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FINDING HUMOR

"If you can laugh at it, you can live with it."Erma Bombeck

"Laugh at yourself first, before anyone else can."Elsa Maxwell

"Laughter is the shortest distance between two people."Victor Borge

"It is not enough to posses wit. One must have enough of it to avoid having too much."Andre Maurois

The most wasted day is that in which we have not laughed.Sebastien-Roch Nicolas de Chamfort

Id rather be a failure at something I enjoy than be a success at something I hate.George Burns

The human race has one really effective weapon, and that is laughter. Mark Twain

People are at their most mindful when they are at play. If we find ways of enjoying our work -

blurring the lines between work and play - the gains will be greater.Ellen Langer

"Each day, and the living of it, has to be a conscious creation in which discipline and order are

relieved with some play and some pure foolishness."May Sarton

"Fun is about as good a habit as there is."Jimmy Buffet

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"Take time every day to do something silly."Philipa Walker

"You can increase your brain power three to fivefold simply by laughing and having fun before

working on a problem. "Doug Hall

"Don't take life too seriously, for you may pass a good laugh along the way!"Keith Gusich,

"Laughter is the music of life."Sir William Osler

"Fun is going to enhance interest, because people don't

feel incompetent when they're having fun."Matthew S. Richter

"You grow up the day you have your first real laugh at yourself."Ethel Barrymore

"Humor comes from self-confidence.

There's an aggressive element to wit."Rita Mae Brown

"He deserves Paradise who makes his companions laugh."The Koran

"He who laughs, lasts."Mary Pettibone Poole

"At the height of laughter, the universe is flung into a kaleidoscope of new possibilities."Jean Houston

"Imagination was given to man to compensate him for what he is not; a sense of humor to console

him for what he is."Sir Francis Bacon

"A day without laughter is a day wasted."Charlie Chaplin

"Were it not for my little jokes, I could not bear the burdens of this office."Abraham Lincoln

"A good laugh is sunshine in a house."

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William Makepeace Thackeray

"The one serious conviction that a man should have is that nothing is to be taken too seriously."Nicholas Murray Butler

You can think best when you're happiest.Peter Thomson, Australian Golfer

A person without a sense of humor is like a wagon without springsjolted by every pebble in the

road.Henry Ward Beecher

Humor is a rubber sword - it allows you to make a point without drawing blood.Mary Hirsch

Humor has a way of bringing people together. It unitespeople. In fact, I'm rather serious when I

suggest that someone should plant a few whoopee cushions in the United Nations.Ron Dentinger

Laughter and tears are both responses to frustration and exhaustion.

I myself prefer to laugh, since there is less cleaning up to do afterward.Kurt Vonnegut

"I think the next best thing to solving a problem is finding some humor in it."Frank A. Clark

"Laughter is the shortest distance between two people."Victor Borge

"A good laugh is sunshine in a house."William Makepeace Thackeray

Laughter is a tranquilizer with no side effects.Arnold Glasow

Man, when you lose your laugh you lose your footing.Ken Kesey

At the height of laughter, the universe is flung into a kaleidoscope of new possibilities.Jean Houston

Laughter is an instant vacation.

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Milton Berle

A person without a sense of humor is like a wagon without springs. It's jolted by every pebble on

the road.Henry Ward Beecher

Humor is perhaps a sense of intellectual perspective: an awareness that some things are really

important, others not; and that the two kinds are most oddly jumbled in everyday affairs.Christopher Morley

Common sense and a sense of humor are the same thing, moving at different speeds. A sense

of humor is just common sense, dancing.William James

"The kind of humor I like is the thing that makes me laugh for five seconds and think for ten

minutes."

William Davis

"Humor is the great thing, the saving thing. The minute it crops up, all our irritation and

resentments slip away, and a sunny spirit takes their place."Mark Twain

"Warning: Humor may be hazardous to your illness."Ellie Katz

"Joy in one's heart and some laughter on one's lips is a sign that the person down deep has a

pretty good grasp of life."

Hugh Sidey

"A serious and good philosophical work could be written consisting entirely of jokes."Ludwig Wittgenstein

"Imagination was given to man to compensate him for what he is not; a sense of humor to

console him for what he is."Francis Bacon

A good laugh is good for both the mental and physical digestion.Abraham Lincoln

"A man isn't poor if he can still laugh."Raymond Hitchcock

"Even if there is nothing to laugh about, laugh on credit."Anon.

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"What soap is to the body, laughter is to the soul."Yiddish Proverb

"There is no defense against adverse fortune which is so effectual as an habitual sense of humor."

Thomas W. Higginson

"Humor is the instinct for taking pain playfully."Max Eastman

"People who laugh actually live longer than those who dont laugh. Few persons realize that health

actually varies according to the amount of laughter."James J. Walsh

"The most exciting phrase to hear in science, the one that heralds new discoveries, is not'Eureka!' but 'That's funny ...'"

Isaac Asimov

"Time spent laughing is time spent with the Gods."Japanese proverb

Laughter is a tranquilizer with no side effects."Arnold Glasow

"If you don't have wrinkles, you haven't laughed enough."

Phyllis Diller, comedienne

Source:

These quotes originally compiled by Emeritus Professor Art Costa.

Also available at www.instituteforhabitsofmind.com