laughter clubs

Limitless Loquacious Laughter – It’s Springtime and Hopefully All’s Well with you.

by
Laughter Clubs using Facebook Live

Hello Folks. I hope you are managing well and aware of the silver lining in the clouds. At the same time, I send my love and empathise with you for the difficult times and even losses you may have endured, especially of late. Many things can be a shock to our system, especially when we do not see them coming. My recommendation is to feel as you feel and do not supress feelings or let any should or ought govern you. This I share from personal experience and a recent event, finding that grief can be felt as a physical pain in the body. All we can do is our best and work through it to the best of our ability and maintain hope, releasing self-judgment and continue, richer for our experiences, no matter what they may be.

On to the good news, sharing how the Ferntree Gully Laughter Club is thriving with people who have managed to master using Zoom. The restrictions and lockdown have opened new vistas, as people who know about the value of laughter yoga around the world join us for a session. Despite the Zoom time lag, it is a blessing to continue to come together in a positive minded group and the bonus of being able to connect in real time.

Where do you get your laughter from? Or perhaps you became serious over the years without realising it? Other than laughing in a facilitated laughter session, people generally find it easiest to laugh when choosing to watch online a funny video, comedy show or movie.  My Lynette Mitchell YouTube Channel has laughter club videos, as does laughter leaders. Here is the link to it, click here.

Are you aware of your laughter quotient? I am writing to jog your awareness, if you need it to be jogged, that is, and if you aren’t satisfied with it, maybe feeling the pressures a bit, you can fix it. There are families who habitually laugh and crack jokes and there are families who are less flamboyant, serious and everything in between. We tend to take on habits from our families.

After John became involved in the laughter club, our days became filled with light heartedness. Our living together contains simple childlike humour, which is a playful way to live together. I directly attribute this to our joint involvement leading laughter clubs. It is a choice too, for us and you as well. We are of more advanced ages and at times may physically not feel up to it, but once we get going and do the session, we feel uplifted, recharged, and invigorated. It was not always that way and if you resonate with this, feeling you would like to laugh more, you can! It may be as simple as a decision to change your habits which includes some daily or at least, regular laughter.

At the risk of being repetitive, here is a frequent message, that laughter is particularly good for you on many levels. It holds many physical benefits, it is good for tuning up your emotional body, while your mental body becomes acuter. Relationships are enhanced and you will feel more connected within to your spirit and the spirit of all that is, whatever you may call that. It helps to open you up to life, new opportunities, greater creativity, and inspiration. There is always a silver lining in the cloud and though things have been tough this year, there has been a chance to re-evaluate our thinking and to grow in unforeseen ways. Let us not lose what we may have benefited from being forced to slow down, take stock, spend time with family and cease the outer distractions and busyness that like for most of us becomes.

Take heart and come, join us in laughter, please do, and feel free to contact me for a chat and suggestions how to add laughter to your life. You will be glad that you did add more laughter to your present situation. I am here, available. Phone 0425 799 258 or email me.

I feel it is so important to love our body, which works harder when we do not value and nurture it. When we take care of our body with regular exercise, a good diet, which includes a good diet for the physical body, also our mind and spirit, we can thrive and grow, as we are akin to nature. I love Desiderata, especially the passage, “You are a child of the Universe, no less than the trees and the stars”.

If you have read my blog to here, thanks and full credit to you! Until next time, laughter and love wishes to you and yours. Do contact me to find out more about or join the free Zoom sessions. That is the Community Laughter Club and the Self Mastery class.

I look forward to hearing from some people and hope you are doing as well as possible, despite all the COVID-19 restrictions, which have been dragging on and now, some signs of relief are finally in sight. If you would like to receive my email newsletter, you can either sign up on my web page or request me to do it for you. Cheerio for now and remember to never, ever give up!

Lots of Love and Laughter, Lynette Mitchell.

