Ten Percent Happier with Dan Harris - 423: A Serious Case for Humor | Jennifer Aaker & Naomi Bagdonas

Episode Date: March 2, 2022

A common denominator among all of the great meditation teachers is a sense of humor. They take the teaching seriously, but they don’t take themselves seriously. So perhaps there’s a link between human flourishing and humor. That’s not to say you have to be hilarious in order to be happy, but it clearly helps a great deal not to take yourself so seriously. And it turns out that humor is a skill.Jennifer Aaker and Naomi Bagdonas co-teach a course at the Stanford Graduate School of Business, called, “Humor: Serious Business.” They also co-authored a book called, Humor, Seriously: Why Humor Is a Secret Weapon in Business and Life (and How Anyone Can Harness It. Even You.)Dr. Jennifer Aaker is the General Atlantic Professor at the Stanford Graduate School of Business whose work has been published in leading scientific journals and featured in The Economist, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Atlantic, and Science. Naomi Bagdonas is a lecturer at the Stanford Graduate School of Business and an executive coach. She trained formally at the Upright Citizens Brigade Theatre, teaches improv in San Francisco’s county jail, and performs in comedy venues.This episode explores:Why Naomi and Jennifer say we’ve fallen off a humor cliffThe four main humor styles and how to figure out which is yoursWhen self-deprecation works, and when it doesn’tHow to conduct a humor auditHow to sign off your emails The relationship between humor and statusThe connection between humor and loveA taxonomy of workplace humorThe different types of humor fails, and what to do about themFull Shownotes: https://www.tenpercent.com/podcast-episode/jennifer-aaker-naomi-bagdonas-423 See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

This is the 10% happier podcast. I'm Dan Harris. Hey, everybody, apologies if you've heard my rap on this subject before, but as you all know, a huge part of my job is interviewing highly attained meditation teachers and masters and a common denominator among all of the guests I have found is a sense of humor. They take the teaching seriously, but they don't take themselves seriously. So there's clearly some sort of link between human flourishing and humor. That is not to say that you have to be hilarious in order to be happy, but again, it clearly

helps a great deal not to take yourself so seriously. As it turns out, like pretty much everything we talk about on this show, humor is a skill. So that's the good news. And my guests today are here to elaborate on this, teach us the skill. They co-teach a course, in fact, at the Stanford Graduate School of Business called Humor, Sirius Business. They also recently co-authored a book called Humor Seriously, Why Humor

is a superpower at work and in life. Dr. Jennifer Ocker is the general Atlantic professor at the Stanford Graduate School of Business and a leading expert on how purpose and meaning shape individual choices and how technology can positively impact both human well-being and company growth.

Her work has been published in leading scientific journals and featured in the Economist, The New York Times, Wall Street Journal, The Atlantic, and Science. Her co-author and co-teacher and friend Naomi Begdonis is a lecturer at the Stanford Graduate School of Business and an executive coach. She formally trained at the upright Citizens Brigade Theater, performs at comedy venues, and teaches improv in San Francisco's county jail. In this conversation, we talk about why they say we've fallen off a humor cliff, the four main humor styles, and how to figure out which one is yours. When self-deprecation works and when it doesn't, how to conduct a humor audit, that's their term, humor audit, how to sign off your emails, the relationship between humor and status,

the connection between humor and love, a taxonomy of workplace humor, and the different types of humor fails and what to do about them. Okay, we'll get started with Jennifer Ocker and Naomi Begdonis right after this. Before we jump into today's show, many of us want to live healthier lives, but keep bumping our heads up against the same obstacles over and over again. But what if there was a different way to relate to this gap between what you want to do and what you actually do? What if you could find intrinsic motivation for habit change that will make you happier

instead of sending you into a shame spiral? Learn how to form healthy habits without kicking your own ass unnecessarily by taking our healthy habits course over on the 10% happier app. It's taught by the Stanford psychologist Kelly McGonical and the great meditation teacher Alexis Santos to access the course just download the 10% happier app wherever you get your apps or by visiting 10% calm all one word spelled out okay on with the show. Hey y'all it's your girl Kiki Palmer I'm an actress singer and entrepreneur on my new podcast baby this is Kiki Palmer I'm asking friends family and experts

the questions that are in my head. Like, it's only fans only bad. Where did memes come from? And where's Tom from MySpace? Listen to Baby, this is Kiki Palmer on Amazon Music or wherever you get your podcast. What's up? Jennifer Acker and Naomi Bagdona,

welcome to the show. Thank you so much. We're so happy to be here. I'm happy you're here. Jennifer, let me just start with you. You say that we've fallen off a humor cliff. What do you mean by that? Yes, so we have data from over 1.5 million people

collected globally by Gallup that asked a very simple question and that is, did you smile or laugh a lot yesterday? And the answer is yes, when we're 16 and 18 and 20, and then all of a sudden, right around 23-ish, the answer drops and becomes no for pretty much everyone. And here's the problem. So right around the time we get into the workforce, the answer becomes no, I don't remember

smiling or laughing a lot yesterday. And it doesn't come back up until about 80. And that is the humor cliff. The biggest challenge is average life expectancy is 78. So that's a math problem. That is the humor cliff. It's just this idea that we stop smiling and laughing as kids. We do it all of the time. And then there's something about around the time we enter the workforce where we stop.

