"The laugh, then, signals the suspension of formal, sincere meaning. It points to a layer of interaction where alternatives to assumed truths are possible, where identities are lighthearted and nonserious. When people laugh, they are taking a momentary vacation from the more sincere claims and implications of their actions."--Dacher Keltner, Born to Be Good: The Science of a Meaningful Life (Image of Keltner below).
Keltner collaborated with George Bonnano to examine how people adjust to the death of a spouse. Specifically they looked at the role of laughter in adjustment to bereavement. They interviewed forty-five adults who had lost a spouse in the previous six months. Each subject had six minutes to talk abut their deceased loved one. Keltner's role was to assess each participant, via videotape, according to the Ekman/Friesen Facial Action Coding System.
In Born to Be Good, Keltner describes their efforts.
"Our question was a simple one that had never been addressed before: What emotions predict healthy adjustment to the death of a spouse, as assessed by clinically sound measures of prolonged bereavement, which captures the individual's continuing longing for the deceased and inability to reenter daily living? And which emotions predict poor adjustment during bereavement?"
I was first attracted to this information because I was trying to unravel the conundrum of recovery I experienced.
On the one hand, I was told that I was recovering and moving on too quickly. I wasn't working through my grief, so I must be engaged in pathological denial. At some point, I was assured, that "deferred grief" would come back to get me.
On the other hand, if I really was getting better quickly, then my assertions of love and devotion for my wife must have been self-deception at best and outright fabrications at worst. In any event, I was supposed to be a good boy--take my medicine of suffering--and wait for others to determine when I was "ready" to move on.
Those professional and orthodox responses did nothing to help me make sense of my loss. Folks who had been through losses analogous to mine had a different response. Good for you! Keep it up! Most of all, many of them said, "Laugh! Do something fun! If you spend all your time grieving, you'll curl up and die."
This was the thesis for Keltner and Bonnano as well. "Our thinking was just the opposite [of bereavement orthodoxy], that laughter would allow our bereaved participants to distance themselves momentarily from the pain of the loss, to gain perspective, to look upon their lives in a more detached way, to find a moment of peace, to take a deep breath, so to speak." That is precisely my experience as well.
If you are actively grieving, find one of your favorite comedy movies and watch it with someone who will laugh with you.
Do something silly with friends or family and laugh with abandon. Give yourself permission to giggle, to chuckle, to guffaw, to howl with mirth, to vibrate with glee!
You aren't dishonoring your loved one by living in some moments of laughter. You aren't denying your pain or masking your moments of melancholy. You don't have to pay for your future happiness with a sufficient amount of present misery (as determined by others).
I'll give some specifics from the work of Keltner and Bonnano in my next post. But for now, find a good internet humor site or a silly youtube video. For a while, for example, I was addicted to "laughing baby" videos, and they were some of my best medications. Here's one:
Laughing really is a way through the tears.
No comments:
Post a Comment
I'm always glad to hear from YOU!