Guiding Light by Sri Sri Ravi Shankar: The Real Laughter

If you ever happen to meet God, do you know what you would tell him? “Oh, I have met you inside.” God will dance in our life when your day dawns in laughter and love. The true prayer is laughing in the morning. Don’t just be laughing outside but from deep inside. The laughter comes from the centre of our Being, from the core of our heart. When you laugh, the whole of nature laughs with you. It echoes and that is really the worth of life. When things go all right, everybody can laugh, but when everything falls apart, and then if you can laugh, that is evolution and growth. So there is nothing in life that is more worthy than your laughter. Never lose it for anything, whatsoever.

Events come and go. Some are a little pleasant, some are unpleasant, but whatever happens, they all leave you untouched. There is some area deep in you that is left untouched. Hold on to that something that is untouched. Then you will be able to keep laughing through life.

Sometimes you laugh just to avoid thinking or to avoid looking at yourself. But when you see and feel within yourself that life is so present every moment, so intense every moment and it is invincible every moment, then nothing can bother you. Nothing can touch you. Then laughter is very authentic. It is real laughter. You might have observed babies, six months old or one year old. When they laugh, they laugh with their whole body. The laughter is not just coming out of their mouths. Every cell in the body is laughing. That is enlightenment. That laughter is innocent, pure, without inhibitions, without any strain.

Laughter opens us up, opens the heart. And anytime we don’t feel up to that innocence, what do we do? You question: “ I don’t feel that innocent or free. What do I do?” You can attend to several layers of your own existence. First, the body - see if you have had good rest, proper food and some exercise. Then attend to the breath. Breath has its own rhythm. Every mood of the mind has a definite rhythm in the breath. By attending to the rhythm in the breath, the mind and body can be elevated. Then look at the concepts and opinions that hover in the mind. Good, bad, right, wrong, should do, shouldn’t do, all these could bind you.

Every thought is associated with sensation, some feeling. Observe the sensation and feeling in the body. Observe the rhythm in the emotions. Attend to this rhythm of the emotions. Observing thoughts as thoughts, emotions as emotions, opens us to our true Self, the godliness within us. The very observation changes it. When you observe, all that is negative falls away. And the nature of positive emotions is – they grow. If you observe when you are angry, the anger will fall away. And if you observe if there is love, love grows.