So what's going on there, Naomi? I wanted to take that one. Yeah, so around age 23, we go to work and we have all these perceptions about how we need to be at work that we have to be serious and put together, and in order to be successful, we have to sort of present this version of ourselves. And that version has absolutely no semblance of humor. Now, there are a couple of hang-ups and misconceptions that people bring to the table about humor, and about its value in the world, especially at work. And the first is that this is about being funny. It's about inventing something clever from thin air,

and that is not true at all. More so, it's just about being truthful. When we look for truth in our lives, we uncover more humor as well. And then the second thing is, when people start to think about having more humor, they're so focused on having the right thing to say. And it's actually about being in

the right mindset. And so this is what we work with our students on at Stanford, as they're integrating humor back into their lives, and especially in their professional lives, we're training them to navigate their lives on the precipice of a smile. Not tell jokes, but just go about your life looking for reasons to be delighted rather than disappointed. It's so funny you say this thing about not telling people they need to be funny. Behind the scenes, a 10% happier as we launch more podcasts with different hosts and we bring different talent onto the app. We talk a lot about humor because we value that as a brand differentiator. By the same token, there's nothing more painful than people trying too hard to be funny.

And so what we've really landed on is take what we're talking about seriously, you know, training the mind, happiness, human flourishing seriously, don't take yourself seriously. And in the process of not taking yourself seriously in being open and real about who you are and what you're going through, it can be humorous, but it's definitely engaging. Does that make sense to you? Not at all.

Absolutely. That's exactly what we teach our students. This idea that you can do very serious things without taking yourself to serious lay. You know what, your entire team should basically get a Stanford MBA, you know, from your leaders to principals. You're totally right that it's easy to believe if we take our lives and our missions seriously that the presence of humor betrays that mission, that gravity and levity are odds.

And our research here tells a different story. And so this is about bringing more humor to work. But the second misconception is exactly that. That bringing humor to work means telling jokes. And that is not it at all. It's exactly what you're saying. It's just not taking ourselves so seriously. Also we talk about this is about humanity over humor. So be a human

first, be your authentic self. That's going to unlock your sense of humor and unlock other people as well. Is part of the issue that the culture has become pretty tricky to navigate these days? There's a lot of sensitivity. I think some of it is really good. I'm less likely sometimes to tell jokes, especially in a work context, because I don't wanna do something stupid or offensive. Yeah, absolutely. So a couple of things there, one, yeah, you can argue that the world has gotten quite humorless,

but it's actually in these moments where there is a lot of tension. Mental well-being has been on the decline. I think one recent survey said that out of a large set of people who are asked since the global pandemic, 85% of people are saying that mental well-being is on the decline and there's tension and there's stress out in the world. And that's not to mention other sort of challenges we're all facing. But what we find, both in the research on health, as well as the research that we've done in business and social settings, that is the exact time that we actually need it.

And so, from a physiological angle, you know, think about what happens when we laugh together. So, what happens is our brains release this cocktail of hormones. We release endorphins, giving us a feeling similar to a runner's high. We lower our cortisol, which makes us feel calmer. By the way, this is a good moment to say, Dan, we love your podcast. We love your book. We love the entire premise that you have gone through the entire journey

you've taken people on. And in fact, I remember when I read your book, I actually felt calmer while laughing. So I think you do this so extremely well. The other thing is that we released dopamine, which is the same hormone release during certain types of physical touch. And so as far as our brains are concerned,

laughing is like exercising, meditating, and having sex all at the same time, but you know, logistically easier. So what's happening here is that it has this really impressive and significant effect on our physiology. I have so many questions. Let me just just just just to say I mean I really appreciate the kind words, but I want to own that I've gotten some pretty pointed and I think helpful,

although painful feedback that my sense of humor in interpersonal relationships can be a double-edged sword. Sometimes it's connective and sometimes it's a little too serrated and people don't know how to deal with it, especially if there's a power differential or it can feel like I'm keeping people at a distance through humor. At least in my own experience, humor is really important, but it's not always easy to deploy. Yeah. And you're bringing up a great point about humor styles. So I think, Dan, you've said previously that the love language in your family is mockery. Right? Yes.

That's sort of, you know, roasts, teasing. That's how love is shown. And we've actually done quite a bit of research around different styles of humor. And we found that there are four broad styles of humor. So the magnet, the sweetheart, the standup and the sniper. And the magnet, their charismatic, outgoing, uplifting, sort of tend to be more goofy, this goofy style of humor.

Then we have the sniper. So snipers are edgy, dry, sarcastic, nuanced. They're sort of masters of the unexpected dig and teasing. Then the stand-up stand-ups are bold, are reverent, not afraid to ruffle a few feathers for a laugh. Again, this sort of teasing style of humor. And then sweethearts. So, sweethearts are understated, honest, always lean on humor that is going to bring people together.

They really lean on self-deprecation. And so, what we find and why these styles are so powerful is those snipers and stand-up styles, they are like quintessential your family, right? Their love language is mockery. And it's important to recognize that not everyone takes mockery as a sign of intimacy. So, you know, we talk a lot with our students about recognizing not just what your style is and what your strengths are and potentially your pitfalls, but also trying to read the room and understand what's the relationship, what's the context,

are you the boss? And if so, leaning towards magnet and sweetheart style humor might actually be more powerful and more connecting for you as an individual. But it does bring me back to something that was said earlier, which is that, you know, we need perhaps humor more than ever given the gravity of the various social and global dynamics. And it's hard to do because people are so sensitive and you can get fired for being insensitive. And so you're asking me to like do a bunch of things at one time. One is to have the the humor mindset to is to like get a joke that comes to mind. Three is to read the room

correctly. And four is to yeah, yeah, it will and kittens at the same time. You've got it. I think our job here is done. Yeah, we can wrap up here. You've got it. I think our job here is done. Yeah, we can wrap up here. I mean, part of this is, you know, this misperception of what you're trying to do. So people often equate being funny with humor, but it's not. It's, as you said earlier, the worst thing you can do when you're trying to create a culture of levity in your team or your family or when talking to strangers is try to be funny. And there's so many boomerang effects that can happen there. But what we talk about in our class at Stanford

and in our research is it's not about trying to be funny. It's really about noticing truths in the world. And so one of our first tips is just you start with truths. Don't try to be funny, just notice what's true. So for example, something like recently, I've come to realize that I like my dog more than most humans, maybe all humans. But you know, that's the truth.

