Why bother to give humor a serious place in your life?

Ask Norman Cousins.

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Excerpt from Chapter 1 of Anatomy of an Illness

This book is about a serious illness that occurred in 1964. I was reluctant to write about it for years because I was fearful of creating false hopes in others who were similarly afflicted. Moreover, I knew that a single case has small standing in the annals of medical research, having little more than “anecdotal” or “testimonial” value. However, references to the illness surfaced from time to time in the general and medical press. People wrote to ask whether it was true that I “laughed” my way out of a crippling disease that doctors believed to be irreversible. In view of those questions, I thought it useful to provide a fuller account…

Check out Anatomy of an Illness, by Norman Cousins. Or read more on Norman Cousins at Wikipedia.

And regardless of whether you believe you can fully cure yourself of *a serious illness* by laughing, there is still the old wisdom: Laughter is the best medicine.

Photo by apdk, Creative Commons, via Flickr.

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