Laughter Clubs Continue with New Vim and Vigour During COVID-19.

by
Laughter Clubs using Facebook Live

You will all agree that our lives have been radically rearranged since the advent of fears and restrictions due to COVID-19.  The virus brought with it many ongoing challenges, heartbreak, both personal and professional. We have been stretched beyond our limits, making it harder for many to stay positive physically, emotionally and mentally.

Simultaneously, many individuals, businesses and organisations are thriving as they can rise to the challenge, reinventing themselves. People often share having a deeper appreciation of things that were taken for granted. There has been a bonding of relationships and ties, people finding new ways to reach out, stay connected and value each other more. The garden industry is thriving, as the public have the time and inclination to be outside, tidying, pruning, replanting, growing vegetables and feeling a stronger connection with nature. Many express gratitude for the shutdown, staying at home has provided time for things that were left until they ‘got around to it’. Despite the difficulties there are blessings when we re-jig the way we have lived our lives, and we take stock of our life’s journey.

This has been the case with Laughter Clubs and those providing Laughter Yoga sessions professionally, new methods to do so. We have gone online using Facebook Live and Zoom meetings so that we can laugh together. They provided us with ways to continue, rather than go into hibernation. Now we embrace people who join us from all around the world, as we also join with laughter clubs in other countries. The laughter community is growing, resilient, connected and letting go of the stress that is so prevalent due to the virus.

We open our hearts in joy as we laugh, as laughter truly is the best medicine. This we choose to do as an aerobic activity, because the body does not know the difference with real and pretend laughter. Laughter releases endorphins, the feel-good hormones oxytocin and serotonin into the blood stream. It also strengthens the immune system, supports the heart and has many other health benefits which help sustain us to be in optimum health, as far as is possible.

I now share some personal feelings about the virus, that it is nature at work rebalancing the earth, which has been way out of balance in many, many ways. Are we doing our best to see the bigger picture and remain positive about future directions? It reminds me of something which if we could emulate, may benefit our lives in the long term.

I read about how a minority of ex-prisoners of war (POW’s) were able to survive the experience and maintain a state of emotional stability, love and internal peace. On the other hand, many returning POW’s were permanently scarred, psychologically or physically.

However, in this minority of people, who one could imagine, had their own strong support belief system in place, these people came back with more ability to embrace life once more. The horrendous ordeal had not broken their spirits, they had never given up hope, returning from the war to go on and become successful in their work and family lives. It is possible that their experiences added a quality of richness as to how they perceived the world, their life, their wartime struggles and their outlook overall.

Might I suggest that we are all in this time together and each day make it a priority to maintain positivity above all else? Especially too because when we live in fear, our immune system is compromised. Laughter as I have often shared, strengthens the immune system, even fake laughter! Let’s go, have a laugh, a giggle now, to yourself or out loud with others. Thank you.

We would love you to join with us in this laughter journey in a virtual way. At this stage we plan to stay online after the restrictions ease and when permitted, we will meet outside in the park again, although less often. We envisage this as being monthly and we plan to continue being online. This will give you the ability to stay at home and experience laughter clubs, as if you were in person. It does work and you will enjoy the laughter sessions, as we do by running them.

Until next time, laughter blessings. Do contact me with any questions you may have about the Zoom invitation or how to connect with our Facebook Live Saturday sessions.

See you soon?

Love and Laughter, Lynette and John. Virtual hugs.

Grounding Courage, Trust and Laughter

by

Is Your Life Difficult or Easy?

Are you Happy having an easy time in your life? I was speaking with a lady on the train who was down from Darwin for a few days. Heather has two male children, one with ADHD and the other with Asperger’s. My immediate reaction was to feel she had a difficult life. She responded that her life was no more difficult than anyone else’s. immediately I felt that she was very courageous. I concurred when she said she believed we are given only that which we are able to cope with and learn from. This is my firm belief, we will be handed challenges, call it what you will, in order to evolve, expand and grow as human beings into becoming more spirit-based, whilst in a human body.