In some context, that could actually be humorous. And then what you do is you take certain tools that comedians oftentimes use, and then you can dial up the humor through exaggeration or observation or ending on rule of three, et cetera. And we can talk a little bit about these tips, but we have a whole chapter in our book, chapter three that dives into them. The big thing, though, is don't try to be funny. That often can backlash.

I would love you to dive into chapter three and give us some tips. One thing that you asked about earlier that I just want to sort of close the loop on and then we can definitely go to tips that we're asking you to juggle so many things and it can feel that way. So I just want to super simplify this idea of how do we make humor really safe. And the first principle in our class is, if you're thinking about using humor, don't ask, will this make me sound funny? Ask, how will this make other people feel? Because the goal is not to get a laugh. The goal is to make the room feel lighter and to make people

feel more at ease. And so when we have that goal in mind, it becomes a lot easier to discern what is going to feel connecting and what might feel distancing. And there's sort of this broader goal in this work, which is the phrase, people want to be valued members of a winning team on an inspired mission. And so if we keep that in mind, how do I make sure that the people on this team feel valued? How do we maintain a winning attitude?

How do we stay connected to our inspired mission? Staying light and staying loose, having a sense of humor, not taking ourselves too seriously. It's not about being funny, right? But sort of staying light and loose, that helps to further all of these things. So again, I just want to super simplify. It feels like we're juggling a lot, but it really is. Don't ask, well, this make me sound funny. Ask, how is this going to make other people feel?

I like that. It reminds me a little bit of something that my meditation teacher, Joseph Goldstein, once said to me about how to speak skillfully in the context of controversial social justice issues. I hope I'm not mangling what he said. But it was something about like, is what you're about to say likely to bring people together

or drive them apart? Yes. And it sounds like that's reasonably close to your humor guideline. Absolutely. Yeah, exactly, exactly. I think people get so focused on themselves when it comes to humor.

Like you get nervous and you think, okay, I want to be funny. I want to say the right thing in the right way. And actually Kelly Leonard and Ann Libra, who run the second city, their first principle is get off of yourself. Get out of your head. It's not about you, it's about the other people.

And there's another principle in the comedy that humor exists in the space between the comedian and the audience. So this idea of quelling the ego, getting off of yourself, and really thinking about how is this going to make other people feel? Is this connecting or is this distancing, and holding that before anything else? It's so true. And, you know, a lot of this also is just about being more generous with your laughter. We know from the research that laughing together, shortens the path to connection. So, for example, when people laugh before having a conversation, they're actually more likely

to disclose personal information. They actually disclose 30% on average, more personal information about themselves. So they feel closer. So there's real benefit to doing that. And again, it's not about you being funny. You can even achieve some of these things by just being more generous with your laughter. It's interesting, you said that thing about, getting out of your own head,

getting out of your own way, getting over yourself in the process of trying to inject levity into a situation because I can see how that's true. And yet, when, at least for me, on the occasions when I say something that people find funny, I do feel, and it go, it could dopamine release. Totally. Well, you are releasing dopamine.

It feels awesome. And it feels awesome for good reason, because not only is it making us feel better, right? It's releasing endorphins, making us feel more energized, able to bounce back more quickly from setbacks, dopamine, lower your cortisol, but it's also changing other people's perceptions of us. We know from the research that individuals who use humor effectively at work are viewed by others as

significantly higher in status, more confident and more competent. We also know that leaders with a good sense of humor are seen as 27% more motivating by their employees and that those employees report being 15% more engaged at work. And so you are feeling good for good reason. However, if you focus too much on that, if that's the goal, you know, to be funny, then it's the most surefire way to fail. So is the poster child for doing this incorrectly,

Michael from the office? Yeah, probably. Yeah, you can see why, right? It's so focused on being funny himself and being seen a certain way, rather than how it makes other people feel. Side note, favorite office episode ever. Have you guys seen the one where they all go to Michael's house and he has

this TV that's like 12 inches by 12 inches on the wall. It's absolutely hilarious. We should all go watch it later. And so Lee Eisenberg, who was a guest in our class, who's a writer for the office, he talked about how that was one of their favorite episodes to film. But it took them like three times the normal episode length because they could not stop laughing. Everyone's like in tears, and even if you watched the episode, there'll be cuts where you sort of see like tears in like some of the actors' eyes because they've just been like having so, so much fun with it.

Anyways, so that's our homework for today is to watch that episode after this. Shout out to Lee Eisenberg, actually. He is an old friend of mine. So while we're propping him up just to say say he's got a new show coming out on Apple TV Plus called We crashed about we work Yep, awesome. We lovely. We lovely great guy. Okay enough promoting of Lee. Let's go back to the long Neglected chapter three that you guys were supposed to be walking me through actually Lee had a big role in chapter three that you guys were supposed to be walking me through. Actually, Lee had a big role in chapter three.

He would come to our class and we would delve into these different sort of rules and insights that comedians often use. Naomi, why don't you take it away? Yeah, so I think what's helpful to boil it down to two quick principles. And those principles are truth and misdirection. So first, we've talked about at the heart of humor is truth, don't look for what's funny. Instead, just notice things that are true. The comedian Sarah Cooper has this great airplane seating chart.

