Humor

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Humor is the intellectual ability to notice their comic side in phenomena. A sense of humor is associated with the subject’s ability to detect contradictions in the world around him.

Humor is a benevolent, good-natured, peace-loving fun and a positive attitude towards life. In humor, the situation (and the participants) are shown from an unexpected, funny side. Usually in humor everything big decreases — both the status of big people, and the volume and magnitude of the troubles that have occurred, and everything small increases …

Humor allows you to calmly relate to human characteristics, helps to survive fear and grief. Humor can help you take the world a little less seriously, which is necessary in many personal and business situations.

Humor is always appropriate, except in situations of normative sadness, when no one should feel good and no one should be happy. Healthy humor means laughing with each other, not at each other.

Types of humor

• Humor on the situation: the situation is funny.
• Humor on myself: I’m funny. Welcomed by all. The only danger is that sometime on this you can lose a little in status.
• Humor is on us: we are funny. Usually good, but this humor is misunderstood by some higher-ups.
• Humor on a partner: you are funny. Such humor is dangerous and is usually a strong conflict generator.
• Black humor.

The virtues of humor

• Relieves stress, helps to survive stressful moments of life.
• Promotes better interpersonal communication, develops cohesion and an atmosphere of trust.
• Helps to overcome conflicts, and in some situations prevents their occurrence.
• It enhances the feeling of “we are a team”, increases motivation, and contributes to more productive work in a team.
• Promotes readiness for change and innovation.
• Forms loyalty towards the organization.

The power of humor

The actor and director Mikhail Chekhov wrote the following lines in his book The Way of the Actor:

“Humor gives the knowledge needed for art and brings ease to creative work. Humor, directed at oneself, saves a person from too much narcissism and ambition. He teaches us to value things in and outside ourselves according to their true worth, and not depending on the personal inclinations, likes and dislikes of a person. The power of humor also lies in the fact that it raises a person above what makes him laugh … It is wonderful that people who know how to laugh immediately recognize each other, understand each other perfectly and often become friends.

An actor (and an artist in general) who can only look seriously at life and at himself, can hardly be a good or, at least, an interesting artist … »