Laughter is the best antidepressant. We understand better why more and more adults in need of recklessness indulge in laughter yoga and other activities inspired by “fun therapy”. The principle is simple and starts from the bottom of the belly, more precisely from the famous diaphragm, already requested for breathing. Kidding and laughing allows you to play down the drama, to take life more lightly. Contagious, this complete muscular exercise (with recognized anti-stress and anti-aging virtues) is welcome to defuse tension.
If you apprehend the burial heads around the New Year’s Eve table, take these collective laughter exercises out of your secret boot. Your biggest challenge? Convince your charming hosts to play along and above all, not be afraid of ridicule. Chick!
An unusual welcome
Receive your guests unexpectedly as you take small steps towards each one with clasped hands and bend over saying HI-HANG before hugging them laughing.
Happy music
Rather than nostalgic and not very catchy Christmas music such as “Mon beau sapin” or “Vive le vent”, warm up the atmosphere by playing a joyful, random song “Happy” by Pharell Williams, “les Sardines” by Patrick Sebastien or again “Volare” by Gipsy King. The idea is not to impose your musical tastes (the more ridiculous the song, the more likely it is to entertain the gallery) but to distill a festive and positive character to the evening. And who knows maybe that Aunt Jacqueline, who hasn’t said a word from her plate of oysters, will start singing the song?
A crazy toast
When it’s time to toast with a glass of champagne, instead of saying “Health” or “Marmoset” (if some still dare to say it), ask everyone to laugh while raising their glass.
Parseltongue in coffee
In the coffee or between the cheese or the dessert, propose to the table to pronounce without forking these “tongue twister”: “are the socks of the Archduchess dry, archi-dry?” ; “Five dogs are hunting six cats” ; “six hundred saws saw six hundred sausages”, etc. Suckers and laughs guaranteed.
A collective song
Your family adores French song hits like Monday in the Sun by Claude François? Improvise a slightly special karaoke: ask the guests to transform the lyrics of the songs by changing all the vowels to I, for example. Also “Monday in the sun is something you will never have” becomes “Li lindi i silil, ci ine chise quei n’iri jimi”.
Find more fun tips to decompress in “50 exercises of laughter”, by Joëlle Cuvilliez and Martine Medjber-Leigner, Eyrolles editions.
>> To read also: Our party file
Christmas: how not to stress before D-Day
