It’s transformative and life-changing, it’s healing and nurturing: it’s the Gift of Laughter.
Author, playwright, and screenwriter R. Eric Thomas joins Refractive’s Johnny Guidry in an episode celebrating the gift of laughter. From laughing through the pain of societal changes to surfing the wave of group laughter at the movies, Johnny and Eric dig into this magical gift that raises our energy to the next level and nudges us to be our highest selves.
You can find Eric’s HILARIOUS writings at the following links. His website is rericthomas.com, and find him on Twitter and Instagram at @OurEric
His books are: HERE FOR IT and RECLAIMING HER TIME
His Newsletter: Sign up here, weekly humor essays and recaps
Plays: New Play Exchange Profile
For more information on Refractive, visit www.RefractiveCoaching.com or www.RefractivePodcast.com. You can find the Refractive YouTube channel by clicking here.
For a similarly themed episode try Unlocking Joy with Jamir Smith.
Episode transcript follows (performed by automatic software); please excuse any inaccuracies.
Speaker 0 00:00:01 Ever since you can remember, you felt something in your chest telling you to move, to love, to speak, to try day after day. You pretend you don’t hear calling. Maybe you dismiss it as silliness or worse that it’s there ready for you, and it will wait for you. And as long as you, my name is Johnny G and I invite you to join me on a journey of awakening. As we dare to embrace our light. This is refractive.
Speaker 1 00:00:47 Hello everyone. And welcome to refractive. I’m Johnny G. Today. I am delighted to introduce you to our Eric Thomas. He is a national best-selling author. He’s a playwright, a screenwriter, and way back in another life, 12 years ago, he and I used to run in the same circles. So it’s wonderful to connect with him here for the podcast, his debut memoir here for it, or how to save your soul in America was a huge hit Lin. Manuel Miranda called it a pop culture, obsessed David Sedaris level laugh out loud, funny book, and it was published in 2020. It was featured on today as an August read with Jenna club pic. And it was also selected by NPR and its list of best books of 2020 for four years. He wrote Eric reads the news, which is a daily humor column, covering pop culture and politics on l.com. And it’s through that, that he’d gone, heard millions of followers. He’s currently writing on the Peabody award-winning series, Dickinson on Apple TV plus, and also better things on FX. I’m excited for you to get to know him as well. And, uh, we’re going to talk today about the power of laughter and humor and what an essential part of human experience laughter and humor is. So I really hope this episode resonates with you. I’m looking forward to it and let’s go, Eric, how are you?
Speaker 2 00:02:19 Oh, I’m so good. I’m so glad to be here with you, Johnny.
Speaker 1 00:02:22 I am delighted. I can’t believe it’s been 12 years since I’ve seen you in person.
Speaker 2 00:02:27 Well, this is the thing about social media. It feels like you’re, we’re hanging out in each other’s lives every day, even though we don’t talk. So this is great.
Speaker 1 00:02:34 Yeah. So thank you so much for being here. And, uh, this topic was something that just felt so natural for our conversation because of your journey. When I discovered that you had written this book here for it and that it was being so widely read. And so well-received, um, I do audio books. That’s kind of how I absorb most of my books nowadays. And so I use one of those audible credits. Now it was like download. And when I am, I was driving on a road trip while I was listening to your book and just guffawing. And so as you and I talked about doing a podcast episode together, I was like, it’s gotta be around laughter in humor because Eric is someone who is harnessed the power of laughter to really, um, shape the path that he’s on. And part of the service that you give to the world is helping them find their own laughter. So, um, this really feels like a natural topic for us.
Speaker 2 00:03:40 Okay. I mean, I’m excited. I love talking about laughter it’s, you know, there’s the adage. There’s nothing less funny than talking about. What’s funny, but I think, I think there are lessons in harnessing humor for all of us. I think it’s really essential to sort of being alive and tapping into the joy of being alive.
Speaker 1 00:03:59 Yeah. And so you mentioned during our kind of initial planning that, um, you found that laughter has a strong healing property and I’d love to hear your thoughts on that.
Speaker 2 00:04:11 Yeah. I, you know, I am putting together a minimum of more, you know, you go through everything that’s happened in your life. And then of course like the structure of story is usually there was conflict. I got, there was an obstruction in my path. I wanted something, I didn’t get it. I didn’t, I or I tried to get it. And then eventually you get it or you don’t get it, it’s a comedy or a tragedy, you know, reform will sense. And one of the challenges that I set for myself was I want to tell the stories of places in my life where, um, things were hard, but I want to find the funny in it. I want to figure out what the locus of the humor is. Um, there’s another adage, you know, uh, comedy equals tragedy plus time, which I think it’s true, you know, not everything becomes funny eventually, but everything becomes takes on a new context.
