectures to
have more impact would you be able to
benefit for more productivity at work
would you be able to benefit for more
clarity in your thinking if you ever had
to deal with an obstinate child have you
ever had to overcome the overwhelming
desire to choke the living daylights out
of some idiot who desperately deserves
it humor can help you survive and thrive
in all of these situations you hold in
your hands the power to change your
world our world and more good news you
don’t even have to be funny don’t get me
wrong I think being funny is great how
many of you in here think you’re funny
I’m not going to look the person over
here you have your hand raised and the
person behind you is going no no I don’t
think show of hands how many of you
think you have a sense of humor yeah I
would expect all hands to go up for no
other reason it’s socially unacceptable
to admit that you don’t have a sense of
humor being funny
performing generating laughter this is a
great skill to have but it’s actually
more important to see funny
than it is to be funny if you practice
the seeing funny the being funny will
fall into place here’s one quick way and
a shortcut to the power of humor raise
your awareness ask yourself what’s funny
around here
what am I missing now some people whine
but there’s nothing funny happening in
my life and if that’s your belief that’s
your reality but if you will
intentionally raise your awareness and
start listening for humor you’ll find it
I once overheard a tourist in Miami
asked a hotel clerk which Beach is
closest to the water seriously you do
not have to make this stuff up if you
intentionally look for humor you’ll see
funny things that other people miss at
this gym members write up an escalator
so they can workout on a Stairmaster not
a bar in sight but absolutely no alcohol
beyond this point so start chugging I
don’t even know what this means
but it cracks me up every time I see it
my interest in humor isn’t just
professional it’s personal my son David
was a full time student in college and a
part-time bouncer in a bar makes a mom
proud he and his best buddy at the bar
were nicknamed Tonto and The Lone Ranger
one morning David wakes up with a pain
in his chest and long story short it’s a
fist-sized cancerous tumor weeks of
chemo turned into months he loses all
his hair but not his spirit one day his
buddies come by after hanging out at the
bar they come over to hang out for a bit
and I hear waves of laughter flood the
house so I ask when they when they leave
he’s just he’s smiling bigger than he
had for months so I said what was all
that about and he laughed and he said oh
I’ve got a new nickname kemo sabe
laughter and humor empowered him and it
faded our fears and by the way David’s
been cancer-free now for ten years I’m
not saying that humor cured his cancer
although scientific evidence is
beginning to point in that direction
however it’s an indisputable fact that
during this devastating time humor
helped him cope and it improved the
quality of his life a hundred years
before nuclear Armageddon was deflected
by humor Mark Twain wrote the human race
has but one really effective weapon and
that’s laughter seventy years ago
Holocaust survivor Victor Frankel said
humor was another of the souls weapons
in the fight for self-preservation
science now proves that both of these
statements are true humors not merely
anecdotal it’s not wishful thinking it’s
not just a dream it’s real do you
remember that great quote by
spider-man’s Uncle Ben Peter Parker’s
Uncle Ben with great power comes great
responsibility you now have a great
responsibility because you now know how
powerful humor is and to not act on this
responsibility would be to deprive
yourself and your families and all of
humanity of the many benefits of humor
it’s time we take humor seriously it’s
time to take action because humor is
power
you
[Laughter]
so we just shared a moment of
spontaneous laughter so what while you
were laughing your whole brain was
engaged humor generated a cascade of
neurotransmitters which engaged your
prefrontal cortex which processes wit
the limbic system which evokes mirth the
occipital lobe which generates laughter
so what humor is more than just
entertainment it’s so much more powerful
than that the benefits of humor are
physiological psychological social and
spiritual humor has the power to heal
influence connect and enlighten humor is
power my friend dr. Lee Burke is a
leading psychoneuroimmunology who
studies humor in the brain he says if we
took what we now know about laughter and
bottled it it would require FDA approval
while you were laughing there was so
much more going on than what you
probably realize you are literally
healthier than you were when I first
walked on the stage if we had you wired
for brain activity we’d see a flood of
gamma waves more on that later if we had
you wired for physiological activity we
would see
