Immediately after the Laughter Yoga Conference we (Rocky and I) gave a workshop to about 20 people. Keep in mind that this was after from three to eight days (depending on how much training people had signed up for) of laughing and learning about laughing and learning how to help other people laugh. The workshop was called “Games that Make People Laugh: A Workshop in Playfulness as a Life Skill,” but it turned out more to be a lot of pointless games and a lot more laughing. We didn’t really get to the “life skill” part because frankly we were having too much fun.
As usual, I learned a lot. One of the biggest came as a result of an attempt to design a game specifically for Laughter Yoga. I suggested that people meet in small groups, take any of the games we played, and adapt it to involve a more ha-ha-ho-ho-type laughter exercise approach. We very quickly discovered that the games were too much fun as they were, and that any attempt to force more laughter into them was just plan lily-gilding.
Dr. Kataria, the founder of Laughter Yoga, explains it this way:
I…tell people that there is a difference between having fun and being funny. Being funny is when someone clowns around like a stand-up comic or performer. They are trying to be funny and make people laugh. But when people meet together in a group as friends, people also laugh not necessarily because they are acting funny, but because they are having fun. So when you become playful, laughter become your nature, you don’t have to focus on laughter.
Pointless Games are what happens as a result of Laughter Yoga, when people stop exercising, and start having fun and being playful.