Speaker 2 00:05:02 And I think humor and laughter really give us a new sense of context about our surroundings and about our world. And it also helps us to identify well who the butt of the joke is or what the butt of the joke is. And there’s some really times where we feel that, uh, we are the butt of the joke. Um, whether it’s like the joke is a joke, uh, put on by society or whether it’s a joke that’s put on, you know, by, uh, an individual in our lives. And just reframing that and saying, I am able to laugh along with myself and laugh at the path that I’ve been on. It really helps to change the perspective, I think on everything that I’ve experienced. And I continue to think through, think of that, that, you know, even as I go through hard times in the present, I, I say to myself, eventually I’m going to write another book about this. And hopefully that book will be funny. We’ll see, you know, cut to 10 years from now. It’s like he never wrote another funny book again, but
Speaker 1 00:06:01 Yeah, you know, um, you F I guess caught the eye, um, of the world with Eric reads the news. And so just the point that you’re making right now, it’s about finding funny in just the ridiculous mundane things that we have to deal with every day. And I wonder if looking at news stories and trying to find the humor in it had an impact on your growth and how you serve the world.
Speaker 2 00:06:32 I think so, you know, there it is so easy for the news to feel overwhelming and, um, to really give into this desire to say like, you know what, I’m, I’m out on this new cycle, I’m out on the present. I, if something happens, somebody will let me know. And my job required that I look into the, the flame that is the news. Um, and you start to see the performative nature of so much of what is going on. Um, and so looking at politics as performance, um, and as narrative I think is really, really helpful, um, going through the pandemic and being stuck in the house or figuring out what is, what is funny about this situation that we’re in. And, you know, also saying, you know, well, sometimes this, this situation isn’t funny, but there are little nuggets in it that I can find, um, that are funny.
Speaker 2 00:07:28 Um, just really it’s for me, it really is a mindfulness exercise. It really is sort of saying I’m going to, uh, acknowledge everything that is happening, um, as sort of, uh, on an equal playing field, I’m going to acknowledge what’s happening inside of myself. Uh, I’m going to note it, and then I’m going to pick and choose from it, what I can use in a humorous way. And that has really helped me, even though I don’t write the column anymore, it’s really helped me in my news diet, in my, in my, uh, social media diet. It’s helped me to sort of take everything and say, like, not everything is attacking me right now. This is information and I can, I can let it go if I need to. Yeah.
Speaker 1 00:08:12 You know, we look at the, the presumed conflict between, you know, um, you know, the leaders of the Republican Congress and the leaders of the democratic Congress. And we like, it’s like, we pretend that they’re not working together to make all this stuff up. Right. Like the idea of Nancy Pelosi sitting behind president Trump and doing that clap, you know, that she did like that wasn’t finely orchestrated and brainstormed around a table in advance, or, you know, when Mitch McConnell of flip-flops and like, he’s not making a phone call in advance to the other side and saying, look, I’m about to flip on this and just be ready because it’s pageantry, it’s pageantry, you know, and I think that your point is exactly right on that. Like, let’s, let’s treat this with a little bit of levity because although it affects people’s lives, like the people who are showing up in the news, it’s just another day at the office for them. Right.
Speaker 2 00:09:13 Exactly. And, you know, and, and I think that can be very disheartening. And I think there are some politicians, you know, maybe some newer ones, or maybe some, some veteran politicians who understand, um, and have a deep desire to do the sort of granular groundwork that is governance. But my suspicion is particularly in this, uh, media saturated age, particularly in this like post post television age that we like the generation of politicians that we have are used to performance, um, and pageantry. And so if you look at, if you look at the ag, you know, activities of the Congress in the same way, as you look at the Oscars or a drag show, um, and I think it right-size this time, it’s like these people put on their costumes, they get in front of cameras. They say the thing that you want to hear, and you think about campaign promises, what does a campaign promise like this is it’s lips thinking for your life. And then you’re
Speaker 1 00:10:15 Like, great. You know,
Speaker 2 00:10:17 You, death dropped on the $15, million minimum wage. You get my vote. But the way that, uh, you know, we all watched, um, schoolhouse rock, we understand that like the way that a bill becomes a law is not by going on TV and, and selling it, you know, and, and, and, you know, razzle, dazzling, it’s, it’s boring and it’s granular and it’s legalees. And so those two things become separated in my mind. And I’m like, I see the things that are being performed for me. And as a viewer and as a participant and as an American citizen, I’m able to say like, I, I can see the pageant as a pageant, and I can see the injustice and the work of governance for what that is and see them as two separate things.
Speaker 1 00:11:01 Yeah. Yeah. So in a broader sense than just politics, um, talk to me about how you’ve learned to find funny in the unfunny and what that, I mean, what that even means, because it can be treacherous land to walk.
