Steve Bhaerman – A Course in Laughter 5 Weeks (April 16 – May 14, 2012)

A Course in Laughter will give you time-tested tools for helping you stay resilient and grounded during these tremendous times of change. It can help you rise above personal challenges and gain new perspective on our global struggles. 
 

Steve Bhaerman – A Course in Laughter 5 Weeks (April 16 – May 14, 2012)

 

“Seriousness is one of the major causes of truth decay on the planet.”

– Swami Beyondananda
While there’s a lot of serious work to be done to heal and transform our lives and world, now more than ever we need to fully care for ourselves.
And laughter is one of the best medicines for healing our bodies, minds and spirits. It brings us great joy and inner peace, which then makes us more available to serve others and the world’s most pressing needs.
This 5-week course with internationally-known author and workshop leader Steve Bhaerman offers you breakthrough tools to unleash your inner comedian, transform any negativity or pain in your life, and help free your spirit to connect more deeply with the world and those around you.
You don’t have to be a professional comedian to use the magical tools of the comic to bring love, laughter, wisdom and perspective into your life! And this fun, funny and incisive course helps you apply the tools of the comedian to your own personal human comedy and the many dramas our planet faces.
For decades, Steve Bhaerman – who has gained a worldwide audience as the “cosmic comic” Swami Beyondananda – has been entertaining (or “innertaining”) thousands with wit and wisdom. He also blogs about politics and current events from a spiritual perspective, prompting Marianne Williamson to call him the “Mark Twain of our generation.”
We are delighted to offer this rare offering in conscious comedy to our global Shift community. The class will consist of five 90-minute evening sessions, starting Monday, April 16 – Monday, May 14 from 5:00 to 6:30 pm PDT, 8:00 to 9:30 pm EDT.
Plus, you’ll receive a A Course in Laughter workbook and two Bonus e-books – Wake Up Laughing: An Insider’s Guide to the Cosmic Comedy and The Zen Cohens of Harry Cohen Baba – that will help you apply and embody what you learn in the course into your daily life.
As the Swami says, “You will wake up laughing and leave laughter in your wake.”
The old adage “Laughter is the best medicine” actually has a wealth of scientific research to support it. Many studies have linked laughter directly to improvements in physical health, relationships, job satisfaction and emotional wellbeing.When you laugh, your whole body chemistry changes. It’s like a cleansing effect – you feel better and lighter. Laughter also cuts across boundaries and helps you connect better with others, even those you don’t know. It promotes group bonding, and laughter’s infectious nature elevates the mood of all those around you.
A Course in Laughter will give you time-tested tools for helping you stay resilient and grounded during these tremendous times of change. It can help you rise above personal challenges and gain new perspective on our global struggles. This course can also:

Boost your immunity and lower stress hormones
Decrease any pain in your body and relax your muscles
Add joy and zest to your life
Improve your mood and increase your resilience
Ease anxiety or fears
Heal your heart and free your mind
Transform your view of our global crises
Strengthen your relationships and help you diffuse conflict
Increase your bond with co-workers or your connections with groups

Get immediately download Steve Bhaerman – A Course in Laughter 5 Weeks (April 16 – May 14, 2012)

Week 1: The Cosmic Joke and the Fool’s Journey (April 16)
In this session, we will explore the metaphysical nature of humor and how and why life is indeed a joke. This understanding is the gateway to both healing the heart and freeing the mind. This week we will learn:

What is the Cosmic Joke, and why is it funny – and not funny?
How and why seriousness is always the set up for humor, and how to know when the joke is on you and not take it “poisonally”
The journey to “fool realization” and the pathway to becoming the “wise fool”

Week 2: The Elements of Humor (April 23)

This week we will look at the four elements and how they apply to comedy. We’ll recognize that with earth, water, fire or water, humor can be used as an “alchemical” (not to mention “all-comical”) balance. In this session we will have fun with:

The alchemy of humor: how to transform the grosser stuff of life into laughter, joy, insight and wisdom
Finding YOUR most powerful element, and identifying your humor type
Using the four elements of humor to heal (i.e., restore wholeness)

Week 3: Humoring Yourself and Others (April 30)

In this session, we explore the protocols of when to go for the jocular… and when not to. We will put humor into the context of all transformational modalities, so a joke builds bridges instead of blowing them up. This week we’ll play with:

Why the first – and best – joke is always on yourself
How and when to take the conversation from serious to humorous
How to tell a joke – really!

