Benable — create shareable lists of things you recommend!
E.g., products you love, local businesses, travel recs - you can add anything to a Benable list!
Healing Laughter- Resources and Places to Start
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items Laughter is NOT the best medicine, because we have vaccines and antibiotics. And also wellbutrin. Maybe that's just me that's so excited about Wellbutrin. If you're just beginning your investigation into how laughter can be healing, check out some of...
Judy Carter is def the OG in terms of finding the funny in daily life and teaching an easy strategy for writing comedy about well, almost anything. This is the workbook version of her newest book (I think the actual book might be temporarily out of p...
The New Comedy Bible-the workbook
This is an older book (98) but it's also a classic on death, dying and humor. One of the biggest takeaways is the fact that there is a big difference between something that is serious and something that needs to be solemn. That's a great differentiat...
The Courage to Laugh: Humor, Hope, and Healing in the Face of Death and Dying a book
This podcast is from the amazing folks at the Association for Applied and Therapeutic Humor and every episode they interview folks doing important work in the field. Often quite entertaining and I always learn a lot. (please note this is NOT a blanke...
LaughBox --a podcast on healing through humor
My least favorite kind of article writing about women's comedy is “well it's true or brave or moving or sad but is it funny???" as if these are dissimilar characteristics instead of moving along very close parallel lines. Having said that, this is a ...
Tig Notaro: A Comedian Makes “Sick” Humor the Main Act
This made me laugh a lot, and it really delves into the nature of healing for the funny person. Did you know research says SEEING funny things is even better for you than being the person who makes these funny things? It's true.
I'm Just a Person a book by Tig Notaro
This isn't something I'd thought about a lot until I listened to this conversation between two therapists talking about use of humor in therapy and also, somewhat inexplicably but interestingly the purpose of humor in evolution. This isn't a very fla...
Talking Therapy Episode 35: Humor in Therapy
Some of the best Gen Z and Millineal stand up is about mental health. This is a great place to start the comedy and healing conversation.
Anxiety and Depression Humor | Netflix Is A Joke
I definitely didn't cry while watching these videos of people diagnosed with serious and persistent mental illness perform comedy. So much to explore here!
Videos of Stand Up For Mental Health Comics | Stand Up for Mental Health
This book is mostly memoir but I've included it here because I see the author (who is a deadblind person who graduated from Harvard Law school) so consistently using humor to break down ableism and help people deal with the awkwardness (her words) of different communication techniques and strategies she uses as a deafblind person. It's a relatively quick read; I've also included links here to some videos of Haben that illustrate her gentle (and sometimes, when needed, not so gentle...
Haben: The Deafblind Woman Who Conquered Harvard Law a book by Haben Girma
This is a great (and funny) example of Haben Girma using humor to disarm feedback she is giving about microaggressions (and let's be real, sometimes macro-aggressions) caused by ableism.
Disability Allyship: Milana Vayntrub & Haben Girma
This book is written for writers of a genres who are trying to add humor to different types of writing (screenplays essays, etc) but it's also a very practical guide to inserting humor into anything written at all. Which includes emails. And text mes...
What Are You Laughing At?: Writing Humor
Karyn Buxman is the OG expert on humor and healing. She calls herself a neurohumorist which might be a newly made up profession but is definitely something we need more of in the world. I've also include links to her speaking and other writing.
What's So Funny About... Nursing?: A Creative Approach to Celebrating Your Profession a book by Karyn Buxman
This is Karyn Buxman, OG nurse/humorist doing her thing! Lots to learn here!
Karyn Buxman | Using Strategic Humor for Influence | Keynote Speaker | SpeakInc
There are two books by this name, and one of them --by Dan O'Shannon who is a well known TV writer--is impossible to find in any library (sorry I've spent a lot of money on funny books about humor, I'm only checking them out from now lest my small ne...
What Are You Laughing At? (talk by Dan O'Shannon)
Looking for a super short explanation of why inside jokes (also known as a callback when done on the stage) work so well? Here ya go!
Dan Dennett: Cute, sexy, sweet, funny (but actually about something different)
The folks who wrote Humor Seriously (linked also in this list) just started a substack. And by “just” I mean three days before I posted this in November 2024. If you'd like to get a little Serious Humor in your mailbox every so often, sign up here. (...
Humor, Seriously | Substack (get some in yer inbox!)
I mean, they teach a class about humor at the Stanford business school for the love of mike, so they are obviously more business than healing focus, but this book is a now classic about using humor. Even if you're not trying to make other MBAs in a b...
Humor, Seriously: Why Humor Is a Secret Weapon in Business and Life (and How Anyone Can Harness It. Even You.) a book by Jennifer Aaker and Naomi Bagdonas