You know, the simple fact is the more fun and humor we have in our lives, the more we reduce the stress caused by the modern disease of seriousness. I think having fun and being playful is the natural human condition.

I’m inspired by an observation Anthropologist, Colin Turnball, in his book, “The Forest People”, “When Pygmies laugh it is hard not to be affected; they hold on to each other as if for support, slap their sides, snap their fingers and go through all manner of physical contortions. If something strikes them as particularly funny they will even roll on the ground…”

Of course you probably wouldn’t want to act like that, right?

Actually imagine falling down laughing like a Pygmie in your office or place of work right now. Simply doing this in your imagination, make you to have more access to the ‘fun-zones’ of your mind.

It’s part of what I like to call, “The Ridiculous Behavior Generator”. Because our minds go in directions, it is very useful to purposefully redirect our thought patterns. Sending our mind towards more fun and humor is an excellent choice because it enables us to have more flexibility of behavior and increased resourcefulness.

So go ahead and pick 3 situations now that you want to ‘funify.’ Starting with the one that will be the easiest to change, go through the “Ridiculous Behavior Generator” below:
1. Think of a situation where you want to have fun.
2. See yourself over there in the situation, like you are watching a movie.
3. See yourself having fun, joking with the other people.
4. Go back to the start of the movie and try out a different way of having more fun.
5. Again from the start, see yourself in the movie and do some behavior that you would never do in reality.
6. Break state. Think of the situation again and notice how you feel better about it and look forward to having even more fun in the situation in the future.

When you’ve practiced this technique a few times you will be able to do it faster, inject more
fun quickly and easily into situations before they’ve occurred. That’s good planning right?

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