Laughter is important and the little dog Trixie is our mascot, trotting around us as we do our laughter exercises.
Laughter is important and the little dog Trixie is our mascot, trotting around us as we do our laughter exercises.

I have chosen to bring up the subject of Courage as being a very important quality to hold and express yourself through. Do you see yourself as being courageous? People generally live life unconsciously, being led and drawn throughout their lives. Granted there are decisions, activities and goals that we busy ourselves in. We can either express from a selfish centre, where it is all about me, which is prevalent when we are young. The whole world revolves around us and our desires. As time passes, this alters and many of us ponder, feeling to give back and share from our life’s experience and gained wisdom. Life expresses more about how may I serve? This revised attitude may also be unconscious, rather that we have a growing feeling of liking to help or be useful in some ways.

Life Throws us Challenges

Courage comes in when challenges present themselves to us and we can take the stance to be strong, to not give in, to never give up, to keep going on, no matter what. We can feel utterly and completely lost, or perhaps see the end in mind, whether we feel we have it all worked out, in line with our purpose and plan or otherwise.

It takes guts to turn up no matter what. Nothing stopping us, becoming unstoppable. There is a fine balance with not burning ourselves out either, as we must give from an overflowing abundance of energy or else our own health may be depleted. We can feel resentful also if we are coming from the ‘wrong’ motives.

Wrong is in inverted commas, because in theory there is no right or wrong. We have choices and consequences. Our motive may be to fulfil a need we carry due to low self-esteem and is not as clear or pure as when it is from a genuine desire to be embracing life in a way that we feel we are giving back to life.

Taken in context, therefore, we have the opportunity to call on Courage in our lives when we feel the need. Courage is an interesting word, or quality. Many of us have it in some things that we have to do and not others. We may work well, be smart, on the ball and feel strong, together and yet on a personal level, we can shrink.

It is all okay, either way. Just get real with yourself and know when you need to call for outside support to get you going, through to the other side.

Call on Courage to see you through, offer support and you may in addition call on Trust, as together with Courage, they go hand in hand. If we don’t feel Trust, it will be harder to accept Courage when we ask for it.

Laughter Yoga Strengthens our Capacity for Courage

This is where using Laughter Yoga can come in, to support us in our lack of commitment and when our fears hold us back. Do we want to be chicken or have the Courage of a Tiger. Or would you pick another cat? Maybe a mouse, who in one story stands up to an elephant.

I sincerely say that the longer I run laughter clubs, the more certain I am that to include (not to say it is all that you need) laughter in your life, you will be changed in ways that will please you! That is for the best, we do not want to be settled, we like to feel safe and secure, but what growth is in that? Nil.

John, my husband who joins me frequently speaks of how laughter has been instrumental in getting him out of comfort zone. John recently shared that he will speak with anybody, new people who he would not have otherwise approached before him joining the laughter club.  He feels it may be more difficult too for the men out there.

A regular male attendee who has been coming for several years astounded us when he said that he was very shy and had to make himself come back again. That is not always the case, as many people come to laughter club once and feel it is not for them. I feel they may not attend long enough to find out if that is so. Quite a few share they felt uncomfortable and returned regardless. The longer you come, the better you will feel. Even though it gets you out of your comfort zone, you will once again experience child-like playful fun, but this time as an adult with other adults. It does become natural and spontaneous once more, with the practice of regular attendance at a laughter club.

Laughter helps you get over yourself, your appearance, lack of confidence and resistance to being outside in a social group. Many of us withdraw or, through no fault of our own, are quite isolated, especially as we age.

We improve being inhibited when we connect with adult members in the laughter club. Part of what we do is embrace child-like playful fun with each other. Such as you may recall as you would have as a child, playing outside with the neighbourhood kids on a hot summer night, or however you remember those precious childhood memories.

What we do at Laughter Club.

We do laughter yoga exercises, deep breathing, singing using ho ho or something similar instead of words, dancing around and in general behave as if we are doing improvisation theatre.

