(I’m going to see Bill Cosby in concert tonight so I thought I’d post
these thoughts about humor, rapport and making people laugh.)
I find it easy to get along with and establish rapport with a wide range of
people. I have a lot of slack for folks to find their own way, whether or not I
agree with where they're going. My fuse is long and I tend to focus on where
the connection is, rather than where the obstacles are.
Funny because really I'm a loner at heart. I've just learned to be
socially fluid and get along with all kinds of people. Maybe it was my habit,
started when I was 5 or 6, of connecting with people through making them
laugh.
I remember the very first time I did it. It was either kindergarten or
first grade and our teacher asked us what the month of March was famous for.
For some reason I whispered to the kid next to me, "Blowing hats
off." He cracked up and the teacher asked me what I'd said. I think I
sheepishly replied "Blowing hats off?" And she said, "Yes!
That's exactly right! We think of March as a windy month." So I got a
double dose of validation and praise simultaneously and I think it really
encouraged me to continue seeing if I could make people laugh. I wasn't exactly
the "class clown" but I'm sure I got on a lot of my teacher's nerves
over the years.
To really make someone laugh in everyday life, and laugh spontaneously
and genuinely, requires getting into their mindset, sensing where their tension
is, and where their releases might be. I find I really have to pay attention to
other people and get them first, only then can I sense into what will make them
laugh. I actually "adopt" their sense of humor. What they think is
funny, I start to think is funny. Of course I can't do this with everyone, but
I can do it with most people. Where I can't do it is with people whose humor is
essentially mean spirited, truly racist or hateful.
I think this humor-rapport thing has helped me relate to lots of
different kinds of people. I have great humor connections with people who would
probably be amazed if they overheard me joking with my other friends since the
humor I share with each of them is totally different. I'm versatile that way.
My own personal sense of humor is kind of silly really and I don't share it
with that many people. I love being a humor chameleon though, since I get to
enjoy so many ways of seeing humor in life. I'm definitely not faking it, I
really see into what others think is funny and end up thinking it's funny
too.
This has really helped me as a T'ai-Chi teacher and enabled me connect with a lot
of very different people. I don't think anyone can really know what someone
else is experiencing. There's no proven way to literally enter another's
experience. However, sharing laughter is one of the fastest and most reliable
indicators that my experience and someone else's are at least similar, if not
close to identical.
True laughter is very hard to fake. At least it's hard to fake and get
me to buy it. I've met many people who cannot really laugh. They know how to
make the "ha ha" sound when something's supposed to be funny, but
they don't erupt into genuine spontaneous laughter. They can't let themselves
lose that much control. It's like everything has to go by their inner gatekeeper
before they can decide if it's funny or not.
To me the beauty of laughter is that I can't have the gatekeeper
monitoring my experience if I want to really laugh. I have to have my genuine
unforced responses, whether or not they are politically, spiritually or
otherwise "correct". Thinking might come later, but I find people who
must think before they decide whether to allow themselves to laugh at something
to be some of the saddest and least interesting people I know.
Every now and then I take it upon myself to see if I can get something
by someone’s inner gatekeeper and make them laugh at something they "don't
think is funny". If can do that, if I can touch that part of them which is
capable of this simple unforced release, I feel like I'm doing something right.
It's not easy though and I don't attempt it often. I much prefer people who
have what used to be called a "ready" laugh. Not someone who goes off
hysterically at the slightest whiff of a joke, but someone who knows how to let
go into laughter and is ready to do so.
This spontaneous quality of true laughter is one of the reasons why
being a stand-up comedian is so difficult and why so many of us
"funny" people, shy away from even thinking about doing stand-up. If
I sing or play guitar badly or in some way don't reach the audience, they can
still clap politely to show that they at least appreciate the effort. But with
a comedian, there's no polite way to laugh at jokes that don't hit the mark.
Even if there was, it would just make it worse for the comedian. He's aiming
for a genuine spontaneous response and if he doesn't get it, it's obvious to
everyone in the room. There's no saving face when you don't do it right. This
is why, comic will say things like "I died out there." In everyday
like, if a joke doesn't work, you can shrug it off, or laugh at the joke
yourself, or just slip and slide a bit and move on. But on stage? That's a
different world. Some comics are very good at recovering from having told a
joke that didn't work. In fact some comedians are at their best while doing
this. Johnny Carson comes to mind. But for most it's excruciating. Lucky for
me, I have no ambitions in this area. I like making people laugh in real life,
one on one or in small groups. And I like letting them make me laugh too. I
like the rapport we have to develop to do this. And I just like to laugh...
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