To the uninitiated it might seem ludicrous, but practitioners say the benefits derived from laughter yoga are nothing to giggle at.

“It relieves pain because of the endorphins that are released. When you’re laughing every organ in your body is being exercised,” said Nancy Hedberg, who gives instruction in a gentle Hatha style of laughter yoga from her Errington home. “It’s like an internal massage and it increases flexibility.”

Those are just a few of the reasons the unique form of recreation — combining traditional forms with group practice aimed at inducing chuckles, snickers and chortles — is quietly gaining recognition.

“I act like a goof basically,” said Hedberg. “I started teaching yoga again last October and I wanted it to be lively and fun. This is simply yoga but with laughter conjoined to everything ... A lot of yoga classes can be quite serious.”

That’s definitely not the case in Hedberg’s class, where laughter is not only encouraged but categorized. There’s the electric shock laugh, where participants sneak up to one another pretending to administer shocks with their fingers; the jackpot laugh, mimicing how one might react to news they’ve won the lottery and many others.

Developed in (1995) by Mumbai family physician Dr. Madan Kataria and his wife Madhuri, a yoga teacher, the first laughter get-together was more like a joke club, where people gathered to engage in buffoonery. From this experience, Dr. Kataria learned humor and jokes can be exclusionary and wanted to find a way to stimulate laughter in his group without relying on jokes. From the science of neuro-linguistic programming, he remembered the body and brain doesn’t know the difference between what it imagines and what is real and devised the technique of using simulated laughter to stimulate actual guffaws.

“Different types of laughs give exercise to different areas of the body,” said Nancy Taunton, Hedberg’s mom and, at 83 years of age, one of the local laughing group’s most enthusiastic boosters.

“It’s supposed to be good for high blood pressure which I have. It makes you feel really good. It’s kind of like a fake laughter, until you get started, and then it all becomes so silly you can’t help yourself ... the laughter has to come from way down in your tummy.”

Measurable health indicators related to laughter yoga are difficult to quantify, but evidence published in the journal Humour and Health points to many positive benefits. Studies indicate laughing lowers blood pressure, reduces stress hormones, increases muscle flexion, and boosts immune function by raising levels of infection fighting T cells and proteins like Gamma-interferon and B cells that produce antibodies against disease. Laughter also triggers the release of endorphins, the body’s natural painkillers.

Hedberg, (who began teaching Hatha Yoga in 2004 after receiving her Yoga Teacher Diploma and) Laughter Yoga (in 2009) after certification received from an on-line course offered out of California, said people’s reactions can be hesitant at first but noted most are turned around quickly to the fun and relatively easy form of exercise.

Details on Hedberg’s classes are available at 250-954-3733.

“It begins with clapping and the words we use for laughing are ‘ho, ho, ha, ha, ha,” she said with some amusement adding, “the initial reaction can be ‘what the Hell is going on.’ It’s not about doing, it’s about being ... I’m not here to entertain them (but to help them to learn to heal themselves.)”

reporter@pqbnews.com