Week 4: Transforming the Trance (May 7)
This week we learn how a joke uses a trance to end a trance, and how and why humor is a dance between the logical and intuitive brains. We will understand the deeper context of jokes so they can be truly used as “healing stories.” Some of what we will cover includes:

Why the mind needs to – and loves to – be tricked
The “aha” after the “ha-ha” – how to seed insight in a “harmless” joke
The Zen Cohen – what it is, how to use it and how to create your own

Week 5: Your Laugh Story (May 14)
Swami says, “Laugh at yourself – and the whole world will laugh at you, too.” This session is about creating “self-facing” humor that dances with your personal shadow while staying “in love.” Some of what we will cover in our final session includes:

Finding the natural humor in your life story, and using it to transform your story into a healing one
Tracing your own “fool’s journey”
The transformational nature of: “… and then, a funny thing happened…”

You will learn about comedy – with a transformational twist – from the inside out, and find out how even a non-comedian can practice “situational comedy” in almost any situation.
Special Course Bonuses
In addition to the five course sessions, you will also receive two “fool length” e-books and a workbook that will help you apply and embody what you learn in the course into your daily life:

Wake Up Laughing: An Insider’s Guide to the Cosmic Comedy, a 75-page downloadable e-book that tells you all you need to know about the Cosmic Joke, The Fool’s Journey, the Divine Comedy… and how and why to laugh even when it’s just not funny. $15 value.

The Zen Cohens of Harry Cohen Baba: Three Dozen of the Funniest Stories Ever Told, a 58-page downloadable e-book with wise and hilarious stories suitable for after dinner speakers, or way after dinner speakers. $15 value.

A Course In Laughter Workbook. Includes exercises guaranteed to help you achieve your humorin’ potential. Downloadable PDF.

Steve Bhaerman is an internationally known author, humorist and workshop leader. For the past 23 years, he has written and performed as Swami Beyondananda, the “Cosmic Comic.”
As the Swami, Steve is the author of Driving Your Own Karma (1989), When You See a Sacred Cow, Milk It For All It’s Worth (1993), Duck Soup for the Soul (1999) and Swami for Precedent: A 7-Step Plan to Heal the Body Politic and Cure Electile Dysfunction (2004).
Get immediately download Steve Bhaerman – A Course in Laughter 5 Weeks (April 16 – May 14, 2012)
In his “past life” (before Swami), Steve started an alternative high school in Washington, D.C. and co-authored a book about his experiences, No Particular Place to Go: Making of a Free High School. A political science major, he later taught history to autoworkers at Wayne State University in Detroit as part of the Weekend College.
In 1980, Steve co-founded Pathways Magazine in Ann Arbor, Michigan, one of the first publications bringing together holistic health, personal growth, spirituality, and politics. Subsequent to Pathways, Steve was a freelance writer and co-author with Don McMillan of Friends and Lovers: How to Meet the People You Want to Meet (Writer’s Digest Books, 1986).
Since 2005, Steve has written a political blog with a spiritual perspective, Notes From the Trail, hailed as an encouraging voice “in the bewilderness.” His latest book, written with cellular biologist Bruce H. Lipton, PhD is Spontaneous Evolution: Our Positive Future and a Way to Get There From Here (Hay House, 2009). Steve is active in transpartisan politics and the practical application of Spontaneous Evolution.