It is never too late to start something new like attending one of our laughter clubs, or that thing that you have held off doing. What is on your bucket list? Does it require Courage and Trust to do it or is it related to time or money?

Develop new Brain Pathways

Neuroplasticity is about the science of neurons, the brain to develop new cells and pathways. Brain Gym is becoming widely practiced and educates people to expand themselves with exercises. People can further develop their brains and have greater cognitive behaviour with various activities. The top activity for Neuroplasticity is laughter, next singing and dancing. We do all of these when we meet at community laughter clubs.

My involvement with laughter has certainly done that, released me from my comfort zone, expanded my horizons, opened up new pathways, not only in my brain but in many other areas of my life.

No doubt we could be led to be involved in many activities that would help us to achieve a feeling of expansion in our lives. That is if we allow ourselves to be inspired by a greater part of us which is beyond physical limitations, we will find our way.

Finishing Off

My wish for you is to dig deep, make an effort if you aren’t already, to discover new things to do in your life. We want to have a greater expression of ourselves on all levels, well many of us are into growing and if what I share does not resonate with you, that is fine as life happens and evolution can take as long as it takes.

We may feel out of our depth, like being pulled along and without being in control, rather than our life being of our choosing and being able to follow our passion.

If you have lost yours, direction and passion, then please, please come to one of the local laughter clubs, or another one if you live elsewhere. It may be just what the doctor ordered!

Laughing together with supportive, like-minded people is extraordinary. We come together sometimes quietly, throw ourselves into the session and leave feeling magnificent. We feel uplifted, energised, appreciative and with the intention of bringing more laughter into our lives, in whatever way is possible.

Cheerio for now. Lynette.

Disclaimer: Information shared is intended to support you and is from my personal understanding, experience and is generalised. I am not responsible for how you take it on board.

Ferntree Gully Laughter Club Celebrates
Lynette was walking towards the camera for this weird shot.

Could Laughter Yoga be Part of Your Self Support in 2019?

by

Hello and how have you been since the start of the year? Are you embarking on new things? Will you be joining us at either the Knoxfield or Ferntree Gully Laughter Clubs? They are on at 10.30am on Saturdays and Sundays. Links to information on the website pages are: Knoxfield – Ferntree Gully.

Are you okay? If you have been meaning to join one of our two local laughter clubs, either Ferntree Gully or Knoxfield, I encourage you to be like the Nike motto. ‘JUST DO IT!’. Furthermore, it’s FREE. The company is GREAT. And you will be welcomed into the laughter ‘family’.

New Year’s Resolutions.

Are they chosen in a spontaneous moment, or, in part influenced by others as something you ‘should’ do. Most of us have been conditioned that we ‘should’ make New Year’s Resolutions. This implies that we are not okay, inadequate and need to pick up our game. Depending on our underlying motive, they could alternatively be used for positive growth.

We often experience guilt when we don’t succeed and there is a natural tendency for humans to be resistant to change. We like to know what is going to happen and feel insecure not knowing for certain how our future will play out.

Resolutions can be good at any time and especially if our motive is coming from love and congruent with our goals.

There are plenty of opportunities for self-improvement and besides using laughter to support us, we may have been considering slowing down our activities agenda by adding some quiet time. Or not, it may be something completely the opposite! Have you been meaning to learn or get better at the art of meditation? There is so much that we are able to try out and see if it works for us, to give pleasure or lower the everyday stress. I am now booking students for a Monday evening personal growth class, which may be a lightbulb moment on reading this piece of information?

Self-Acceptance and a Nightly review

This feels like a regular topic related to self-esteem and sharing about the nightly review process. If you do wish to work on bringing more love and self-acceptance to your day, it is worth creating this good habit. At the end of each day I ask myself “Did I bring more love to what I was involved in today? Was I kinder and more self-accepting, both to myself and others? Was I without criticism and judgment?”.

