[Neurons] 2008 Meta Reflections #42

[Dr. Hall]

From:  L. Michael Hall

Sept 15, 2008

Meta Reflection #42

   Humor -4

 


 

THE ART OF CREATING

HUMOR

                              

 

 

The sense of humor is our seventh sense.  The complex structure of humor
(#40 and #41) reveals a meta-state structure of eliciting two contrasting
incongruous sets of expectations that jars our awareness, giving us a
meta-state moment of lightness, perspective, and delight.  It is the sense
of transcendence that arises from meta-stating our experience. As such humor
is a human sense that can positive contribute to our sanity, health,
bonding, connection, philosophical wisdom, etc.  Given all this, how is it
created?  

           How can we create humor?

           What are the tools (processes, techniques) by which we can
create humor for ourselves, our clients, our audiences, and our friends?

 

1) Exaggerate.

Take something that a person says or does, the way someone relates or
performs something and exaggerate it, blow it out of proportion.  Create a
ridiculous picture or sound of the object.  Be absurd; create absurdities.
Raise things to laughable proportions.  Be ridiculous.  After all, as
someone wrote, "Humor is tragedy standing on its head-with its pants down."

 

In RET (Rational Emotive Therapy) Albert Ellis introduced shame-attacking
exercises to counteract over-seriousness.  A RET therapist might assign a
person one of the following.  1) Walk down the street with an open umbrella
on a sunny day.  2) Call out the stops on the subway in a loud voice.  3)
Stop a stranger on the street and say, "I've been on the computer for a long
time, what year is it?"  4) Go to a busy department story and announce
unashamedly at the top of your lungs, "It's 2:30 and all is well."  5) Go
into a drug store and announce, "I want 20 boxes of condoms because I plan
to get lots of sex!"

 

In the beginning of NLP Richard Bandler introduced humor in terms of
exaggerations.  He especially exaggerated the words and cinematic effects of
the inner movies and representations that made people miserable.  "So you
say that you are worthless and that you won't ever amount to anything?  Now
hear those words in your mind in the voice of Donald Duck, and feel really,
really bad."

 

2) Tease.

Take something and play with it.  Mimic it (mock it), play with the words
you or another use, create a pun from the words, rhyme the language, create
a poem, a rap, play with a metaphor.

 

If someone explains that he or she has a sweet tooth and especially can't
resist cookies, tease and play with it.  "So if there are cookies in your
pantry, they call out to you, 'Eat me!  Eat me!'  And then they exert a
powerful invisible force making you walk into the kitchen and grab a handful
of cookies.  Then they jump from your hand and force themselves down your
throat.  Is that what you're saying?  I know just what you mean.  You
wouldn't believe what lemon cream pies do to me!"  

 

3) Create a surprise, shock, or jarring expectation.

Surprise your listener with something unexpected.  Set up an expectation and
then violate it.  Shift the person from what would normally be expected to
something totally unexpected.

 

In the book of Genesis there's a story of utter surprise involving Abraham
and Sarah.  When they heard the announcement that Sarah would have a baby at
90 years of age, they laughed.  "Abraham fell on his face and laughed."
(Genesis 17:12, 17).  Why?  Because a grandmother would be entering the
maternity ward with medicare picking up the bill.  So they named the baby
"Chuckles" (Isaac in Hebrew means "Laughter").  Sarah explained the name
from her experience, "God has made laughter for me; every one who hears will
laugh over me." (Genesis 22:6).

 

4) Identify and highlight incongruities.

Identify incongruities and associate them so that the differences stand out.
Mis-match what is with what one would normally expect.  Use unexpected
terms.  Match things that do not fit together, "Now hear your critic
insulting you, saying, 'You'll never amount to anything,' in the sexiest
voice you can imagine and feel really depressed."

 

5) Play with words and ideas.

Take words and create puns, rhythms, alliteration, alter the spelling or
grammar.  Use language to create satire, irony, and to play with the
double-meanings in words.  Use your wit to find and develop wisecracks and
witty phrases.  One wit gave a different, strange, and weird way for
thinking about playing a violin: "It is the process of pulling the hairs of
a horse's tail across the intestines of a dead cat." 

 

6) Have fun.

Lighten up with whatever you're doing, enjoy it.  Have fun with it.  We do
that with babies and small children when we play peekaboo and engage in
tickling bouts.  Mirth in life is all about learning how to "be of good
cheer" as an attitude for living.  Originally "humor" referred to the Greek
idea of humus which combined optimism and pleasure to create a light state
of enjoyment.

7) Learn how to laugh at your laughter.

With your self-reflexivity, enjoy your enjoyment, have fun about your
playfulness, laugh at your laughter.  When you do this, it takes you into
meta-humor and meta-fun so that you can be dancing in your mind and
emotions.

 


Now in the creativity of generating humor, make sure that you have
permission within yourself to create, express, and enjoy humor.  Do you?
Give yourself permission to be silly, ridiculous, to exaggerate, to play, to
create puns on words, to be comical, etc.  Do you have permission?  Does it
settle well within you?  Or is laughter and humor "silly," unprofessional,
foolishness, etc.?   Do you have to be serious?  Do you have permission to
be imperfect?  As a perfectly imperfect human being who thinks, says, and
does lots of silly things, here's to the perfection of your silliness!  To
the unleashing of your humorous self!

 

 

 

L.  Michael Hall, Ph.D.

International Society of Neuro-Semantics

Meta-Coach Training System

P.O. Box 8

Clifton, CO.  81520 USA

1 970-523-7877

1 970-523-5790 fax

     www.neurosemantics.com 

      www.neuro-semantics-trainings.com 

      www.self-actualizing.org

      www.meta-coaching.org

      www.ns-video.com 

 

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://eight.pairlist.net/pipermail/neurons/attachments/20080915/4e452539/attachment.htm>