Laughter for lungs

From our new book--

Laughing can be a kind of nutrient in its own right.
Have a five-minute hearty laugh break, taking a longer class or internet session, choosing comedies, or whatever makes you laugh regularly can help you take adeep breath! It can be an important  and joyful addition to a healthy lifestyle that helps to prevent and treat lung disorders. You may not feel at all like laughing, but once you get started, even fake laughter can act very quickly
to help you feel better. (It’s hard to sustain fake laughing for very long before you are really chuckling and then guffawing at yourself.)


Laughing uses the same muscles as exercise; strengthens your core
and lower back muscles. Laughing can get you breathing more deeply,strengthening your respiratory muscles; helping prepare you for the breathing exercises program given in this book, and bring a quick form of stress management into your life.

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Laughter lowers your blood pressure; the blood pressure goes up
for about 30 seconds, then it becomes lower. Your respiratory and heart
rate also are elevated slightly for a short time, then reduced. Laughing
increases your protective hormones: serotonin, the hormone of tranquility;
 endorphins, our natural painkillers; and dopamine, associated with
a feeling of bliss. The immune system elements interleukin and NK cell
activity have been documented to increase. The hormones associated with
stress, adrenaline and cortisol, are lowered after a session of laughing.
The blood’s level of the amount of inflammation in your body, C-Reactive
Protein, is lowered.

Elevated blood sugar is decreased, and the carbon
dioxide levels in your lungs are diminished.
Your mood is marked enhanced; both anxiety and depression are
diminished. Even a fake smile was found to lower stress hormones. In
one study, even fake laughter, performed three times a day for five min
-utes, lowered cholesterol, blood pressure, and helped relieve anxiety and
depression. When you smile, the muscles in your face don’t have to work
as hard: it takes 18 muscles to smile and 37 to frown. If you laugh regularly,
your risk for heart attacks and irregular heartbeats (arrhythmias) is forty
per cent lower! Even anticipating a funny event lowers stress hormones for
three days ahead of time.

Try laughter yoga today!!