Forced laughter leads to real laughter.
"Even if you start out fake laughing, because you're in a group, pretty soon that gets funny, and then, you start out really laughing," Laugh Club founder Danny Birdsell said. "Also, (Madan Kataria) from India, he was saying that it doesn't even matter if you're fake laughing. You still get all the benefits. The same chemical's released in your brain, so it's another plus."
Every Tuesday at 4 p.m., the Laugh Club meets at the volleyball net on Lower Johnson Field and plays laughing games for 20 minutes.
Kataria founded the first laughter club in 1955 in a park after reading about how Marx Brothers films and steady belly laughing helped to bring the writer Norman Cousin back from painful near-total paralysis.
"He was just, like, 'People need to laugh more,'" Birdsell said. "It's healthy - a good stress release."
Members of Laugh Club stand in a circle and take turns choosing laughing games.
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"Joel! Joel! Come laugh with us!" member Andrea Schoeny yelled out to a student walking by.
She periodically calls to friends, acquaintances and strangers to join the Laugh Club as a means of recruiting.
"There have been a few people that came once and then were too weirded out and didn't really want to come back," Birdsell said. "Everyone gets involved, and everyone has a say. It's sort of a conscious effort to laugh."
The routine on Tuesday went as follows: Members chant "Ho, ho! Ha ha ha!" twice while slapping their legs and clapping, and then let out a big breath and stretch their arms over their heads and down by their sides. Then one member instructed everyone to laugh-cry, so everyone simulated laughing while crying, which collectively sounds like a giant Ricky Ricardo guffaw. It lasted for less than a minute, and then they regrouped to chant and clap.
"Laugh at the sun," member Alanna Carlson then said.
Everyone pointed at the sun and laughed at it.
"Let's square dance," Birdsell said.
They all swung their partners 'round and 'round while laughing.
"Hurry up, Alex!" Schoeny called out to her friend, who ran over to join the laughter.
They have a list of games to draw from if no one can think of something new on the spot.
"You can just make up whatever you want," Birdsell said. "One day, we were like, 'Hey, let's do the stadium wave,' you know, and we just went around."
Schoeny said she likes coming because the meeting us right after she leaves biology class.
"You do leave in a good mood," member Read
Langhenry said.
