Humor, Play & the Healing Power of Not Taking Ourselves So Seriously

At The Nature Within LLC, I offer services for anyone looking to find a little more stillness, connection, and inner peace.

Reiki. Breathwork. Meditation. Coaching. Spiritual mentorship.

The articles and writing I share here to help us move through some of the harder moments in life. Creating connection and awareness are core foundations of what, and why, I do on these platforms.

I write a lot about the things that keep us stuck.

The things that keep us in fight-or-flight.

The patterns that disconnect us from ourselves.

The stories we carry.

The defenses we build.

However, there is another really important side to connection that I think we sometimes overlook.

Humor and play.

We can take ourselves way too seriously.

I don’t mean that we shouldn’t take life seriously. There are absolutely moments that require our attention, responsibility, compassion, and presence.

But taking ourselves too seriously can become its own form of disconnection.

Humor can be one of the simplest ways back.

I’m not talking about sarcasm, although that can be fun as well in very small doses.

I’m not talking about making fun of someone at their expense either.

I’m talking about humor, wit, timing, and the ability to recognize the moment we’re actually in.

Humor is often considered a form of intelligence because it requires awareness.

It requires a reference point.

It requires presence.

When we’re deeply engaged in a conversation, an experience, or even play, there are beautiful opportunities to connect with what is happening right in front of us.

Humor is one of those opportunities.

A perfectly timed comment can take the pressure out of a moment.

It can lighten the energetic field around us.

It can lower defenses.

It can create enough space for people to stop feeling like they have to protect themselves.

For those of us who sometimes feel like we have to defend every statement, comment, question, action, or idea because there is always some opposing debate waiting around the corner, humor can be a beautiful way to stabilize destabilized energy.

Humor and play are fantastic negotiators.

They can be tone-setters.

They can be the pace car that slows everyone down enough to recognize that we’re still human beings having an experience together.

There is something about laughter that says:

We’re okay. It opens us to safety.

For a moment, we don’t have to fight.

We don’t have to prove.

We don’t have to defend.

We can simply be here.

When the outcome is genuine laughter, connection and healing can become the energy that fills the environment.

Of course, there is a shadow side to humor and play.

Anything can be extended beyond its invitation.

Humor, when used inappropriately or overused, can cross a line. Emotions can surface, and energy can become unstable or volatile quickly.

In a group setting, humor that is ill-advised can insult rather than connect.

The same is true with play.

Competition, motivation, aggression, winning, losing, and the desire to prove ourselves can enter the experience.

Play can stop being play.

Humor can stop being connection.

Both require awareness.

I’ve always loved to joke and be lighthearted. I’m also guilty of being annoying in its overuse.

Being fully engaged in a conversation allows me to sometimes say the thing without actually saying the thing.

The perfect line.

At the perfect time.

A little wit.

A little timing.

A little creativity.

The things that might have required a much heavier conversation has a door opened through laughter.

That’s the beauty of humor.

It can penetrate places that a conversation alone may not always reach.

When laughter is genuinely invoked, something happens around us.

People feel good.

The body softens.

The energy shifts toward comfort.

Defenses can come down.

We remember what it feels like to simply enjoy being alive.

I think laughter is one of the healthiest things for the human soul.

We’ve all experienced that moment when we completely lose ourselves in laughter.

The kind where your stomach hurts.

Your face hurts.

You can’t catch your breath.

You’re saying, “I’m going to pee my pants.”

It is both completely blissful and slightly painful at the same time.

That’s connection.

That’s presence.

That’s the body fully participating in the moment.

I was a happy kid.

Fun-loving.

Full of play.

For me, play was a love language.

It was a style of connection.

It was one of the ways I moved toward deeper relationships with people.

And looking back, I can see how healing that was for my physical body as well.

There is something incredibly powerful about allowing ourselves to experience joy without needing to justify it.

Without needing to accomplish something.

Without needing to make it productive.

Sometimes we just need to laugh.

Sometimes we need to play.

Sometimes we need to be ridiculous.

Sometimes we need to stop carrying the weight of the world for five minutes.

I would love to see our society move back toward some of that.

Not toward separation.

Not toward pointing fingers at the opposing side.

Not toward defensive posturing and constant attack.

But toward remembering that we are human beings.

We can disagree and still laugh.

We can have difficult conversations and still find moments of lightness.

We can be responsible without being rigid.

We can be serious without becoming so serious that we lose ourselves.

Humor creates openings.

Play creates movement.

Laughter creates connection.

The simplest way back to ourselves is to stop trying so hard to find our way back.

So today, notice where you might lighten things up.

Notice where you might invite a little play.

Notice where laughter might create an opening.

Not at someone else’s expense.

Not to avoid something that needs to be addressed.

But simply to reconnect with the human experience happening right in front of you.

Wayne Dyer’s Rule # 6 - Don’t take yourself so seriously.

Give yourself permission to laugh.

Give yourself permission to play.

Give yourself permission to be fully present in the ridiculous, beautiful, uncomfortable, hilarious experience of being human.

It may be more healing than you realize.

Mind. Body. Soul.

Sometimes healing sounds a lot like laughter.