Speaker 2 00:11:20 Absolutely. Yeah. I mean, a lot of, a lot of the stories that I’ve told about my life, a lot of things that I, you know, I write in a weekly newsletter where I sort of write about what happened in my week or what’s happening in politics. And like a lot of times it starts with this thing is frustrating to me. This is something where I didn’t get what I wanted, and I have learned to not hold everything up to the light, uh, with the question of whether it’s funny or not. But I have learned to say, is this, um, is this something that, um, I can see levity, and I’ll give you a small example. There’s an essay in my book about, um, a time that I went viral in 2002 for writing an article in my college newspaper, where I was mistaken for white supremacist, very common, very common thing. So for listeners who don’t know, I’m a black person. Um, and I was writing what I thought was a satire and everyone else thought was a serious, um, critique of black history. And so it didn’t go over well. And I got thousands of emails, and even as it was going on, even as there was a campus meeting being held about me as a person that nobody knew, um, and everyone thought was,
Speaker 1 00:12:34 I can’t believe you were hiding in the back of the room. That was amazing. They’re like, we gotta find this are Eric Thomas. They’re like
Speaker 2 00:12:42 Forks and Eno and torches. And I’m like, Oh, I don’t know where he went that way. Um, even as I was in it, it was a miserable, miserable moment in my life. Um, even as I was in it, I was like, this has the hallmarks of farce. Um, I’m literally hanging in the back of my, in the back of this auditorium, pretending not to be myself. And so, you know, maybe five, six years later, I got up at a storytelling show and I tried to tell them actually, well, the first thing that happened was the newspaper staff. We all had like a meeting after we all had blown over and we tried to do a drinking game based on the, the hate mail I received. Um, uh, every time somebody said accident turned, turn where we all drink and that went over.
Speaker 1 00:13:28 It’s like, mean tweets. It’s like the predecessor to reading mean tweets. Yeah,
Speaker 2 00:13:31 Exactly. And, uh, that went over like a lead balloon. It was terrible. It was awful to sort of read those words, to hear those words. It was too soon and I didn’t have the right focus. I was, I was, I was still the butt of the joke. The years later, I tried to tell the story at a storytelling show and it kind of fell apart on stage because I was, I was not, I was still in it and I was still hurt. And it didn’t, it wasn’t until years later, as I was prepping the, write the book that I realized that, like I had a lot of complicity in that, um, in my own sort of, uh, the bad things that happened to me in that situation. And I had to sort of acknowledge I was in pain and I tried to write to that tire and, and I failed.
Speaker 2 00:14:17 And so acknowledging I failed at this, I put all these other people in a bad situation and they reacted and the minute I did that, and then the minute I acknowledged what I had done wrong, it freed me to right around the rest of the humor. And it became funny to me because it wasn’t that I was using humor to mask places where I failed. It was, I was like, I made a mistake. I’m not the butt of this joke, the situation, as far as, but in the heart of the farts is a person who I have forgiven. And I acknowledged that I did something wrong. And that’s what started this whole thing.
Speaker 1 00:14:55 Yeah. And there’s the healing that we were talking about, you know, um, this certainly, isn’t very funny, but the idea, one of the principles that I very much believe in adhered to over these past couple of years, as I’ve gone through a spiritual path, is that ego can’t survive in the light. And that the minute you turn the light on your ego and you look at it, it begins to fade away because you start to see it for what it is. And it’s not an immediate thing. Always it could be, um, but it’s a gradual thing that it begins to lose its power. And so I love that through looking for the humorous side, you saw the total, the totality of what had happened and that allowed you to kind of let go of, I don’t know, your egoic grasp of like this wasn’t fair.
Speaker 2 00:15:47 Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Yeah. That’s a thing I had gone for years. It had been probably a decade, um, uh, maybe more and always thinking I, I was wronged by all of these people and, um, and I did nothing wrong and, and let’s talk about how funny that is. And it just didn’t work. It didn’t work as a comedic premise. The minute I said, I did something wrong, I, I have a part to play in this. And, um, I forgive myself for making the mistake that got me into the situation. It freed me up to, to see it all in a direct sizing. Yeah, yeah. That’s right.
Speaker 1 00:16:30 You know, I remember after nine 11 happened, um, all the comedy shows went dark. Well, not all of them. Right. Uh, but most of the prominent comedy shows went dark and some of them for several weeks, I remember because I was a fan of David Letterman. I, uh, when I was in high school, I used to watch it with my mom and, uh, every night. And, um, I was in college when nine 11 happened. And I remember like, wow, David Letterman is not on for like weeks. And, um, and then decisions were made in our culture that it’s now appropriate to come back in force with comedy as a sign of resilience and strength and our determination not to let this, um, disrupt our way of life. The point of this story is that not long after that Gilbert Godfried was roasting Hugh Hefner, you know, they had the friars club roast and, uh, he made a joke about, um, nine 11 and the crowd went through this awkward silence.
