Budget cuts, reductions in resources and reimbursements, loss of patients and key personnel -- now, more than ever, we need to bring humor and laughter into our personal, professional and organizational lives.
I recall a stress workshop I did with VA Hospital head nurses. These women were feeling stretched to the limit by demanding doctors, impatient patients and visitors, staff productivity and morale pressures, not enough supplies, difficulty communicating with the administration, and so on. The tension in the room crackled and hung heavy like an impending storm. Then each nurse thunderously barked her name and work station: Johnson, W-14; Thomas, W-16; Sanders, W-20; etc. I responded reflexively: "It sounds like you're reporting from your battle stations." The spontaneous, palpable sighs and nodding heads let me know I was psychologically on target.
At the same time, these nurses knew how to circle their medicine carts against the perceived antagonists or, at least, to defuse momentarily their "combat fatigue" with some "M*A*S*H" humor. The nurses' favorite supervisory battle cry: "Do your eight and hit the gate," "Nine to five and stay alive." Hey, she who laughs last— lasts!
There are limitations to this kind of survival humor and the respite it provides. Such humor, based on frustration and aggression, while understandable, easily results in an "us against them" mindset. Overt conflict or the spilling over of passive-aggressive behavior patterns into operations and work relations is predictable.
The challenge: to transform that aggressive energy (or apathy, helplessness, etc.) and dark or covert humor into open, supportive venting followed by creative problem-solving interaction.
Transforming darkness or heaviness into lightness and enlightenment is no trivial quest. As that great humanitarian and undaunted, perceptual pioneer, Helen Keller observed:
"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 hidden in somber circumstances and irksome tasks."
Ironically, the mental and allied health professional, often working the battlefronts of "care and sorrow," is primed for making the transition from psychotherapist to healing humorist. As Charlie Chaplin once observed: "A paradoxical thing is that in making comedy, the tragic is precisely that 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."
So, how does one become a "psychohumorist"? Can you blend a touch of personal craziness, an appreciation for absurdity or contradiction and an ability to express verbally and nonverbally your comfort with neurosis, empathy for pain and acceptance of conflict? Throw into this psychological and communicational gumbo a sense of timing and— voila! You now have a recipe for serious and luminous lunacy. As a purposefully playful catalyst, you will help folks acknowledge, explore, gently laugh at and even, at times, transcend their own fears, flaws and foibles.
Self-recognition through laughter is vital yet, clearly, not sufficient. The fundamental goals of the organizational healing humorist are interactive. They involve strengthening mutual understanding, shared enjoyment and productive collaboration among diverse and often competing people -- rather critical objectives in today's "do more with less" climate.
The following techniques will illustrate both conceptual and applied strategies of a psychohumorist.
After a somewhat compelling and humorous opening (such as the VA head nurses scenario), I quickly engage an audience with questions that allow for spontaneous and individual association, e.g., "What's the first thought that comes to mind when you hear the word 'stress'?" Picking up on the group's responses, I further elaborate the dual nature of stress smoke signals. For example, we establish that under significant stress people may sleep too much or, conversely, know all the best buys at 3 a.m. on the QVC cable shopping channel.
Eventually, I run down "The Four Stages of Burnout," which really grabs people's attention. While the overall mood gets a bit somber, I still break in with the unexpected or the exaggerated. For example, after exaggerating the labored, deep sighing of an exhausted individual (and then leading a group sigh), I ask the audience, "When do you hear people caught up in deep or heavy breathing and sighing? ... Other than when you call those 1-900 numbers, of course." (The straight answer I provide is, "when encountering individuals dealing with poignant loss, such as grieving family members at a funeral.")
These scenarios illustrate the principle of ongoing ebb and flow between the serious and the humorous, the predictable and the unexpected, and between sharing information and evoking group association and participation.
People enjoy and are more receptive to a serious message when it's gift wrapped with humor. Some people initially laugh at me; some immediately enjoy the silliness. I'm not particularly worried about looking and sounding ridiculous. If I'm not taking myself so seriously, maybe audience members can be a little less hard on themselves.
Some real gifts of the psychohumorist are: the capacity for self-effacing humor -- based on ego strength and the awareness of limitations, not deprecation -- along with the loosening of inhibition and lowering the volume of rigid or judgmental inner voices.
Even Sigmund Freud might have acknowledged the potential contributions of a healing humorist. For Freud, the capacity for mature humor -- by which he meant internalizing the encouragement of our efforts and the gentle tolerance of our failures -- is perhaps the greatest gift parental figures can bestow upon a child. (Or a psychohumorist upon a colleague or client.)
The foundation for the most interactive intervention is now in place. The participants are ready for a moderately risk-taking and maximally rewarding problem-solving experience.
First, I break up the audience into teams of three or four. I try to have disparate people or department personnel working together. Then, I ask participants to discuss the sources of stress and conflict in the organization or department. I remind folks this isn't "true confessions;" people are to share only at a level that feels comfortable.
After 10 minutes of discussion, the team proceeds to generate a group picture or composite of the individual stress scenarios. Believe me, I've seen it all: sinking ships, stalking dinosaurs, wildly rampaging twisters, exploding castles, barren deserts and consuming black holes, all sorts of chained bodies and contorted faces (along with a lot of "bad hair days"). To clarify task instructions and reduce performance anxiety, I reassure participants that stick figures are just fine.
The drawing phase is also limited to about 10 minutes. In both segments, I periodically give time-limit reminders. This invariably heightens arousal level and task focus.
Finally, we do a "show-guess-and-tell," whereby the teams pridefully display their colorful composites (perhaps "darkly bright crystals," to modify Ms. Keller's metaphor) while the entire audience free-associates to each of the drawings. People can project their perceptions, biases and fantasies onto the pictures. This last interactive-feedback segment becomes a free-associative, supportive and playfully aggressive large group catharsis.
Before closing the experience, I ask the audience to reflect on what made the exercise valuable and enjoyable. The exercise enables participants to vent and to gain support and insight while generating laughter and group synergy. In fact, this exercise often breaks the ice between individuals, status hierarchies, sections, departments, etc. It facilitates beginning conflict resolution during the program and also sets the stage for future collaborative problem-solving.
Today's "managed scare" and "frightsizing" climate is a call for both professional action and healthcare com-munity healing. Help yourself and your organization bring the specter of downsizing down to size. Discover the art, path and spirit of the psychohumorist. Seek the higher power of humor: "May the Farce Be with You!"
Mark
Gorkin, "The Stress Doc," is a licensed clinical social worker,
national speaker and training consultant specializing in
reorganizational stress, managing anger, team building and humor. For
more info, call the "Doc" at 202/232-8662, email:
StressDoc@aol.com or visit his
website at
www.stressdoc.com.
© 1997 Targeted Publications Group, Inc. All rights reserved.
