Relieving Tension and Fear, Disarming Frustration and Conflict Theory: Humor Intelligence – Part Ten

When humor springs from the head and heart of Emotional Intelligence, it has the potential to be much more than just a good joke. And this is especially true if a complex communicator knows how to play with and connect Emotional Intelligence (EQ) with the Stress Doc’s new concept of “Humor Intelligence” (HQ). Part Nine of the Stress Doc’s Higher Power Humor Series examines the fourth of seven humor theories posited: “Relieving Tension, Fear, and Depression, Disarming Hurt, Frustration and Conflict Theory.” Here is a listing of all seven theories:

Seven Theories and Related Functions of Humor

1. Superiority Theory: Aggressive and Self-Aggrandizing, Competitive and Social Status Functions

2. Self-Effacing Theory: Protective and Affirmative, Empathic and Accommodating, Modeling and Collaborative

3. Dopamine Delivery and “Inner Jogging” Theory: Flexibility and Flush, Mind-Body Massage, and Creativity and En-lighten-ment Functions

4. Relieving Tension, Fear, and Depression, Disarming Hurt, Frustration and Conflict Theory: Tension Reduction and Self-Regulation, Sexual and Aggressive, Courageous and Creative Functions

5. Breaking Through (Restraint) and Breaking Out (Rebellious and Out-rage-ous) Theory: Outwitting Critical Voices, Courageous and Creative, Iconoclastic Identity/Voice and Subversive Functions

6. Incongruity and Surprise Theory:  Defying Expectations and Provocative, Openness and Creativity Functions

7. Higher Adaptive Defense and Communication Theories:  Humble and Heroic, (including the Five “H” Higher Power Humor Functions: Healing, Hostility-Reducing, Harnessing, Humanizing, Harmonizing (including Holism)

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Relieving Tension and Fear, Disarming Frustration and Conflict Theory

An ability to laugh at our absurdities or seemingly helpless condition makes it easier to accept our own fears, flaws and foibles; we are not alone in our frenzy. For example, right after 9/11, when airport lines were creating serious customer stress, Baltimore-Washington International Airport hired actors to play costumed comic figures, such as Groucho Marx – in tails, with a crouched walk, leering eyes, and waving an oversized cigar – to banter with folks on line or milling about. The purpose: a sense of the absurd could reduce if not replace anxiety or frustration. Two complementary quotes illuminate the powerful interplay between fear and focus, laughter and psychological freedom. First, a) how the lunacy of Marxism could beat the threat of bin Ladenism and next, b) how lampooning a looming threat may bring it down to earth.

Psychiatrist Ernst Kris: What was once feared and is now mastered is laughed at.

When we have begun to face and embrace our fears about a person or situation, not only are we less stressed, but we have the self-assurance to look back and laugh at our previous vulnerability.

And the Stress Doc’s inversion: “What was once feared and is now laughed at is no longer a master!”

On a personal note, I have previously shared a newly conceived personal strategy for dealing with a health condition, one that is often fraught with uncertainty and stress. Having discovered that being alone in the walk-up to my Prostate Cancer Active Surveillance Screening heightens a sense of loneliness, I’ve come up with a remedy that should allow me to poke some fun at the “C”-word: a pre-biopsy party! Cancer is not the only answer, and it will not, if I have anything to say on the matter, be my “master.”

Amazing Grief: When Resilient Magic Springs from the Tragic or the Birth of Gospel Grief Rap

Once again, magic may arise from the ashes of tragedy. A personal challenge during a critical incident grief intervention triggers an unexpected if not somewhat startling response. And we all discover how the outrageous can help open up the group grief process. Let me quick-sketch the mercurial happening. I was making my second critical intervention at a social service agency after the unexpected, heart-wrenching suicide of a much beloved, senior staff member. This individual apparently played a mother or big sister role for many of her multi-generational colleagues. Most knew she was experiencing some stress; none could imagine the severity. Not surprisingly, at the first meeting with the group, many were in a state of shock, though several had watery eyes, a few were quietly weeping.

At the second gathering, three days later, there were fewer glazed looks; still the mood, understandably, remained somber. During the initial check-in, a former policeman turned the tables on me. (Before the first group encounter, he and I had talked briefly; he seemed to be checking me out.) Seemingly parts inquisitive, parts confrontational, he asked how I dealt with “stress.” Viewing his question as an opportunity to move outside my professional cover, to engage in some personal sharing, I responded, “I like to walk, and I enjoy creative writing.”

He then asked about my writing. When I said “poetry,” he immediately asked me to share some. Alas, the performer more than the grief consultant momentarily took the stage. I mentioned my work as a “Shrink Rapper” ?, which induced a mix of groans and chuckles. I quickly decided to “rap” (and clap) the first four lines of a favorite:

When it comes to feelings do you stuff them inside?

Is tough John Wayne your emotional guide?

And it’s not just men so proud and tight-lipped

For every Rambo there seems to be a Rambette!