You must work on YOU first, because if you are not okay with yourself, you will be unable to help, support and share the love with others you encounter.

Back to basics, remember that when we laugh wholeheartedly and allow ourselves to be doing child-like playful activities, it is one of the very, very best things we can do for our physical, emotional, mental and spiritual health. The laughter clubs run in all weather, hail, rain or shine. Sometimes we may even begin feeling a tad flat and this quickly changes. We start laughing and deep breathing, making us feel invigorated, uplifted and happy. This method of joining together brings belonging, comradeship, and a new way of living one’s life. We take the spirit of laughter with us. Do come and give it a go. It truly is transformative and life changing.

This photo was taken during a session at the Federation Square Laughter Club. I recently returned to being a Committee member of Laughter Clubs Victoria Inc. (LCVI) that puts these laughter sessions on. They are on the 1st and 3rd Sunday at 11am and are free. Read more here.

May 2019 be beneficially memorable for you. Keep on keeping on! And remember, to never, ever, ever give up!!!

Cheerio for now. Lynette.

Disclaimer: Information shared is intended to support you and is from my personal understanding, experience and is generalised. I am not responsible for how you take it on board.

The History of Laughter Yoga and How I Became Involved

by

Hello there,

Recently I received an enquiry to facilitate a Laughter Yoga session from a primary school teacher of grades 5-6. She went on to ask me to share a few words about how I both became involved in Laughter Yoga and the history of the laughter club movement. It seemed like a good idea to expand a little in a blog post and hopefully this is of interest to you.

The year was 1995 when it all began, the origin of the Laughter Yoga Community Clubs, who practice ‘laughing for no reason’ all around the world. Indian Physician, Dr Madan Kataria was impressed by Norman Cousins’ book Anatomy of an Illness and the research work by Dr Lee Berk on the benefits of laughter to one’s health and wellbeing. Madan decided to field-test the impact of laughter upon himself and others, gathering with four friends in a Mumbai public park.

This happy little group had many bystanders, who quickly joined in and numbered over 50 after a couple of weeks. BUT, around that time it was discovered that either the jokes and humour ran out or became offensive. Dr Kataria went home to ponder if there could be a resolution. Otherwise he felt that trying to laugh together on a regular basis would simply not work long term.

Upon reviewing the research, there was a light-bulb moment! It was around the fact that the body cannot differentiate between pretend and genuine laughter, because both produce the same happy chemistry. Participants were amazed, the make-believe laughter quickly turned into real laughter that was contagious. Realising there were other ways to experience laughter than through humour, the group switched to role-play and other techniques to stimulate the importance of child-like playfulness.

That was 23 years ago, the first laughter club was born and as the saying goes, the rest is history. There are currently thousands of laughter clubs in over 100 countries around the world.

For myself 13 years ago in 2005, I saw people laughing loudly together on TV as a social activity and then heard that ‘the laughter guru’ was coming to Melbourne to present a Laughter Yoga workshop. I went along, met with Dr Kataria and was so impressed by how fantastic I felt, I straight away committed to doing the laughter club training and immediately thereafter started a laughter club.

My personal reasons were that as a young girl, adults seemed serious, stressed, upset and fearful, as if they had lost hope and life was a burden. From that awareness, I unconsciously chose to be young at heart and not let life beat me down. I kept it up as good as I could, to not get stressed out over work and adult issues. Sometimes people said I was like Peter Pan who was youthful, happy and an inspired person, living with faith and hope for the future, enjoying each day, one day at a time. Mind you, now I understand there is more to it than the simplified version of my earlier life, which was quite ungrounded. That was in part replaced as I learnt to stop judging unpleasant feelings and be authentic. Feelings are to be celebrated and not supressed, which is vastly different from the earlier me. Nevertheless, that is the story in a nutshell, as to why I was drawn to Laughter Yoga.