Speaker 1 00:17:43 Someone yelled too soon. And, and this was, I learned the first time that too soon entered pop culture commentary of like, uh, because it was so widely broadcast and it just caught fire. And now it’s almost like a joke, right? Like someone makes an inappropriate, but like too soon. Right. Um, but you know, it goes to show that there is a healing that needs to happen. There is an appropriate boundary, right? Not everything can be funny to everybody, uh, in the midst of pain, but it’s, by looking through that, like you illustrated and finding the healing in it, uh, that we can then take joy and the randomness of life.
Speaker 2 00:18:30 Yeah. Yeah. I think that’s so fascinating. I did not know that about too soon entering vernacular at that moment. I, I, you know, I’d love to hear what the person who yelled it was thinking, because it’s, it’s really, it’s very wise. It’s this idea of it’s like the person wasn’t saying don’t ever say that, you know, the person was saying, we’re not there yet. And, and, and that acknowledges that we’re all on this continuum and that humor has a place in the continuum, but it’s not right now. And that’s really, I’ll give you, it’s like reading the room, you know, which is every comedian needs to do. I’ve, I’ve like nine 11 comedy is, which is a string sentence or straight trays. But I find it very fascinating because so many comedians really do try and push the envelope and move our culture forward, um, and, and shake an audience and say, we, we can talk about this. And I think there’s ways of doing, I think, of various ways of doing well, but I think there’s a lot of ways of doing it irresponsibly and, um, and responsibility when you’re, when you’re trying to make people laugh is, is a huge thing. I think that’s, that’s sort of my primary sort of motivation is, is this responsible?
Speaker 1 00:19:41 Yeah. Yeah. All right. We’re going to take a break for just a few seconds and, uh, everybody we’ll be back in just 45 seconds. Thanks a lot. Hi, everyone. I’m so happy that you’re listening to refractive podcast. I hope you’re resonating with today’s episode. I’m speaking now, especially to those of you who are leaders in your organizations. If I can ever be of service for your team, I hope you’ll reach out to me. I live my best life by helping others do the same. My services include facilitating leadership meetings, offering workshops, emceeing, employee events, and of course, coaching, I work with individuals and with small groups to help your high performers release, limiting beliefs and step into their full power I’m based in DC. I’m happy to travel and I can also support you virtually through zoom for more information, please visit refractive coaching.com. And now let’s go back to the podcast. All right, everybody, welcome back. I’m here with our Eric Thomas and we are talking about the role of laughter and how it helps to heal and move on, move on and find joy and even thrive. And so Eric, we were talking earlier, uh, before the break about some of the sensitivities around certain types of humor. And I know that we were referring to what the limits of humor are. So what else do you have to share with us on that?
Speaker 2 00:21:08 I think humor is, I think it’s important to think of humor as a communal experience. Um, and so you want to make somebody else laugh, even it’s if, if it’s a conversation on a date or whether it’s family dinner or whether it’s a auditorium, a thousand people in it. And so you obviously can’t be inside of somebody else’s head and know what they think is funny. But I do think that there is a responsibility to be, um, cognizant that you are, there is a consent involved in it. Um, and so humor can’t act, um, as a sort of a catch all for, for everything that you’re trying to do. It has to be, uh, an ex, uh, a give and take. I also think the humor, you know, a lot of times, and we were talking a little bit about this with, uh, with nine 11.
Speaker 2 00:21:57 So many times we use a joke to, to shove the conversation into a new space. Um, uh, and sometime, you know, and depending on the consent in the, in the group, sometimes that’ll work. Somebody breaks the tension or the grief at a funeral with a joke about the deceased in the right space. That is exactly what everybody needs, but you’ve got to know your audience, know your audience. Um, and, um, and also know that, like, it doesn’t take the place of, of true healing. It doesn’t take the place of, it can be a signpost of healing. It can be a path along, uh, uh, it can be a step along the path of healing, but it isn’t healing itself. And it isn’t, you know, when you think about political humor, it also isn’t policy. Um, it is not, humor is not itself social change. Uh, it can be a harbinger of social change, but it is not, it is not a substitute for action.
Speaker 1 00:22:54 Yeah. And I mean, that’s completely evidenced by the white house correspondence dinner, right. Where like the whole nation comes together and pokes fun at all kinds of politics, but it doesn’t change things.
Speaker 2 00:23:07 Yeah. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. And I mean, that, it’s up as a pageant, you know, you got journalists and politicians all sitting around, yucking it up and you’re like, I feel like maybe this is all an act.