a drop in cortisol a drop in your blood
pressure a drop in your muscle tension
if psychologically you experienced
positive and uplifting emotions even
though you didn’t know why you were
laughing and socially you bonded with
everyone in the room through a shared
emotional experience so what do you know
anyone who suffers from heart disease
from diabetes from memory problems from
depression from memory problems from
stress from memory problems these
conditions are no joke but they may be a
laughing matter
why because humor is power now you’ve
also heard that knowledge is power not
quite it’s the application of knowledge
that’s power I’m a nurse I know how to
perform CPR but if I see you clutch your
chest and collapse to the ground it’s
not going to help you if I hover over
you going I know how to perform CPR no
it’s not in the knowledge it’s in the
application of the knowledge so I don’t
want you to be satisfied when you leave
here today knowing that humor is good
for you I want you to grasp the power
that you have at your very fingertips
but you haven’t taken advantage of and I
want to inspire you to take action I’m a
neuro humorist I know what you’re
thinking
another neuro humorist
for 25 years I’ve lived at the
intersection of humor and the brain for
my master’s thesis
I studied the effects of humor on health
and communication when I was first asked
to share my findings I was thrilled
starting with my fellow academics my
very first presentation I dove into my
research methodology I excitedly
explained the significance of the
p-value of less than 0.05 and I
discovered that people thought I was
funny
who knew from there I went on to share
my findings with local groups and
companies and then national groups and
companies and then international groups
and companies I’d stumbled backwards
into my calling we’re just now beginning
to grasp the power of the giggle the
chortle the belly laugh but it’s taken
eons to emerge for people to recognize
the intentional humor has real power in
the real world let me give you some
context by giving you a brief history of
humor or a countdown 10 200,000 BC of
drops a rock on ooks foot everyone
laughs 9 the ancient Greeks believed
that health was a balance of four body
fluids they called humors eight proverbs
17:22
a merry heart doeth good like a medicine
seven ninth century The Laughing Buddha
appears six the dark ages okay no humor
there
five the Reformation court jesters
through humour tell truths that no one
else dare speak for early 20th century
Sigmund Freud publishes jokes and their
relation to the unconscious and also has
the insight sometimes a cigar is just a
cigar three 1970s Norman Cousins cures
himself of ankylosing spondylitis by
watching comedy films and candid camera
and goes on to write the classic anatomy
of an illness to 1970s 1970s it was
patch Adams who broke ranks with his
fellow doctors by using intentional
humor as a healing modality in hospitals
one today science proves the power of
humor to change humans at the cellular
level zero liftoff in your lifetime you
will experience the power of humor as it
heals disease shapes society and helps
save the world save the world she say
yes it’s already happened once October
1962 the Cuban Missile Crisis is
careening forward the countdown to
nuclear Armageddon is ticking toward
zero for 13 days America and Russia
rattled their nuclear sabers as a
six-year-old girl I wasn’t afraid of the
bomb I was afraid of the fear in my
father’s face that’s what kept me awake
at night negotiations between the two
superpowers are deadlocked a handful of
stone-faced men stare at each other
across a mahogany boardroom table the
tension is palpable as these men
literally hold the fate of our world in
their hands and then one of the Soviet
delegates tells a joke
tells a joke what is difference between
capitalism and communism in capitalism
men exploits men in communism is other
way around
both sides laugh the tension breaks the
talks resume and you know the rest they
didn’t blow up the planet humor is power
let’s shift our perspective from the
global or macro level to the micro or
cellular level science now shows the
power of humor to change human beings at
the cellular level researchers have
discovered positive changes in the
epithelial lining of blood vessels in
levels of cortisol in the immune system
this is great news for people with
diabetes heart disease autoimmune
disorders fertility problems dementia
depression but wait there’s more recent
research shows the power of humor goes
beyond the cellular level studies
conducted on people with diabetes showed
that pro-r in and dropped sharply after
they watched funny films and even bigger
news published in the journal Life
Sciences
laughter normalize the expression of the
pro Renan receptor gene thus
demonstrating the inhibitory effect of
laughter at the onset deterioration of
diabetic complications at the gene