She made the observation that airplane seats tend to get smaller and smaller and more uncomfortable. And so that's the truth, right? She made this airplane seating chart and the labels were things like, you know, economy economy, economy comfort, economy, economy discomfort, economy agony, economy to the reckoning,

where's your God now economy, Satan's den economy and then finally just poop. So this is like super simple truth observation and by the way, she added a little bit of exaggeration to it. Second is misdirection. So laughter springs from the unexpected, right? When we look at a visual, it looks like a regular airplane seating chart and then all of a sudden economy to the reckoning. And so those are the two sort of highest order principles. So look at what's true in your life and then try and figure out a way to communicate it in a way that has a bit of misdirection built in.

Coming up, Jennifer and Naomi explain how to conduct what they call a humor audit. They talk about how to sign off on your emails and the pros and cons of self deprecating humor. That's right after this. self-deprecating humor. That's right after this. Hey, I'm Ericia, and I'm Brooke. And we're the hosts of Wundery's podcast, Even the Rich, where we bring you absolutely true and absolutely shocking stories about the most famous families and biggest celebrities the world has ever seen. Our newest series is all about drag icon RuPaul Charles. After a childhood of being ignored by his absentee father, Ru goes out searching for love and acceptance. But the road to success is a rocky one. Substance abuse and mental health struggles threaten to veer Ru off course. In our series RuPaul Born Naked, we'll show you how RuPaul overcame his demons

and carved out a place for himself as one of the world's top entertainers, opening the doors for aspiring queens everywhere. Follow even the rich wherever you get your podcasts. You can listen ad-free on Amazon Music or the Wondery app. Any other tips from this now super famous chapter three? First of all, chapter three is just, yeah, it's a piece of work. It should be its own book. But one of them is so simple and it goes back to your point of how do you actually create humor, but also be thoughtful about how you're sort of offsetting risks as well.

And one of the easiest tools you can do is just simply moving the humorous or unusual thing to the very end of a sentence. So, for example, Amy Schumer once said, what did she say? She started her stand-up, a particular show saying, you might have noticed that I've gotten very rich, very famous, and very humble. Now, how to use humble as the first or second trait would not be as funny. So simply moving things to the end of the sentence is a really easy way to actually increase loveity and decrease the risk of offsetting anything. Another one simply is just around simple things like callback. So let's say Dan, you're in a podcast.

Let's say it's this one. Let's say there was an earlier moment where we all laughed together. And then simply at the end of the podcast, making reference to that single line that created that laughter. And first of all, again, no risk in mentioning that callback, which is simply referencing the laugh line

that someone else might have mentioned before. And second of all, it makes that other person feel great because, A, you were listening, and B, it brought it back to them. So there's really simple tools that can be brought about to actually increase the humor and make people feel like they are on a team and are listening to.

I'll add on a couple more. So we talked about exaggeration, that's a good one. And then another is contrast. So we talked about exaggeration. That's a good one. And then another is contrast. So look for areas of contrast in your life or train build contrast into your observation. So one of my favorite Larry David quotes is I had a wonderful childhood, which is really tough because it's hard to adjust to a miserable adulthood.

Right. So just making that sort of area of contrast, rule of three is another good one. So that's Jennifer talked about ending on the humorous thing. If you're not sure how to do that, just create a list of three things, make the last one a little bit unexpected, like the Amy Schumer humility quote. So maybe I could show how this works in action. So we had a CEO come to us and say, Hey, listen, I've got to give this big talk to my organization. And I want to be funny. So right, we some lines tell me how to be funny.

And we said, great, that sounds awesome. Forget all that. Just tell me what's going on in your life. Tell me what's true. And so we had sort of an exploratory conversation with him. He feels like his employees feel kind of distanced from him. Like he's on a pedestal and he wants to humanize himself We found out that he worries that that status barrier is impacting the team and makes him seem an unapproachable

And we found out that his kids don't listen to him at all. So this is like great awesome fodder So he actually ended up opening the talk using rule of three and Contrast and a little bit of exaggeration. So he opened the talk and he said something like, with working from home, my life has never been more full of contrast. He said, you know, I join these Zoom calls and I'm the CEO. Everyone listens to me. I joined my board meetings and I'm an industry expert.

And then I walk out of this office like through that door that you see in my background. And I am an executive assistant to two teenage daughters. You know, I'm an Uber driver. I'm a semi-professional manicurist. I'm a professional peanut butter and jelly maker. And he sort of goes on to all of these things that are really humanizing and totally true about his life as a dad to two teenage daughters. So it was just this kind of really nice, really low stakes way to share a little bit of levity, but more importantly, share a little bit more about himself and some humanity. Another thing I take from that story is that self-deprecation is one

of the safer strategies, although I'm curious, can self-deprecation go wrong? Absolutely. So self-deprecation is this really tricky form of humor that is super dependent on status and context. So if you are the highest status person in the room, self-deprecation is gonna be one of your greatest assets because we know that people code self-deprecation from high status individuals, from leaders, as confidence, as humanizing, as not taking yourself too seriously. So it's super powerful in that context.