Speaker 1 00:23:22 There you go. You know, I, as you were talking, I was thinking about married with children. So the old sitcom and how so much of the humor from married with children was about Al Bundy being this caveman, who was like not accepting of, uh, progress. And a lot of the jokes were about his lesbian neighbor. A lot of the jokes were about his wife’s role in life. And, um, and you know, I remember sitting down and watching that show with my brothers and like my mom not approving of us. Um, but it, it did kind of, it did kind of desensitize the topic of people who are resistant to social change, even though it was Al Bundy making so many jokes about like, uh, his perception of like liberals and whatever. How do I say this? Everybody kind of shared in the pageantry of the humor and it really did bring to the forefront, um, an opportunity to, uh, see this societal issue a little more clearly.
Speaker 2 00:24:35 Yeah. Yeah. I think television is so has such an interesting role in this because so often we do have contrarian characters, Al Bundy, um, uh, Archie bunker is probably the most famous and, you know, there are ways, but, you know, there are ways that that contrarian character is elevated and there are ways that contrarian character satirize. And so, like, it is, it is always introducing a conversation and again, like television isn’t social change, but it does for better, or for worse, married with children did put a lesbian character on television. And that is that’s. That is I think, a step on a continuum, you know, to say like, you know, we’re probably about the same age. Like I don’t recall seeing, um, gay, lesbian and transgender characters on television. And when I was, um, when I was a kid, um, uh, besides like very few instances and I didn’t, I wasn’t allowed to watch my children, but I was aware that there was a lesbian on my own marriage children, and for much of my childhood and even teenage years, um, uh, gain his queerness, didn’t have a name.
Speaker 2 00:25:46 Um, and, and it wasn’t, it didn’t exist. And so the minute you put language to it, um, you, you move it along, you move it further into, um, into the light. And that is, I think that’s very interesting, you know, and I think the legacy of some of these shows are, you know, Archie bunker still holds up, but then you look at, you look at some old episodes of all in the family and you’re like, Oh, I don’t know that I would listen to, I don’t, I don’t want to, I don’t want to put this in my brain, but on the other side, it’s like, that’s the way that people were talking back then. That’s right. It was a reflection of the society, but there was a kernel there that says, I am reflecting the conflict that I see in society in a bit of a fun house mirror. Um, and I’ve done the processing to figure out what our solution might be. I think, married with children and all in the family and the Jeffersons all offer solutions for if society is interested in taking them,
Speaker 1 00:26:46 Right. Because, you know, and we’ll move on from married with children. But like, uh, you know, the thing is that, although Al Bundy seems to be the hero, he is the protagonist of married with children. Those show writers, those show writers who crafted Al Bundy in his crude, uh, every man hero status also made the decision to put a lesbian on TV. Right. And so it goes to show that’s what I was trying to say earlier that I didn’t, I didn’t articulate very well that even though my brothers watched it for the macho humor, there was a bigger story being told that was one layer beneath that it helps society to become less sensitive and more open to considering, uh, new topics.
Speaker 2 00:27:41 Yeah. Yeah. And, you know, I like, I write a little bit for television now, and it’s been very fascinating to me to see your one television is such a huge collaborative process between from writers to executives. Uh, you know, obviously the people you see on screen and every step of the way it can go one way or another, it can go wrong. And, you know, so like a kernel of good intention can turn into mockery or a kernel of mockery can turn into something that is, um, pushes a culture forward. Um, and so it’s, it’s exciting and it’s also like dangerous. And you think everything that we receive from the news to sitcoms to dramas is movies, uh, is narrative and narrative teaches us what our values are. Um, and so I don’t think it’s, I don’t, I think it’s really important to seriously consider what we are watching and, and, and to ask the questions like we’re asking, like what, what, what does this character do for us?
Speaker 2 00:28:44 And how can we help that character achieve the end in a, like, in terms of society that we’re looking forward to achieve? It is something that I think is never finished, you know, like, and I think that we will always look back and say like, Oh, we couldn’t, we had a great opportunity for this character. We look will, and grace could have been, this could have been more of that. I think those things are true, but I also think that there is a, it comes down to community communal consent. And if the community is saying, we are not going to watch something that doesn’t, that we don’t, that doesn’t fit into our narrative, you know, what effects can come in narrative have nobody’s watching it. So, you know, there’s a, there’s a strange give and take. Yeah.
Speaker 1 00:29:27 So, you know, one of the most amazing, uh, an extraordinary experiences in life is when you lose yourself in laughter with another person. Yeah. You know, and we’ve all been there when we’re with a friend and something catches us off guard as hilarious, and you just can’t stop laughing. And one person laughing, causes the other to laugh. And it’s just this cycle. And I wonder, especially with your experience of standing on a stage with the goal of making people belly laugh, how has that role of the physicality of laughter worked into the calculus that you apply to what you do every day?