expression level say what in layman’s
terms humor has the power to change your
very DNA you could be passing along
healthier genes to your children
epigenetics this is your future and the
better it gets the better it gets for
the last 30 years neuroscientists have
uncovered bit by bit the secrets behind
brainwaves how Alpha Beta Delta and
theta waves are associated with varying
degrees of consciousness but when they
looked at the fifth kind of brainwave
gamma waves the waves were so fine that
at first researchers thought they were
merely static but over the years
technology improved and ten years ago
researchers discovered that gamma waves
were related to mental states achieved
by deep meditation and mindfulness
states like creativity focus and flow
and then just recently dr. Lee Burke
studied brain activity on people exposed
to humor and discovers that mirthful
humor generates gamma waves too so what
could a better memory improve your
grades would you like your lectures to
have more impact would you be able to
benefit for more productivity at work
would you be able to benefit for more
clarity in your thinking if you ever had
to deal with an obstinate child have you
ever had to overcome the overwhelming
desire to choke the living daylights out
of some idiot who desperately deserves
it humor can help you survive and thrive
in all of these situations you hold in
your hands the power to change your
world our world and more good news you
don’t even have to be funny don’t get me
wrong I think being funny is great how
many of you in here think you’re funny
I’m not going to look the person over
here you have your hand raised and the
person behind you is going no no I don’t
think show of hands how many of you
think you have a sense of humor yeah I
would expect all hands to go up for no
other reason it’s socially unacceptable
to admit that you don’t have a sense of
humor being funny
performing generating laughter this is a
great skill to have but it’s actually
more important to see funny
than it is to be funny if you practice
the seeing funny the being funny will
fall into place here’s one quick way and
a shortcut to the power of humor raise
your awareness ask yourself what’s funny
around here
what am I missing now some people whine
but there’s nothing funny happening in
my life and if that’s your belief that’s
your reality but if you will
intentionally raise your awareness and
start listening for humor you’ll find it
I once overheard a tourist in Miami
asked a hotel clerk which Beach is
closest to the water seriously you do
not have to make this stuff up if you
intentionally look for humor you’ll see
funny things that other people miss at
this gym members write up an escalator
so they can workout on a Stairmaster not
a bar in sight but absolutely no alcohol
beyond this point so start chugging I
don’t even know what this means
but it cracks me up every time I see it
my interest in humor isn’t just
professional it’s personal my son David
was a full time student in college and a
part-time bouncer in a bar makes a mom
proud he and his best buddy at the bar
were nicknamed Tonto and The Lone Ranger
one morning David wakes up with a pain
in his chest and long story short it’s a
fist-sized cancerous tumor weeks of
chemo turned into months he loses all
his hair but not his spirit one day his
buddies come by after hanging out at the
bar they come over to hang out for a bit
and I hear waves of laughter flood the
house so I ask when they when they leave
he’s just he’s smiling bigger than he
had for months so I said what was all
that about and he laughed and he said oh
I’ve got a new nickname kemo sabe
laughter and humor empowered him and it
faded our fears and by the way David’s
been cancer-free now for ten years I’m
not saying that humor cured his cancer
although scientific evidence is
beginning to point in that direction
however it’s an indisputable fact that
during this devastating time humor
helped him cope and it improved the
quality of his life a hundred years
before nuclear Armageddon was deflected
by humor Mark Twain wrote the human race
has but one really effective weapon and
that’s laughter seventy years ago
Holocaust survivor Victor Frankel said
humor was another of the souls weapons
in the fight for self-preservation
science now proves that both of these
statements are true humors not merely
anecdotal it’s not wishful thinking it’s
not just a dream it’s real do you
remember that great quote by
spider-man’s Uncle Ben Peter Parker’s
Uncle Ben with great power comes great
responsibility you now have a great
responsibility because you now know how
powerful humor is and to not act on this
responsibility would be to deprive
yourself and your families and all of
humanity of the many benefits of humor
it’s time we take humor seriously it’s
time to take action because humor is
power
you
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