As you sit here reading these words, you are breathing … stop for a moment and notice this breath.

You could control the breath, and make it behave as you like … or you can simply let yourself breathe.

There is peace in just letting your body breathe, without having to do anything about it.

Now imagine letting the your hands breathe. Just let them be, without having to control them. Just let them breathe.

Now look around you, and notice what else is in the room with you. See each object, and let it breathe.

If there are any people in the room with you, in your building, or in nearby buildings our houses … see them in your mind and let them breathe.

When you let them breathe, you just let them be, exactly as they are. You don’t need to change them, don’t need to control them, don’t need to improve them. You just let them breathe, in peace, and you accept that. You might even smile at this breathing.

As you go through your day, let everything breathe. Let yourself breathe.

There is no need to do anything. You don’t expect anything from anything or anybody. Just let them come as they come, let them go as they go.

Just appreciate everything and everybody as they are, miracles of existence, breathing in the soft air of the world, and smile at this joyful manifestation of love.

Have you ever made a bucket list? For me, they’re incredibly seductive. I love reading other people’s bucket lists, and making my own.

But here’s what happens when you make a bucket list:

You put this huge burden on yourself to get the list accomplished. As if we don’t have enough on our to-do lists already!

If you don’t do well at pursuing the things on the list, you feel under accomplished.

If you do well at pursuing the list, you are probably pursuing less-than-meaningful activities. They’re usually just there because they sounded cool to do.

The truth is, most of the things we put on bucket lists are just ideas that popped into our heads, not anything connected to meaning.

We put things like “skydiving” and “learn to surf” and “visit the Amazon rainforest” and “kiss in the rain” all of which are excellent activities …

but we rarely put things like, “change someone’s life” or “find meaningful work that I care about” or “be compassionate toward my family”.

Why put pressure on ourselves to achieve a huge list of things that aren’t that meaningful? Why feel guilty if we’re not pursuing them? Why not let them go?

Life isn’t a big todo list, nor is it about optimizing all the things we do in life.

The most amazing things are right in front of us, right where we are. Right now. We don’t have to go anywhere or see some incredible sights or do daring activities to experience the wonder of life.

And we can do meaningful work, right where we are. What would a shorter list of meaningful activities look like? What would your anti-bucket list contain?

And if you don’t know what’s meaningful to you … isn’t that what you should be pursuing instead of a bucket list?

My friend is a stand-up comedian. He is seriously trying to make this a full-time profession. Humour, it seems, does not get you much money. Exceptions like Vir Das prove that point after a decade of making people laugh.

I sometimes like writing about day-to-day life and some of it may apply to some of my friends who practice management. I have been told that I am witty.

I have also been told that my wit often misses its mark. Worse, it is taken as a sign of a casual attitude, and I am kept out of “grown-up” discourses. Given that I am nifty at twenty four this bothers me so much that I am unable to see the lighter side of it. It’s not that I’m that old anyways.
I decided to pull up my socks and look into this humour business. Not too many people question whether it is a useful tool.

However, is it possible to get it? Is it genetic? What sort of a mindset is needed to bring in a light touch at a moment’s notice to break tension? I asked my particularly good friend known for his one liners and sarcastic comments. I also asked Uncle Google about the underlying science behind Humour. And this is what I found.

Humour comes in several different packages. A lighter way of looking at things is one way. Another way is to come up with one-liners. For this, I keep going back to my favourite author Oscar Wilde. A quote he said in a lighter vein which particularly appeals to me as an Executive and Life Coach is “Be yourself. Everyone else is taken.”

Humour can take the form of comic relief. Often in movies, plays and novels, when the setting become too intense, a touch of humour makes things more bearable. In real life also, it is a big asset for a leader to have the ability to inject humour when things are very serious.

The last line of the Poem, “When I Consider How My Light is Spent”, more commonly known as “On His Blindness” written by John Milton has the famous words, “They also serve who only stand and wait.”

We may not perform the main role , but appreciating humour is a much lower hanging fruit which gives pleasant results. That first step in using Humour is learning to appreciate it. Humour is meant to lighten the atmosphere.

Often, it is taken too seriously. Ask yourself a few basic questions:
“Is this even important”
“Will I or anyone else even remember it in a few days”?
“Is it worth getting worked up about?”

I was called “baby elephant” by a friend , and it caught onto a few of his close friends too because I am a size sexy. I had no issue being called that name because I saw the fondness displayed in it since baby elephants are cute and actually less bigger than an elephant.

The difference between acceptable and offensive humour often distils down to whether you are laughing with and being laughed at.

Ability to laugh at one’s own self is an important ingredient of this. An American writer and philosopher made this profound observation, “Do not take life too seriously. You will never get out of it alive”. This underlying truth should make people lighten up .

After all, their lives don’t centre around you and off-cuff remarks which evoke laughter at one’s expense should be laughed off.

The vast majority who can barely find the patience to read a one thousand words article can learn a little bit about the importance of being humorous here.

For those who still read books, I thoroughly recommend Oscar Wilde’s book, “The Importance of Being Earnest” to understand how importance triviality is.