But we also know that folks who are lower in status, if they over-index on self-deprecation, people can sort of code it as genuine insecurity. And so you really wanna be aware of what's the context, what's your sort of position in the room, and are you over indexing? That's incredibly helpful, it's really interesting. You also mentioned Zoom, the CEO's worry that he was distanced from his employees,

especially given the remote culture these days. And I'm just curious, Yard, their best practices for humor in an era of remote work? Yeah, I mean, I think the story you're mentioning is when we actually love the person who teaches with us at Stanford, his name is Connor Demon Yomine. He's also the co-CEO of a large nonprofit. And he brings humor and levity to life so organically and so beautifully

and with such significant effect that it's like a case study just walking around. So remember, he has high status because he's the co-CEO of this large nonprofit. But right when the world went into quarantine, he was leading his first virtual offsite with his entire organization. And people are exhausted and they're scared, it's tense. So he's sharing a few slides before passing to a teammate to speak. But when he does, he intentionally leaves his screen share on. And the entirety, thinking it's a mistake, watches as he closes his PowerPoint. He opens a Google search and types in things inspirational CEOs say during hard times. And like everyone loses it.

It's this beautiful moment. And what's powerful about this is we're all basically operating on Zoom some of the time, if not a lot of the time. And people often think that humor is, you know is challenging to do in these moments of remote work. But in fact, that little anecdote just goes to show that this isn't about being funny, oftentimes you can use self-deprecation and really achieve significant effects.

Because as Naomi said before, we know from the research that when leaders are seen as having a sense of humor, not even a great sense of humor, just a sense of humor, they're more motivating and their teams are more bonded, they're more creative, mental well-being increases. And think about that. That was free. It didn't take a lot of thought and it was strategic, thoughtful and intentional. So, yeah, we find in these moments, even if remote work work that humor can be even potentially

more important. What is a humor audit? Well, it's the most fun audit you will ever take. It is, yeah, it is absolutely the most fun audit. So a humor audit is going through your life and making some observations about how humor shows up in your day. So things like noticing all the moments throughout the day

that you laughed or smiled, noticing moments when you made other people laugh and smile, and really importantly noticing who brings out your sense of humor. So what's the context who are you with? And we find that we're not super tapped into humor in the world, and it's a really important barometer for our mental well-being, for the people in our lives who are energizers versus energy trainers, and for the activities that we're doing where we're feeling in flow and we're

feeling like there's a sense of joy with what we're doing as well. So that's the humor audit. And then a subsection of that is actually, we have our students do an email audit. So in this email audit, they have to go through their sent email folder and pick out the last five or 10 emails that they've sent and forward them to a classmate. Obviously, emails that are okay to share.

And their classmate has to open up these emails and basically give them a score of how robotic versus human they open up these emails and basically give them a score of how robotic versus human they are in these emails. And what we find is the more that we interact with each other electronically, the easier it is to lose our humanity and our sense of humor along the way.

And so we try and train our students to weave back in some semblance of humanity and a little bit of levity in their emails. And we have some really specific tips for how to do that if we want to go into that. But that's the humor audit and the sub-portion of the email audit that we do in our class. Yeah, and then we do the tax audit because you know, you got to end on a winning note. Hey Dan, how do you sign off your emails? I don't.

Okay. Well, you, how do you sign off your emails? I don't. Well, you and I passed this class. So no, I'm worried about this because email Slack text, it's one of the least happy parts of my life. It does just so much coming at me. And I feel I do feel obligated to respond to all of it. And often I think I am humorless or lack humanity. And when I hear you say that we should have levity and humanity in our digital communications, I think, yes, that's true. And that sounds like a ton of work. I don't know that I have the bandwidth for. That is exactly how our students feel, too. And what we do is just just prove that belief, You know, people often

think this is a heavy lift. This will take too much time. But in fact, it not only doesn't, but the benefits of how you start interacting with others, fundamentally shipped in benefits are significant. So for example, about 90% of our students say that they most frequently sign off with best or best regards. But what does that even mean? You know, are you the best? Am I the best? Like, why do I need to tell you that? Best is the worst, maybe second after just silencing people and not signing off.

But anyway, it's really up there with being bad. But when you've been up all night, you can just sign off yours heavily caffeinated. Or if it's about something digital communication, like sign off, Dan, with let's never speak of this again, never email again. Or on rare occasion, I'm the best, because sometimes you just gotta let people know.

But the idea here is that you don't need to like assume that this is actually high stakes. We even encourage the students just to put a PS making reference to what the other person that said that might have just even created a smile. The bar in business is so low. It could not be lower. And so even these small changes that take very little time have extraordinary impact on how they start relating to others. And if trust in our culture and our teams and organizations is at all time low, which it is, and we know that if you can make someone smile or laugh,

it increases connection. It shortens the distance between two people. Why wouldn't you consider this as a tool in your toolkit? We assume you have a toolkit. You seem like a handy person. Yeah, and I'll just add, I know a lot of this is about creating shortcuts for people because you're writing a funny email sounds, super high stakes, but having just one word or line at the end of your email that shows any semblance

of humanity is actually super easy. So I just went into my sent mail, and I'll share my last two email sign offs. So one was an author had reached out about drumming up buzz for their book, and I wrote a super quick one line email back, and then I signed off with buzzing Naomi. So just a little bit of levity.

Another one had, this is a guy who gives a lot of talks and does research around the power of napping. So I just signed off with yours, a napper. So any little semblance of humanity or levity or something relates to the other person completely shifts the dynamic. And what we find is that when you send all of these emails out, right Dan, when you send your hundreds of emails out, you know, emails that leave your inbox every single day,

even if they're one line, if they have a tiny bit of humanity, it creates this ripple effect where everything you get back has a bit of humanity and levity as well. What if you're actually a lizard? Oh my god. Yeah, this is a problem in the class that we teach for humor for reptiles. And it's a great question, one that we really have to tackle.

Like I would have told that guy, your stupid email is making me tired. And then it would have been like a family member and they would have said, I love you. You love me. Exactly, like mockery. Oh my God, I never thought that. Daniels love me.

