A Daily Laugh for You on LaughterYoga.org

Thanks to my good friend and laughter leader Farah who suggested it, my youtube.com/adlfy videos are currently being featured on the Laughter Yoga International website. I truly hope this helps increase their reach to help people laugh more and try Laughter Yoga.

Find the story here.

Laughter Yoga University

If the world can have a McDonald's University (sad but true) then why not a Laughter Yoga University? Indeed, why not? That's the dream of Dr. Kataria (the inventor of Laughter Yoga.) This dream is coming true:

What has been a dream for the last five years is very soon becoming a reality for Dr Madan and his wife, Madhuri Kataria. Before the year's end, they will throw open the gates to India's first Laughter Yoga University.

Located at Ramnagar, about 50 kilometers outside Bangalore, laughter enthusiasts from across the world will have access to the specially designed courses which cover everything right from the basics of laughter yoga, to teachers training courses, stress management techniques and even applied courses in Ayurveda and Naturopathy.

But that's not even the best part. At the very end of the article an awesome vision is revealed:

Besides the Bangalore university, Madan is also planning the country's first 'Laughter City' -- a township that encourages people from around the world to come together and form a community based on the essence of Laughter Yoga -- singing, dancing, playing and laughter.

My bags are so packed! See here for the full article.

A Daily Laugh for You

This is my newest project: record and post a daily video of me (and possibly others) laughing. Please spread the word and also subscribe to help cheer your day.



Enjoy!

Raising the Dead in the Corporate World

So I'm beginning to catch the vision of what my new career will be. Do these comics speak to you? In my previous job, there were the things that I got paid to do and there were the activities that I led on my own time. While I appreciate the opportunities I was given in the paid part of my job and genuinely did enjoy some aspects of them, that work did not truly fire my soul. It was the unpaid activities that gave me real joy. These things stretched people and gave them happiness. Life is too short to be the living dead at work. Now of course I realize that not everyone feels like that all the time (I know I didn't) but I think that many in the corporate world do -- and I want to help change that. I was doing that to some degree at my former work and now I have the chance to do that at many work places. What are your thoughts? What do you think I could do? If something I have done has helped you, please let me know -- I'm looking for a few good quotes that I can use to help promote my services in my new role. Doing my best to make this world a better place with the gifts I have. Thanks!

Success

The other day I had two thoughts about reaching my goals:

1. Things take work (I have to put effort into things if I ever hope to see them happen.)
2. Not everything works (Just because I put effort into something doesn't mean it will succeed.)

Now of course these are obvious facts but it was a bit of a revelation or epiphany to me. I am very lazy and so I tend to get stuck at number 1. I am also easily discouraged and so I get hung up at number 2 as well. I still have dreams and goals like everybody but so many of them have remained eternally frustrate because of these two facts. I figure I need to believe in myself and that will hopefully lead to others believing in me which will then propel me to sustained action. I really do believe some of my dreams are awesome. I just want more of them to see the light of day.

How to become an optimist

Research shows that life goes better for optimists. I used to be very pessimistic. I am changing. Here's my plan:

1. Limit your exposure to negative things. Seek out positive things.
   
2. Cultivate optimistic friends.
3. Be thankful. Write down one thing a day in a notebook by your bed.
   
4. Exercise. Get some fresh air.
   
5. Persevere. Don't give up. Try a new way. Let go.
   
6. Help others. Encourage them. Compliment them - genuinely.
   
7. Listen to "positive" music. Dance. Sing.
   
8. Laugh! Practice makes perfect.
   

For me the last item is key and I do this by participating in an awesome weekly Laughter Club. What are some of your ideas?

The gift of a healing touch

We just spent three days at a wonderful spa retreat centre in Mission. While there, I was given a few massage / acupressure treatments by a highly skilled and gifted practitioner. The first session in particular was amazing; I could actually feel the energy rebalance in my body. I've never felt anything quite like it.

I've been reflecting on this experience, and I realize that we don't touch one another enough. Fear of physical contact - that it be misconstrued as sexual or that we don't want to "invade" another person's space - means we hardly touch others at all. Because of these past three days however, I have more of an appreciation for the power of touch to connect us with others and to connect our minds to our bodies. And to heal us.

I am changing. We are changing...

Hello friends, family, and the Internet,

I have heard from many friends that November was a hard month. Very Hard. And I personally have been through a lot in the last 4 weeks or so. I have also learned (or relearned?) a lot about myself and life. And I am changing. And growing. And it has been hard. And it continues to be hard. There have been a few key things that have made it possible for me to make it this far. Music. Sunshine and fireplaces. Laughter Yoga. And most importantly, friends. I think that is the major thing I am learning is that friendship is crucial. Family too. I am learning that I need to do things for my own self care and growth. Not an unhealthy selfish but instead a healthy selfish.

I am growing to have a more optimistic life outlook too. I think being in a weekly Laughter Yoga group is a large part of that. And having optimistic friends helps too. I am learning that the key to health is a positive environment. Both external (people) and internal (thoughts). It is certainly good to be grounded but it is equally important to believe the best. We all need that spark of hope that the future will not be as dark as some say, now more than ever. Yes, things do look challenging. Very challenging. And even if the long term might be better than today (although very different) getting there will take every ounce of optimism we have.

I need to rediscover what my desires are and pursue them with passion. When I am healthy and happy, that lifts others. Life is short and unpredictable. We need to seize opportunities when they happen. Take risks. And try to have as few regrets as possible. What have your experiences been recently?

-Chris

The super hero meme

One of the big problems with our (and other) cultures, in my opinion, is the deeply ingrained "super hero" mythos / meme. We can see this exemplified in the huge popularity of super hero films (Batman, Spiderman, Superman) and in certain religious figures (Krishna, Jesus, Muhammad). Now I'm not going to delve into whether or not these latter "heroes" were all they are purported to be. My point is that the mindset of "some champion is going to come and save us all from the mess we've made for ourselves" is fundamentally an unhelpful one. When you look at Nature, what do you see? How does change come about? For example, (with the very rare exception) the mountains are not worn down by one big event (i.e. a volcano blowing its top) but by multitudinous individual drops of rain. The message here is that power comes from many acting together, rather than a single super-one acting alone. If we are ever going to dig ourselves out of the hole we're in (pick your favourite current crisis) we will need to do so together.

Probability Travel

So never mind space or even time travel, what I want is probability travel. We all know what space travel is. Surely by now almost everyone has at least heard of time travel. However almost nobody has heard or even conceived of probability travel. The basic premise is that from any point in time there are not just one but many (infinite?) possible ways the future might unfold. There is a movie that explores this called Sliding Doors. Now wouldn't it be great to be able to surf between different outcomes and see what different realities are like? For a short video describing the theory of higher order dimensions, please follow this link. As always, I welcome your comments.