Speaker 2 00:30:06 Oh, that’s a great question. There were times where, um, well, like I, you know, I host them off storytelling, um, show live and we’ll be in the theater of 400 people. And there are times where laughter moves like energy across the room and you become a feels like I’ve, I feel like Tom cruise or minority report, you know, where I’m like moving things around on the screen, a little dials and switching things. And it’s you, it is, it is. And it’s honestly like, so mix a metaphor. It’s like surfing where you sort of consents, you sense the people who are, are, are really tapped in and you can like, see it in their bodies. You can like see that energy, like jump off of them and onto the person next to them. And especially when it’s in the dark and you, you sense, there is laughter there was enjoyment coming from someplace that you can’t see that is so phenomenal to me.
Speaker 2 00:31:07 And it reminds me that we like that it’s laughter is contagious, that there is, uh, also a sort of, uh, an, uh, I believe the term has anaerobic, uh, quality to it that it is like compressing your diaphragm and pushing air out and taking air in. And so we are sharing the same air. We are, uh, like metaphorically and also physically. And that is so deeply important to me. I don’t know when I’m on stage or when I’m writing on my laptop. I have no idea who is going to be, uh, receiving the jokes that I’m putting out. But what I do know is that we all have bodies that function in very similar ways. And, um, and so what I’m always trying to do is like to capture the mind, but also to like prod the body into, into movement. And that is a really exciting potential for me.
Speaker 1 00:32:05 You talked about how laughter moves like an energy, almost like a, a stone that you drop in a pond and the ripples of it just kind of flow out and, you know, I’m a speaker and, um, and a facilitator. And so when I’m in front of a group, I know exactly what you mean, and it’s not the laughter that I go for. It’s the, it’s the sparkle behind the eyes and is, and, and, um, you know, as a speaker that there, there is, there are few things as extraordinary as speaking and watching someone turn on watching someone connect and, uh, and, and the people around them don’t know that the person has connected, but you see it ripple out because we put out this energy, right? We put out this enthusiasm that people feel without even realizing it. And that’s the most amazing thing. And you watch the spark just catch from person to person, to person, to person, and with laughter it’s the same way. And it’s, it’s just a beautiful phenomenon. I love that. You brought that up.
Speaker 2 00:33:12 Yeah. Yeah. One of my favorite things is I work extemporaneously a lot. I don’t write it. You know, when I’m live, I don’t write a lot of my material. And so I’m not a standup comedian. And so like as a standup comedian, that would be a dangerous thing, but it’s somebody who’s hosting shows in a humorous way. It’s fine. Um, time for me, I don’t know. I’m not giving anybody advice, but one of the things that’s exciting to me is knowing when I’m approaching a punchline, um, in something that I’m going to say, and there is like that, that anticipatory silence where we all sort of are plugged in and there might be, there might be people who are like, Oh, I bet you something funny is coming. Or there might be people who are like, I’m just listening to this story. And then I drop it in.
Speaker 2 00:33:53 And it is, it is like hearing the burst of laughter coming from nothing is, it is the most powerful experience that I, I I’ve ever had. And I, I chase it because what it says is that in that instant, we have all changed. We have all gone from this neutral or this anticipatory state to this active, energetic state. And, and I think that every time you laugh, it changes you. Um, and that is, that is so deeply important. It’s so deep. It’s so core to who I am as a person. Um, I have always seeking to be changed by laughter. I like, and it feels, it honestly feels like, like atomic, like it’s just something that like was, was not there. And then suddenly was the big bang and it can happen over and over and over again.
Speaker 1 00:34:48 Okay. So I need to break topic for a second because I’ve not been able to stop thinking about your Sylvia Plath wallpaper. It’s killing me. It is amazing. I wish the people. So if you’re watching this on YouTube, you know what I’m saying, but if you’re listening to the podcast, you can’t see, but, uh, go on YouTube. I just, it’s stunning. It’s stunning. I want to buy that wallpaper. So, uh, anyway,
Speaker 2 00:35:12 Well, it’s from Ellie Cashman. Um, and I apologize. So YouTube viewers, I don’t, I think I forgot that we were going to be, uh, on YouTube is why would I look better now if I, if I turn on a light, um, anyway, so apologies to everybody. Um, but, uh, yeah, it’s from Ellie Cashman and she’s a designer in the Netherlands. And when I, we moved into this house and built a pandemic, we decided the fat, um, uh, since no one would see anything, but the square around us, it might as well be, uh, like, you know, Rococo and
Speaker 1 00:35:45 It’s amazing. So anyway, okay. I just needed, I just couldn’t hold it anymore. I was about to burst. Um, so I want to talk about, you know, people who listened to this podcast know that spirituality is my jam. It’s, uh, how I try to connect with my audience, people who are kind of feeling this, um, little spark of awakening happen and they kind of want to dig deeper into it. So I want to ask you, um, do you think laughter is spiritual?
