Circumstances can be uncontrollable. Reality is daunting, but laughter is contagious.
Do you remember the last time you had a good belly laugh or a true laugh out loud experience?
Comedians Lucille Ball, Carol Burnett and Gilda Radner understand the impact humour and laughter can have on a life.
They perfected comedy in that jokes are all in the surprise, something we never see coming. Humour is based on inconsistencies; about something being out of place.
Lucille Ball doesn’t hold back in I Love Lucy. With her impeccable timing, her physicality and her dedication to detail, Lucy had the ability to make audiences laugh and cry at the same time.
“I’m happy that I have brought laughter because I have been shown by many the value of it in so many lives, in so many ways,” said Ball.
Carol Burnett, another comedy icon, credits everything to humour through the success of The Carol Burnett Show.
“I didn’t even ask to be famous. All I asked was to be able to earn a living making people laugh,” said Burnett.
And Gilda Radner, an original Saturday Night Live cast member, is revered for her loveable, comical characters such as Roseanne Roseannadanna, Lisa Loopner and Emily Litella, and her rib-tickling humour.
So, what makes these three comedy legends stand out? When we look back on their work we laugh with them. When we look back on their lives, our hearts ache for them.
Lucille Ball and husband, and co-star, Desi Arnaz faced marital problems.
Carol Burnett’s daughter suffered from addiction in her teens, then passed away from lung cancer at the age of 38.
And Gilda Radner was just 39 when she was diagnosed with ovarian cancer, which she would die from at the age of 42.
“Cancer is probably the most unfunny thing in the world, but I’m a comedian, and even cancer couldn’t stop me from seeing the humour in what I went through,” said Radner.
Humour can get us through tough times, days and circumstances.
Laughter ignites the joy within us, even when we don’t feel it. Whether we give laughter or express it, it is the contagious medicine that gives hope in the moment.
Today we question, “What is there to laugh about?”
Better to remember, a merry heart does good like a medicine, where doom and gloom leave you bone tired.
Let’s laugh together this year.