Exactly. So yeah, Matt, my wife sometimes says she can tell I'm in a bad mood if I'm not saying inappropriate things which is so perverse. So that actually leads me to a bit of what may be a digression here, but I'm interested. We're talking about work and we're going to come back to work, of course. But have you taken a look at the application of humor in one's personal life, in romantic life, and what the benefits and risks may be there?

Yes, in fact, one of our favorite studies, we did not run this study, but we very much admire the researchers who did. And what they did was they just asked people, they took like you and your wife and then, you know, another couple, so randomized control conditions, and they put you in the condition where you were asked to think of times where you and your wife laughed together. And in other conditions, the couples were asked, write down times or remember times when you were happy together.

And then the researcher came back to the different sets of couples and asked them, hey, by the way, how happy are you in your relationship? The individuals in your condition, the one who were called shared moments of laughter reported to be about 25% happier in their relationship than those who were just thinking about happy moments.

25%, it's an extraordinary thing because we spent a lot of time on therapy theoretically buying flowers theoretically. And yet, if you cultivate these moments of shared laughter, they become more memorable, they define the relationship and their impact actually really lasts over time. So yes, this is really important not just in business, but absolutely in life. I remember reading this book by my friend, Dacker Caldner from UC Berkeley, it's called Born

to Be Good. He's been on the show before. And in there, he talked about what researchers were calling off record humor, sort of like kind of inappropriate jokes, being useful for marriages. And I think I loaded that over my wife for, you know, like several decades. And I just wonder, like, if that sounds right to you, because part of my humor with my wife is that, you know, I do say things to her.

I would never say anybody to anybody else. And we laugh about that a lot. Well, first of all, Dacquers research is just outstanding. And so that does resonate. In fact, one of our other favorite studies is run by Dacquer and his co-author, George Bonanno. And they looked at these effects of laughter on the bereavement process. So they recruited about 40 people

who had lost a loved one in the last six months, and they asked them to describe their relationship with the deceased, and they taped the interviews. And when they found that when the participants who displayed genuine laughter, which is also called like Dushan laughter, when talking about their loved one, they reported 80% less anger and 35% less distress

in follow-on questionnaires versus those that didn't laugh at all. So, dackers work on positive emotions more generally, but certainly humor and laughter in particular is so important and extremely profound. What is Dushen laughter? Because it sounds like a name my wife calls me. All it is is authentic laughter, authentic smile like. So it's when your eyes get kind of crinkly and you're actually truly, truly laughing versus fake laughing.

The fake laughter just brings me a little bit back to this power dynamic that is prevalent in many workplaces. And sometimes I'll make a joke and people feel like they have to laugh. And that seems like a form of interpersonal violence because I'm in a position of power and I want to like, you know, puff up my own ego by being funny and people feel like they have to play along. That's not a good dynamic.

It is not a good dynamic and it happens super frequently. So we are hardwired to laugh at people in higher status. So again, there's been research where you have individuals walk into a room. You basically prime them to believe that the person in front of them is high status versus the same status versus low status. And then you have that person tell a super lame joke. In the high status condition, the majority of people in the that person tell a super lame joke. In the high status condition, the majority of people in the room will laugh at the lame joke. In the medium status condition, it's sort of 50-50, but people tend to not laugh as much, and then in the low status condition, basically no one's laughing. And so we talk about, as you rise in status, your barometer gets totally wacky, right?

Cause you're no longer getting real feedback about whether you're being appropriate, whether you're being funny or not. And so in that context, it's super important to have a set of trusted testers. So people who are gonna really shoot straight with you about how your humor's going and give you hard feedback if it's sort of going off track.

I also wanna come back to this idea of humor outside of work and in particular situations that are really hard or dark humor in situations that are hard, right? You said that you say things to your wife that you wouldn't say to anyone else and we've done quite a bit of interviewing of ER doctors during the pandemic and the things that are said behind the scenes, right? It's this feeling of, listen, my colleagues and I are laughing with each other behind the scenes because we have to. It is a coping mechanism and we absolutely have to find ways to take care of ourselves emotionally.

It doesn't mean that we're not taking our job seriously. In fact, I'm taking my job so seriously that I'm desperate for ways to stay healthy. And we also teach humor and improv in the local county jails in San Francisco. So we do this exercise in the jail. It's an improv exercise and it's called, fuck that sh**.

Or you can say like screw that stuff. It's where members of the community, so these are 35 inmates in the San Francisco County jail. They step into the middle of the circle and they shout out something that they're frustrated about. And step into the middle of the circle and they shout out something that they're frustrated about. And everyone on the outside of the circle has to make a sound or an emotion that is 10 times more frustrated that the person in the middle feels.

So someone steps into the circle, they say something they're frustrated about, everyone else sort of grouse about it or yells about it or says, you know, f*** that. So what we find with this exercise is some of the things are poignant, some of them are funny, but at the end of it, there is this feeling of sort of camaraderie and we've had folks in there who cry and say it's a really powerful experience.

So there are things like one guy steps in the middle and he says, seeing the exit sign every f*** day and not being able to exit. And everyone just yells as loud as they can. Or someone else steps in and they say, orange being my least favorite color. You know, everyone's standing there in orange and everyone's just yelling. Someone else steps in and says, my mom dying while I was in jail. And everyone just yells.