Speaker 2 00:36:12 So, I mean, I think anything that changes that shocks us out of our neutral state of sort of passive, uh, experience of life is spiritual. Um, and I think, I think, like I said, that there it is a step on a path, um, toward healing and that is very exciting. Um, and I think that taps into our spirit. Um, I, I also, you know, I think the, the more extreme emotions, anger obviously, but like sorrow grief, laughter joy. Those have, I, I think they, they function at a higher level. Um, and so much of our lives, I think for a lot of us are really just sort of locked into neutrality. We’re sort of going the wrong or doing your day, you’re annoyed, blah, blah, blah. Um, and getting to jump out of the neutral, um, is I think stunning and I think it can, I don’t know.
Speaker 2 00:37:13 I think, I think a lot, actually, when I think about laughter I think a lot about, uh, the one time a year, every year that I do bigger, me yoga. I always think that I’m a Bikram yoga person and unfortunately I’m not. Um, but I think, you know, it’s a very physically strenuous, it’s like 95 degrees in the room, a hundred percent humidity or whatever, I guess that’s water, but I don’t know. I don’t know what humidity is. Um, but it’s an hour and a half of strenuous exercise. And then at the end of it, you’re like completely drained. You’re soaking soaking with sweat and you lie down and you sort of just still in this position called Savasana and you’re supposed to just sort of like be there in the chorus pose. Um, and it is the most, every time I do it, uh, I think that I’m doing it wrong because it is, has the most energy, um, inside of it that I like I experienced the entire time because it is not neutral.
Speaker 2 00:38:11 It is a space where all of the feeling that I felt like that I’ve, that I’ve worked through in the class, everything that I’ve squeezed out of my muscles, everything that I’ve sort of been like pushing out of my brain space so I can just concentrate comes flooding back in and flooding and floating to the surface of myself. And I’m all that raw emotion. And it does that. That is the feeling that I think laughter and provoke as well, this feeling of being your true yes. Interior raw self in a really glorious way that has so much potential.
Speaker 1 00:38:46 Yes. So I mean, Oh my God, so many, so many thoughts and concepts came into my mind while you were talking and you know, I’ve, I’ve thought a lot about laughter over the years and how laughter uh, typically relates to surprise, right? Like you’re catch people off guard, but I want to kind of cross reference that with something that was so interesting that I learned. Um, I’m trying to think of which book I heard it in. Ah, I can’t remember. But um, this book said that when you are in grief, when you cry, when you’re mourning, um, it is a form of meditation. It’s a form of lower vibration meditation because meditation is losing yourself in the moment. And so by experiencing this utter grief, you are losing yourself in the moment and uh, nothing else exists, but the now in that moment, and so, uh, as you were speaking, I was like, wow, laughter is meditation. Um, fear like utter fear and terror is meditation because these are times when you get lost in the present, the ever present now and nothing else exists, but what you’re experiencing in that moment, and I love it. You actually mentioned in the beginning of the podcast that, um, laughter has something to do with being in the present. And uh, I love the idea of laughing as a form of meditation, um, which is the absolute fastest, most direct way to spiritual growth.
Speaker 2 00:40:27 I love that. That is vetted. That’s you put it so succinctly and then that totally matches with the experience that I have, the thing that I’m always chasing. And it’s also a nice, you know, for somebody like me, who you don’t have a lot of a fair amount of energy. I come from a long line of anxious people. And um, and so it’s sometimes hard to like sort of sit down with my meditation app or, you know, sort of just quiet my mind. And so sometimes I’m like, well let me just put on a comedy podcast. And, and that works in the same way. Like it really, it takes me someplace else. I go lapping alone in my car, listening to somebody else, uh, on the radio or on a podcast. It is, it is. I love it. I love thinking about it as meditation because I do come out of it and in a different state and that’s phenomenal.
Speaker 1 00:41:18 That’s right. And I mean like for the listeners, because so many of us, me too, even though I’ve been working at this, like meditation can be so difficult, but I got to tell you when you slept, Benita comes on like that is meditation because nothing exists. But me and Madge like dancing,
Speaker 2 00:41:38 Oh, don’t even get me started on like the, like the needle drop on songs. I mean, you know, like I, you know, I haven’t been, I haven’t been out of the house in a year, um, essentially, except for, to like the grocery grips I pick up. But the minute I’m able to go back to a club and I can hear Robin’s dancing on my own. I’m going to be in outer space. I’m going to be floating around Venus because of that, like that experience of just sort of tapping into, and it’s just raw emotion. It’s remembering the first time you ever heard it, it’s remembering, um, you know, whatever emotions it calls up, but it’s also being deeply present in, you know, and moving your body and letting it be inside of your body. I think laughter is the same thing I really do. That’s amazing.
Speaker 1 00:42:23 I wonder if we think about like going to the, going to the movies as an escape, but I wonder if it’s not an escape. I wonder if it’s like a surrender to the present, you know what, yeah.