Cheerio for now, Lots of love and laughter, Lynette Mitchell xo

Disclaimer: Information shared here is intended to be supportive and from my personal understanding and experience. Advice given is general and as I am not a medical doctor, take no responsibility for how it is received

Stress, Suggestions and Using Laughter Yoga

by

What does the word stress bring up for you? Very likely it will be negative because the media influences us that stress is ‘bad’ and we are directed to find relief from it with buying, eating, drinking, holidaying etc. Many people are so accustomed to living in a stressful manner and may not realise that there are ways to combat it. It can be that when we our time is restricted, it is beneficial to feel under pressure and we can achieve that without sending our bodies into a stressed mode. In fact it can be uplifting and energising, rather like self-testing or facing a challenge. Laughter and other things like mindfulness and meditation can help a lot, here’s my take on incorporating Laughter Yoga into your daily routine – Read More

John Mitchell & Vicki at Ferntree Gully Laughter Club
I have this much limitation laugh (which is very little) and this much potential (which is huge), at Ferntree Gully Laughter Club.

John Mitchell and Vicki sharing a favorite laugh, a tiny space between thumb
and finger indicating that little limitation
and next the arms go wide showing how much potential.

Feel the Community Spirit in Melbourne!

by

AUSTRALIA DAY MARCH 2013

Community spirit injection. Well, our dozen or so band of laughers joined in the March again and it was a beautiful day for it, neither hot nor cold, which meant that we could completely focus on walking and ho, ho-ing all the way to the Domain Gardens, where there were heaps of activities.

I feel the more that we nurture ourselves with the spirit of community and coming together in love, enjoying fun activities, the greater our roots are grounded into the earth.

Hats off to the laughter club members who marched and I feel that I can speak for all of us, it was a completely and utterly uplifting experience. The public of Melbourne were several deep lining the route and some of us high-fived them. Bronwyn counted and got up to 125, what an extraordinary number indeed.

After a little while I got right into the spirit of it and it was doubly joyful to do that. I put my hand or both hands up to give people a ‘high five’ and with that found our eyes connecting and could feel our hearts joining together. People’s faces lit up with that extra close interaction, instead of watching us walk and make noises as we passed.

I am very grateful for the opportunity to be on the inside out looking at so many people and feeling that I made a difference, together with my buddies, demonstrating laughter and light heartedness, bringing it to the awareness of the public that we happily exist in their home town.

The Australia Day People’s March was reported to have over 2000 representatives from community groups including multicultural, sporting and special interest clubs and 4000 public lining the streets watching the March. That is huge, is it not? I feel that there is so much fear and negativity in the world and on this day people take the opportunity to connect in body mind and spirit.

Mahes Karuppiah led the laughter session in the afternoon, here are some pictures that my husband John, my greatest supporter took of us laughing together. I noticed that the crowd of onlookers was far greater than others years and that they joined in with the laughter and breathing exercises without restraint. It was a fantastic session and one can only hope that the positive experience will indeed help to spread the laughter word around the halls of Melbourne and wider.

I would also like to acknowledge the consistent and long time service given by Phillipa Challis, the Founder of Laughter Clubs Victoria Inc. Each Australia Day, Phillipa arrives early at the Domain Gardens, bringing banners and information and staying all day manning the marquis in order to talk with the hoards of people wanting to find out about laughter clubs in Victoria. Thank you Pip.

For those locals who feel that they may be keen to come in next year or any other year after that, let me tell you that there are many and varied activities around the gardens after the March. Especially for young children, there was a marquis of people called ‘Outrageous Workshops’, where the littlies were busy sticking things onto CDs to thread and hang around the necks or to decorate a shade visor for their head.

There were hundreds of old and collectable cars and my husband even made a newspaper pot and potted an Australian native seedling. Wait there’s more, a sheep dog herding sheep, little ponies to pat, ducks, goats and sheep to hand feed.

I loved seeing the Roulettes fly over in formation again at 2pm. There were six of these special planes and OMG they looked as if they came so close that it took my breath away.

