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6 amazing health benefits of laughing

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6 amazing health benefits of laughing
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Laughter therapy is an alternative therapy that involves using laughing to treat health problems, primarily mental health problems but also physical ones. When we experience ‘belly laughs’, around 100 to 400 muscles are engaged. Discover the numerous benefits of laughing on our health. 

What is laughter therapy?

Did you know that children laugh up to 300 times a day? Over time, the daily amount of time we spend laughing reduces, and it is far less in adulthood.

Laughter therapy is generally practiced in a group, in which you laugh to relax the muscles, eliminate tension and learn how to laugh naturally and spontaneously. 

During the group sessions, the goal is to tell jokes or quite simply to clown around, without being judged, in order to help adults to use laughter as a way of living and of expressing themselves. 

Here are the types of exercises you may complete during a laughter therapy session:

  • blowing up a balloon to use your breath to get rid of negative emotions
  • dancing with a balloon stuck to your shoes
  • having fun with different types of laughter (from the gentlest to the strongest laughs)
  • tickling your neighbour
  • listening to children’s laughter, which is highly contagious

The benefits of laughter therapy

Here are the numerous benefits associated with laughter therapy, which could also be seen as a “good sense of humour”:

  • it increases immune defenses because it increases body heat
  • it brings oxygen to the body tissues and accelerates healing of injuries or illnesses
  • it helps us face our problems because it is a way of freeing ourselves from stress, anxiety and diverse illnesses
  • it increases feelings of happiness because it stimulates the production of endorphins in the brain and it balances hormones.
  • it strengthens the body: in 20 seconds of intense laughter, the body works as hard as it it would during 3 minutes of fitness exercises.
  • Laughter therapy releases physical and emotional tension: when we laugh, we leave aside our problems in order to find solutions.
  • Laughing makes us feel and look younger: the skin is more relaxed, acne and signs of premature ageing disappear. 

Following laughter therapy, and especially if it leads to a new lifestyle, you will see that you analyse situations differently and you will find it easier to come up with solutions to problems. Laughing chases bad moods away, keeps illnesses and stress at bay, strengthens the muscles and makes you younger: in short, it makes you happy! 

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