Speaker 2 00:42:35 Oh, I love that. And here’s the thing. Okay. Let me give me my, like my small soapbox. One of the things that’s frustrating about the movie industry right now, not to like put on my Hollywood hat, but like one of the things that’s frustrated against that like, like just comedy is too straightforward. Comedies are not being greenlit as much. Like everything is sort of a temple and that’s exciting. You go to see a Marvel movie and you do, you know, everybody’s experiencing that tension, that excitement and that’s meditative as well, I suppose. And, but like there is something that is just so juicy and exciting about sitting in a theater full of people all go far, you know, bridesmaids or big business or, you know, something that is just
Speaker 1 00:43:17 Like a big business.
Speaker 2 00:43:20 I’m pulling the throwbacks it’s and like to go in and say like, I’m going to have my hands covered in popcorn, sitting in this weird seat that I don’t know what else has been in the seat. And I’m going to be in another meditative plane with these other people, these strangers that’s magic. That’s why movies are magic.
Speaker 1 00:43:38 Yes. Oh, I love that. That’s amazing. So, um, uh, Oh, thank you for that. As we wind down to the end of the podcast, um, I’d love to hear what you’re working on and uh, where life has brought you today.
Speaker 2 00:43:52 Yeah, well, I’m, I’m writing for a couple of TV series, um, Dickinson on Apple TV plus and um, um, better things on FX. Those seasons will presumably for Dickinson. I am, yeah,
Speaker 1 00:44:04 Almost I was thinking about the wallpaper and I was like, should I say Dickinson or not? Because I didn’t know if I say, should I say Dickinson or Sylvia Plath? And I’m like, I’m a Sylvia Plath, but I love it. Yeah.
Speaker 2 00:44:14 Yeah. The reason I have this particular wallpaper is because I watched the first season of Dickinson before I wrote for the show and I was like, I want that wallpaper. Um, so it’s, I love, I love that you clocked it. That’s amazing. So I’m writing those seasons that I wrote on will be out in 2022 on the respective platforms. Um, I have a young adult novel coming out, um, in 2022 as well. Um, that it’s great for readers 14 and up. I think adults will really enjoy it as well. It’s a very funny novel tentatively called Ferris. Um, but I’m not sure. So just Google my name. Um, and that’s, you know, that’s what I’m working on.
Speaker 1 00:44:48 Um, and if people want to soak up some of the craft that you have released, um, how do they find you? Where do they get it? Um,
Speaker 2 00:44:58 So the easiest way I I’m on social media, my Twitter handle is OurEric. Oureric. That’s also my Instagram. Um, I write a weekly humor newsletter if it comes out on Sundays, if you want to sort of way to end your week or begin your week, depending on how you see a Sunday, um, with, uh, with humor, um, uh, it’s a great place to do it. You can find that at REricThomas.substack.com or just going to my website Rericthomas.com.
Speaker 1 00:45:34 Okay. So I have some rapid fire questions that I like to, uh, I like to put my guests through. And, um, so are you ready for this? Sometimes you’ll have a question to answer sometimes you’ll just need to, uh, complete a sentence. Okay. Okay. All right. I see Godwin.
Speaker 2 00:45:52 Oh, Oh. I, uh, the first thought I had was when children laugh. So I’m going to go with that.
Speaker 1 00:45:56 Oh, I love that. Okay. What does prayer sound like?
Speaker 2 00:46:03 It sounds like a magic trick to me. Abracadabra. What is grace? Grace is a forgiveness for yourself, forgiveness for others, forgiveness for the universe.
Speaker 1 00:46:17 I find joy when
Speaker 2 00:46:21 I can recognize and celebrate what other people are proud of or happy about, or, um, what I wish for
Speaker 1 00:46:34 My favorite thing is:
Speaker 2 00:46:38 Cake.
Speaker 1 00:46:42 Yes, no comment. And last question. Uh, my definition of love is,
Speaker 2 00:46:49 Oh, absolute comfort. Uh, even in the midst of tribulation, um, or dispute, um, comfort. Yeah.
Speaker 1 00:47:02 All right, Eric, thank you so, so much for joining me on refractive and, uh, and for sharing your light and your gift with us. And, um, it’s just been wonderful for me.
Speaker 2 00:47:14 No, thank you. It’s been wonderful for me. This is such a life-giving conversation. So thank you for having me.
Speaker 1 00:47:18 All right. Well, everybody, uh, enjoy your day and, uh, don’t forget. Aim your light. You have been listening to refractive podcast, and this is Johnny G. If you’ve enjoyed today’s episode, do me a favor, give it a share on social media, or if you’re in the podcast app, give it a rating. If you’re on YouTube click, like it really does make a difference in the search results. I am a speaker, coach and facilitator based in Washington, DC, but I work in person and remotely with people who are ready to step with clarity into their most authentic life. If I can be of service, reach out to me, JOHNNy@refractivecoaching.com have an amazing day. Be good to each other and always Aim your light.