And so this ability to have real truth with each other and be able to look at those things and have also an outlet for levity and an ability to sort of bond over the fact that we're all here in orange, that there's an exit sign, whatever those things are, can be such an incredibly powerful and therapeutic thing to do. Yeah, I really resonate with that, given them, as a former combat correspondent, and we did a lot of joking in those contexts. And as I understand it, Jennifer,

your interest in humor began in a high stakes context with your mom working in a hospice. Yeah, I grew up with mom doing basically part-time work as a hospice volunteer. So her job, she's a teacher, and she also does American Cancer and volunteers for Mewls on Wheels. She's one of those angels, magical people. But I remember growing up and she would share with us what people wished for in their

last days of life because it was her job working in hospice to see if she could appease them or see if she could make them happier in some way or, you know, at least listen. And, you know, there were a lot of people that she spent the last days with who died and very joyful, very appreciative and uplifting ways, but there were also some who did express for greater wishes. And they seemed to fall into a few categories. When I remember her saying that people wish that they lived more boldly. Like, I should have done this. I should have done that.

And I should have traveled. I should have taken more risks. I wish I lived more authentically. I wish I was more me. And you know, they wish that they didn't listen as much to others or what they should have done. They wish they just savored more, the small moments. There were so many small moments that they just rushed by.

They wish they actually laughed more and didn't take themselves so seriously so that the earlier comment you made at the beginning of this podcast where you can do very serious things but just not take yourself so seriously. People don't really realize that deeply, oftentimes, till it's closer to the end. And also, I wish I had the chance to say I love you one more time. And so what's been so fascinating in the 10 years of work that Niyomi and I have collaborated and taught is that we've really found through the research and just through the stories of leaders and comedians that we talk to is that humor really mitig found through the research and just through the stories of leaders and comedians that we talk to, is that humor really mitigates

not just that one regret, but we shouldn't take myself so seriously, but the others, because it allows you to move through negative emotions more quickly. That's what you found also as a wartime correspondent, because it can diffuse tension and empower us to take bolder risks. It absolutely allows us to or can allow us to express ourselves more authentically. In fact, when we're finding joy, we care less about what people think and do more what we believe.

Almost by definition, you have to be more present. You have to be really savoring because you're trying to notice these truths, these hidden truths in each moment or those moments for a callback, you know, to laugh generously again. And maybe most importantly, there are a few acts that's easy and generous as, you know, sharing a laugh with someone. We have Michael Lewis, who's one of our favorite

guests and collaborators and friends, and he ends the book in an afterward he did with us with his phrase that we love, which is where humor exists. Love is not far behind. So yeah, that's one of the reasons we find this to be so important on just in business, but more broadly. Coming up, Jennifer and Naomi, share some humor lessons from the Dalai Lama, the New York Yankees, and Madeline Albright, and they tell us what to do when an attempt at humor falls flat right after this. It's really apparent to me that the overlap between humor, slash levity, and both mindfulness and what some might

call spirituality more generally. The mindfulness piece, the sort of present moment, awareness, being a wake quality, you just referenced in like having this mindset that makes you kind of humor ready where you're on the lookout for truth and on the lookout for connection and callbacks. The sort of broader contemplative piece or spiritual pieces, I might have mentioned this on the show before, so I apologize for any repetition. But in my job, my job is to interview not only researchers like the two of you, but also perhaps more frequently highly attained spiritual athletes. And the common denominator among all, and I mean all of the great spiritual teachers, gurus, whatever title they might prefer, the common

denominator is none of them takes themselves seriously. And it's just so striking. I mean, even earlier today, I was interviewing a really, really well established long time meditation teacher. And I don't know if we will have posted this interview by the time that has gone up. His name is Ajahn Sucito, British guy who's studied in the Thai forest tradition. So he has a title of Ajahn, which is basically teacher in that tradition.

And I remember just this small, he was funny throughout, but just this small thing at the end, I often asked this a little bit profunctory question of, is there anything I missed? Are there any questions you wish I had asked? He said, I mean, he didn't know I was going to ask this. And he just, no hesitation. He was like, there are a lot of questions I'm glad you didn't ask. If you look inside, you can't help but see how ridiculous you are.

And the humor just flows right out of that, even if you're not traditionally funny, or what maybe you're not a stand-up or a sniper, do you just look enough internally and you're just going to see so much ridiculous stuff that the only sane response over time is to laugh. Actually, the reduction of ego and being able to laugh easily, generously, and at yourself is so aligned with that work. We have not yet met him, but the Dalai Lama supposedly has just an incredible sense of humor. He laughs generously, he smiles generously. I remember there was an anecdote, I think,

was a CNN correspondent. Maybe it was Sanjay Gupta, and who said, basically, I notice you smile a lot, and it was Sanjay Gupta, who said, basically, you know, I noticed you smile a lot and it's very contagious. And he replied that basically were social animals and just to be able to develop connection and friendship, trust is so important. And he was using humor and just smiling as a way in order to create that genuine love and trust. I have interviewed him a bunch of times, and he is very funny. I've written about both of these before,

but the first time I met him, the first thing he said to me was that he had to go pee. I'm first duty, he said. And then he went to the bathroom, and then he came back and we talked. And then another time I was on a panel with him, and I told this joke that I always tell, which is shortly after my first book came out,

I found myself up in the middle of the night holding this screaming beast to poop everywhere, and I had this idea that the title of my next book is gonna be everything in my last book was bullsh**. And the crowd was laughing, and then I could see his translator reaching over to translate it for him, which made the whole thing even funnier. And then his response was, well, that tells me that you're not a very good meditator.

And did you say you need to meet my dad? Yeah, he's got that Borscht belt thing that my dad, it has. He is funny. I think some of the challenges of his public persona is that he's complex. I know plenty of people who know him well who've said that they've seen him in bad moods. They've seen him angry and sad. And so he's not just perennial goofball. He's a complex character, but he has this capacity to be really funny.

