They say that the best medicine is laughter. What’s so nice about it is that it’s easily accessible and comes absolutely free of charge — you don’t have to head to the nearest pharmacy or shell out cash for it. Laughter is always a funny YouTube video or a friend with an awesome sense of humor away.
According to scientists, there are so many different benefits to laughing more often. Coincidentally, they are the ones that this article will impart.
If you want to know some of the reasons why it’s a good idea to laugh, keep on reading to get to know them. Got a lot of family members and friends who are constantly pouting? Then make sure that you repost this article later on so that they, too, may learn that laughing more often allows them to enjoy the following:
Lowered Stress
Are you leading a very stressful everyday life? Then see to it that you engage in activities that can leave you laughing especially at the end of a particularly tiring day. Based on numerous studies, laughing is very good at lowering the levels of stress hormones coursing through your bloodstream.
Chronic stress is something that you surely don’t want to have especially if you’re a health-conscious individual. Being stressed all the time can in fact wreak havoc on your health in all kinds of ways.
Reduced Anxiety
Stress and anxiety usually go hand in hand as stress can cause you to feel anxious. The problem with having lots of anxious thoughts is that it can create a vicious cycle that can be very hard to escape — anxiety can leave you even more stressed, and being more stressed can leave you feeling more anxious.
Anxiety is actually one of the most common forms of mental illness. In the US alone, it is estimated that about 40 million adults are suffering from it. The good news is anxiety is highly treatable with the help of medications and also numerous all-natural approaches such as psychotherapy.
Lifted Mood
One more type of mental illness that is affecting millions and millions of people these days is depression. Being depressed can definitely keep you from having a meaningful and productive life as it can leave you feeling fatigued and having no interest in everyday things and activities.
It’s important to put depression under control without delay as it can certainly decrease an individual’s quality of life dramatically. What’s more, some people who are battling depression commit suicide.
Lowered Heart Disease Risk
Believe it or not, laughing more often is capable of keeping your ticker out of harm’s way. According to scientists, laughing can cause the blood vessels to dilate, thus allowing the blood to flow without trouble through the blood vessels. One of the many perks of such is that it can help lower the blood pressure.
Having high blood pressure is regarded as a risk factor for heart disease, heart attack and stroke. Another thing that can cause those very serious problems to strike is too much stress — just like what’s mentioned above, laughing can help lower one’s stress levels.
Strengthened Immunity
Constantly down with the common cold or flu? Maybe you should need to wash your hands more often. And maybe you should need to laugh a lot. Health authorities say that laughing can in fact strengthen your immune system, thus allowing your body to become more defended against infection-causing microbes.
Aside from laughing more often, other ways to get your immune system strengthened and your risk of infections lowered include having a diet that’s rich in vitamin C, quitting smoking, getting 7 to 9 hours of restorative sleep at night, and exercising regularly.
Smaller Waistline
Speaking of getting your regular dose of exercise, did you know that laughing can in fact burn lots of calories? Needless to say, weight-conscious individuals should laugh more often than usual in order for them to burn those extra calories before they end up converted into fat cells by the body.
Laughing is particularly good for your waistline as it can give your abdominal muscles a good workout. Notice how your belly feels achy each time you laugh really hard for a long time? Well, that’s a telltale sign that you are actually working out your abdominal muscles while laughing.