James Morrison was playing his trumpet, opera singers were singing, the Ukulele club were Ukuleleying. All in all it was a fabulous, community spirited and fun filled day.

We wearily walked to the railway station and took a train home, being really glad for making the effort to go and do it and I will be back next year, rain, hail or shine.

Come and join me! Please!

Love and Laughter Blessings once again.

xxxx oooo

Belonging, Community Spirit & Australia Day in Melbourne 2012

by

Laughter yoga blog

Australia Day – Woo Woo – Thursday 26th January

Who lives near Melbourne or in Victoria? Then you will know about heaps of activities that go on in and around the city on Australia Day.

Please spread the word, I felt to share this on my blog because some readers may live overseas, yet have friends in Melbourne. In which case, the more the merrier to join us at 10am near the corner on Bourke and Swanston Streets.

We are group number 58 and you won’t be able to miss our purple and yellow Laughter Clubs Vic t shirts. If you have one please wear it and if not we may have one you can borrow. The march starts with the raising of the flag at 10.30am and lasts about 30 minutes but we need to be there for marshalling at 10am. After the march we will be meeting for community laughter sessions in the park at the Melbourne People’s Day Festival.

After the March at 2.10 pm Laughter Clubs Victoria Inc will be leading a laughter session and there is more information on the Australia Day 2012 page at Laughter Clubs Victoria’s website. It is on the grassed area and note, not on the main stage.

If you would like more information about what’s on in Melbourne. Then Google What’s On In Melbourne! I just did and saw that The Roulettes will be flying overhead at 2pm. The Roulettes are from the Royal Australian Air Force and they will be putting on quite a display. And there are fireworks at night, at midday at The Shrine, an Australia Day 21 Gun Salute, movie marathon at ACMA showing our nation’s rich heritag, Government House is open, even a 5km swim at Middle Brighton Pier, plus you could start the day with breakfast. Everything is covered on this very special day, between breakfast, lunch and right up to the fireworks.

It is wonderful to be part of a nation and community. I recall when I went to see my beautiful daughter Georgina in Vancouver a few years back, we were driving through the mountains to Calgary and happened on a small community which was having its celebrations. There was a march and one person jumped out at me, he was posing for my photo and was a really small, finely built elderly gentleman who loved to dress up as a clown and share fun, love and laughter with his small community.

Isn’t that what life is about? We all make so many contributions, albeit unconsciously to come together and share ourselves with others, sharing the joys, the sorrows, the ups and the downs. Where would we be without family and friends and I believe that all of us, or truthfully, the majority at least, have that sense of belonging.

That belonging can be to ourselves, to immediate family, larger family group, our work and it extends out and out until in reality, we are all connected upon earth. I love that there is so much awareness happening these days with the animal kingdom, the environment and with many overlapping areas, people are growing and evolving, becoming interested and desiring to make a difference as they can.

Regardless of feeling of hopelessness and what is the point of it all that is shoved down our throats and programmed through the predominantly negative media, there is hope, there is a purpose to it all and it starts with one thought, word and deed. It is never too late to start a new beginning. Each day is a new day and with it comes a new start. What was that saying about changing the things that you can and accepting what you cannot. We can change our attitude and how we react to things. We can make a difference in our lives and help uplift the planet, holding in our mind’s eye the ideal, rather than heaping more judgment on what we see and hear. To hold in our heart the ideal of what can be and say ‘Mother Father God, they will not my will be done’  helps us to work with the universe into programming love not fear.

I did not know this was going to happen, felt to write about Australia Day and obviously it touched something in me wanting to be expressed. It is wonderful to be part of something, Laughter Yoga, that sense of believing in a movement that is positive. cherished and world wide. As I said, it is great to belong on many levels and with all that develops a deeper purpose which can help to fill the void and connect us with our heart and soul.

Thanks for listening. Love and Laughter Blessings to You and Yours. xxx