After two lines (and the improbability of what they were seeing and hearing), the metamorphosis was palpable – from the widening of eyes and the relaxing of individual facial expressions to increasing group energy and body movement; several people had started to sway and clap. By the end of this first stanza their eyes (and my ears) were twinkling (buzzing) with (and from the) laughter. Now I just blasted through any sound barrier and sang the entire “Stress Doc’s Stress Rap.” Being “shocked” was no longer just associated with grief. (Considering that all but one in the group were people of color, most African-American, with hindsight, perhaps this was the birth of “Grief” or “Gospel Rap” or “Gospel Grief Rap.” During my “American in Cajun Paris Years,” I have great memories of being electrically if not soulfully charged in many N’Awlins Jazz Fest Gospel tents. ;-).

Jolted to the Light and the Absurdity of Life

The enthusiastic applause told me how much this group needed some healing humor and “lightening the mood” laughter. At the same time, despite the recent trauma, there was clear and reassuring evidence of a vital group pulse. FYI, their cheers certainly did not reflect my “rapping” talents. In fact, as a “Shrink Rap” performer, when a show of appreciation dies down, my standard rejoinder: I can tell when an audience is applauding out of relief.

We were dancing on the edge of “gallows humor”: turning the serious into the ridiculous… hopefully, without losing sight of the tragic elements of the space-time we were inhabiting together. While in no way comparable, Dr. Chaya Ostrower’s dissertation, It Kept Us Alive: Humor in the Holocaust, vividly quotes various Holocaust victims on the link between incorrigible and irreverent humor – from the seemingly insignificant to the wildly dark and imaginative – and survival:

Look, without humor we would all have committed suicide. We made fun of everything. What I'm actually saying is that (humor, laughter) helped us remain human, even under hard conditions.

When I was interviewed for Spielberg (for the movie Schindler’s List), and they asked me what I thought was the reason I survived, they probably expected me to answer good fortune or other things. I said that I thought it was laughter and humor, not to take things the way we were living but to dress them up as something different. That was what helped me. I wasn't thinking about miracles and wasn't thinking anything, I only thought how not to take things seriously.

And Dr. Freud would resoundingly agree. The powerful message of this most mature defense mechanism, of higher power humor: “Look here! This is all this seemingly dangerous world amounts to. Child’s play – the very thing to jest about.” (Of course, the world can be deadly dangerous, yet we still often need mix humor with grief to face tragic trials and troubling truths.)

From the Ridiculous to the Insightful

Back to my “Amazing Grief” story. Now, recovering my grief consultant mindset, I dispensed with added banter, but noted how our immediate process reflected a truth captured by the pioneering comedic film genius, Charlie Chaplin: A paradoxical thing about making comedy is that it is precisely the tragic which arouses the funny. We have to laugh due to our helplessness in the face of natural forces and in order not to go crazy! The sighs and nodding heads affirmed Chaplin’s wisdom.

As I once penned: “People are less defensive and more open to a serious message gift-wrapped with humor.” (Pun actually not intended.) Having been infused with some positive energy, folks seemed more willing to acknowledge feelings of disappointment and regret, even some anger, for a beloved colleague who walled them off with her silence and secrets; a kindred spirit who would no longer inhabit and share their physical space. Perhaps we were creating a yin-yang mind-body flow. A Stress Doc rule of thumb in helping people evolve through emotional loss and change: take time for the pain and blend dark and lightness to ease folks moving from negative to positive energy.

A Closing P.S. and Mission Statement

After the group intervention, the previously mentioned former policeman approached me. He’s been talking to a colleague, seemingly bottling up some stress. “And he won’t open up! What should I do?” My reply: “How about asking this person if you could check in periodically, maybe once a week, to see how s/he’s doing?” This “old school” guy’s reply: “Oh, I shouldn’t try to make him talk.” I smiled and nodded. The gentleman was displaying some resilience:  considering a novel, less controlling and more flexible strategy for dealing with personal frustration and interpersonal boundaries; a new approach for relating with and assisting another. A good way to help one and all...Practice Safe Stress!

Finally, one of the world's great humanitarians, the undaunted perceptual trailblazer, Helen Keller, beautifully captured the universal drive and hope in, if you will, my “Higher Power Humor” mission statement:

The world is so full of care and sorrow that it is a gracious debt we owe to one another to discover the bright crystals of delight in somber circumstances and irksome tasks.

Mark Gorkin, MSW, LICSW, "The Stress Doc" ?, a nationally acclaimed speaker, popular webinar educator, writer, and "Motivational Psychohumorist" ?. Mark is a founding partner and Stress Resilience and Trauma Debriefing Consultant for the Nepali Diaspora Behavioral Health & Wellness Initiative and is a Cross-Cultural Diversity Training Speaker & Consultant for numerous Federal Agencies. The Doc is also a Leadership and Life Coach as well as a Clinical Therapist for Inner City Family Services, Washington, DC. A former Stress and Violence Prevention Consultant for the US Postal Service, he has led numerous Pre-Deployment Stress Resilience-Humor-Team Building Retreats for the US Army. Presently, Mark does Cross Cultural Facilitation and Presentations for organizational/corporate clients of HR Consulting Firm PRM. The Doc is the author of Practice Safe Stress, The Four Faces of Anger, and Preserving Human Touch in a High-Tech World. Mark’s award-winning, USA Today Online "HotSite" – www.stressdoc.com – was called a "workplace resource" by National Public Radio (NPR). For more info, email: [email protected].

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