08.28.07
Got Ideas?
Share your captions for this picture from Happy Trails ranch near Kittanning, PA where my group and I sang for a guest performance.
08.22.07
The Power of Humor in Coping With Transitions
Humor, laughter, smiling—they’ve all been cited as helping improving our health and mental well-being. And, they can be equally useful and powerful when we’re going through transition situations like job changes, relationship changes, aging, etc.
Authors Nancy Schlossberg and Susan Porter Robinson, in their book, “Going to Plan B: How you can cope, regroup, and start your life on a new path,” talk of the transition situation of coping with non-events. They define non-events as those events in our life that we expected to happen but that didn’t. The promotion that never materialized. The kids who didn’t become what we expected. The children who weren’t born. The dreams that weren’t realized. Part of these authors’ coping strategy involves a process of dream-reshaping. In this four-part process, humor enters in at the second, “easing”, stage.
Humor can not only ease us into the next phase of the transition process, it can also wake us up. For example, some therapists have found that humorous metaphors can drive home a point more effectively. Schlossberg and Robinson acknowledge that metaphors can help us acknowledge the futility of our situation and seek other options for ourselves. Educator David Deshler suggests metaphor analysis as a vehicle for learning, reflection, and understanding the way we act upon our experience.
The book, “The Positive Power of Negative Thinking”, by Julie Norem, PhD., highlights a strategy that is useful for some people, that of imagining the worst-case scenario. From that imagining, we can devise coping strategies and form more effective plans. Humor can be part of that imagining; as we exaggerate beyond reality, we can not only make better plans, but we may even get to the point of laughter.
Schlossberg and Robinson suggest that coping implies a continuum of strategies, each one allowing us more room for hope. Humor can lead us toward hope by helping us to deflect our feelings of defeat. In addition, humor allows us to distance ourselves from the problem, enabling us to increase our self-confidence. As comedienne Ruth Sprague of 3comedians.com says, “Once our brain calms down and the dust settles, then we’ll be able to see: ‘Oh yes, that IS funny!’”
Until next time, “Get Your SHINE Together!”,
Trina
08.21.07
SHINE EZine Article Available Online!
Please check out my article on EZineArticles, address below.
http://EzineArticles.com/?id=685003
I welcome your feedback!
Thanks,
Trina
08.19.07
Even George Carlin Agrees With Me!
Whether you love him or hate him, comedian George Carlin offers us some of the most accurate critiques of political, social, and economic life in America. He interprets the world in his own way, and shows us how to make meaning of the oftentimes unexamined things we call ‘common sense’.
Here are some reflections on George Carlin’s 2004 interview with Tavis Smiley. In it, Carlin talks about the risk-taking, thinking processes, and the chain-reaction that is humor & comedy. His comments reflect the need for humanness in our communications—an idea that is the basis of my SHINE System of Communication.
Carlin says that the audience sees him as a person who isn’t a threat to them—he’s a vulnerable figure, but not vulnerable from a victim standpoint. Instead, people see in him a softer, human side—what I would refer to as being accessible. He explains, “There is a thing they see in me which isn’t threatening.” This likeability factor allows him to form the basis of a safe foundation, and from there, he can state his strong and sometimes unpopular viewpoints.
This tool is available to anyone; we can all create that safe environment through the use of humor. Carlin believes that if you establish the context for an audience, you can facilitate a human connection with them. And once they accept that context that you have established, they are on your side—they will listen to any kind of topic. “Anything can be made funny within the proper context. Once you have established that context, the audience feels safe to say, ‘Ok, he’s fine, I’m comfortable, where is he going to go with this [topic]? Oh, that’s interesting.’”
The surprise aspect of comedy contributes to this safe context, and makes the audience want to be on your side. He continues, “I like to look for a different way into things; I like to look for a side door. I like audiences to say, ‘I don’t know whether I agree with you, but I like how you got there.’”
Carlin also mentions that these comedic tools get sharper and better with use, “Just like you get better playing the violin; you’re gonna be better at 60 than you were at 20.” I took comfort in his quote, sure that I will be a wonderful violinist by age 60—especially because I wasn’t playing the violin at age 20! I’ll take any motivation I can get.
Until next time,
“Get Your SHINE Together!”
Trina
08.12.07
The Kill Point on SPIKE TV
P.S. The photo is from the cast party for “The Kill Point”, which airs on Sundays at 9 pm (EST) on SPIKE TV. It re-airs Wednesdays at 10 pm. I am the “Detective in the Green Skirt Suit”. In tonight’s episode I was “Loud Shoes”, walking out the restaurant door just after One-arm Leon puts a scrambler under the table, after he talked to Donnie Wahlberg.
P.P.S. I also found out during this experience that Donnie Wahlberg has a brother! And Donnie wasn’t the one in the Calvin Klein commercials…When I found out, I stormed off the set. Because it was the last day of filming….
Read more about the Kill Point at channelguidemag.wordpress.com/2007/06/12/the-kill-point-countdown-part-4/
What’s so Funny about Adult Education?!
Currently I am in the dissertation phase of my doctoral program in Adult Education/Workforce Education at Penn State University (which means I’m 6 credits away from being a Marxist.) Anyway, a funny thing happened on the way to academia: I realized that stand-up comedy exhibits many of the tenets of adult education.
For example, when we watch stand-up comedy, we’re prepared to have our views challenged and/or changed—it is a readiness to learn. And when our strongly defended views are questioned and ridiculed, we’re prodded toward critical reflection. As we witness the absurd joke, the exaggerated character, and the bizarre comment, we’re introduced to ways we can increase and express our own creativity. Through the experience, we learn how to look at the world differently.
Just as Paolo Friere challenged us to examine how our social contexts have shaped us, so too do comedians offer us this challenge. Comics make us ask ourselves, “Whose interests are we trying to protect by not making fun of certain people, situations, or policies?” The willingness to appreciate the humor in a situation–without immediately taking offense–reminds one of the maturity aspect depicted in Malcolm Knowles’ “andragogic model of teaching”.
Some more instances of the similarities between adult education and stand-up include the following: Pittsburgh comedian Chris Ciardi says, “We all grew up in two-story houses. One story was what really happened. The other story is what we tell the neighbors.†Is this a show of insensitivity to a traumatic childhood wound? Or—is it an example of being able to put your history into proper perspective, and to be able to laugh at your situation?
When Steven Wright ponders, “Why don’t you ever see commercials for string? ‘This string is so good—it’s almost ROPE.’?â€, is he merely spouting a mundane observation? Or, is he actively questioning the status quo—and maybe even using valuable critical thinking skills?
Take Henny Youngman’s classic, “Take my wife….PLEASE!â€: Is it a gender-based insult? Or, is it a challenge to our habitual way of using and responding to our native language?
Who do you think does a better job of highlighting the plight of the politically oppressed? Cervero & Wilson? Or perhaps Cheech & Chong?
Is Joan Rivers insecure as she pokes fun at herself? Or has she reached Maslov’s self-actualization stage, where her ego is no longer important?
If you’re convinced that listening to Mozart in the womb makes a smarter baby, you might want to try having Comedy Central playing in the background as you’re trying to write your dissertation, work on that important project at work, or brainstorm for ideas. After all, it couldn’t hurt….
Until next time,
“Get Your SHINE Together!”
Trina