I love that. Back to creating a culture at work. There are these character types, you reference. So, in Chapter 6 in your book, you talk about creating a culture of levity. And you say that it helps to identify some of the archetypes of sort of workplace humor. Can you go through that taxonomy? Yeah, totally. So, one of them is the instigator.

So the instigator, those are these people who come into your organization. They don't at all fit the mold. And oftentimes, the reaction to an instigator coming into your organization is to reject it. And Ed Katmullet-Pixer talks about how these instigators are actually some of the most important of people, especially in creative organizations, or in any high-performing organization really,

to make other people feel safe bringing their humor or weirdness or whatever it is. So one example is we talked to Alex Rodriguez about the 2006 Yankee season, and that was the season that Johnny Damon joined the team. So it was spring training of 2006. Johnny Damon was gonna join the Yankees. And as Alex put it, we were very buttoned up at that time. We were the Goldman Sachs of baseball. They had a famously strict policy on hair,

nothing long in the back, no facial hair, all of that. And here comes in, you know, Johnny Damon drives a black Ferrari. His autobiography is called Idiot. He once dropped a pumpkin from his 34th floor balcony just to see what would happen. So he comes in and he's this archetypal instigator. And Alex told us about how on day one of spring training, he walks into the clubhouse at six in the morning, and he's got his boom box on his shoulder playing kid rock really, really loud and sort of like all heads go on a swivel and it was just this moment.

But rather than rejecting this energy, right, rather than sort of shutting it down, the team embraced it. And it, as Alex said, it unlocked a lot of people's senses of humor and it made people relax and play better. So this sort of shockwave to the culture, this weirdness, this out there, not playing by the rules, blasting kid rockets 6am, made everyone sort of loosen up and also bring out their own sense of humor. So it wasn't much later where AJ Burnett, who's the picture, started a new tradition where every time someone hit a home run or had a walk off to end the game, he would be waiting

to smash them in the face with a pie. And so Alex talked about how, for baseball in a world of everyone being appraised by numbers, home runs, RBI's, slugging percentages, there are these people who walk into a clubhouse and shift the energy, who shift the ambiance, and it's those people who make other people loosen up, make them lighter, bring their full selves to work that actually helps make the team play much better. All right, so culture carriers, those are these natural leaders and rising stars who tend to have sort of a natural strength around humor. Then you've got these hidden gems. So that's the third type. And hidden gems are diligent under the radar, high performers that provide sort of unexpected opportunities for levity just by being themselves. So if you've got the instigator as like the doesn't fit

the mold, totally making a ruckus, the hidden gems are completely keeping them self doing a really good job, but often through elevating them, you can actually help the culture. So one example of a hidden gem was in Apple's Creative Design Studio. So this is a story from Herokia Si.

So he would have these all hands meetings. And they spent months leading up to these all hands meetings, trying to figure out what sort of fun, interesting, lively thing they would do. They had one time wherever we dressed up. They did like a blue man group presentation. They have funny videos. They have all of these different sort of weird things to kind of energize the group.

Well, before one of the all-hands, Heroki learned that one of his junior designers is a gospel music singer on the weekends. He talked to her a little bit about it. And then when the all-hands rolled around, Heroki's up on stage and he says, actually, you know, before we go further, I want to bring up Emily and have her talk a little bit about the work she's been doing. Everyone looks around confused and is like, why is this junior designer about to come speak at the all hands? So this woman gets on stage, she grabs the mic and she starts singing and it turns into a gospel flash mob, like a gospel choir flash mob where the curtains

come back. There's a chorus behind her, there are people planted in the audience who start coming forward and singing. And so it was just this like total weird burst of energy. Everyone's laughing, everyone's singing along. But that's a great example of a hidden gem, right? Just someone, anyone in your organization who is doing a good job, just figuring out something that they're good at, something that they have a passionate outside of work, and elevating them to show other people,

hey, it's okay to bring your whole self to work, not only that, but this is a place where we're going to celebrate it. What if I want to be an instigator, if I'm by nature and instigator, but I'm afraid? One thing to think about there is, we talked about these four humor types. And actually, it would be helpful to know what you think you are. You can go to humorseriously.com and take the quiz. But I'm just going to give you a reminder of the four types. You probably score high on matinee.

They tend to be expressive, charismatic, easy to make laugh, oftentimes self-deprecating, but the inner room and everyone kind of lights up. Then there's the sniper and their edgy sarcastic nuanced masters of the unexpected dig. So you might think of Bill Burr or Michelle Wolfe, whereas like the magnet might also be like Jimmy Fallon or maybe Ellen DeGeneres. Then there's the sweetheart and their earnest

and understated and the used humor just that lightens the mood. And then there's the standup and they're bold, in a reverent and unafraid to ruffle a few feathers for a laugh. And what's interesting about each of these four types is that if you're an instigator with one style, it's gonna be easier to come to life in a certain way,

but you also need to be aware of certain disadvantages of your style as well. So what would you say, you are? What are your top one or two styles? Just a total sweetheart, four square. That means you're a sniper and a map. So my wife is delivering all that douchin laughter all the time. I'm so happy that you have a new word in your vocabulary.

You can think Dacker as well for that one. But anyway, okay, so let's assume that your part sniper, part magnet. And so if you're going to go instigate more of that humor in your organization, your team, or your interviews or whatever, you need to be able to kind of read the room. If you do have the trusted testers around, your wife around, et cetera, probably can lean heavy and instigating humor, using that sniper style. But if you might want to up-level more of that magnet style,

which makes everyone feel kind of part of the team, if you don't know people as well, or you're talking about things that are challenging, or if you potentially overstepped, and you need to kind of recover, you're talking about things that are challenging or if you potentially overstepped and you need to kind of recover, that type of magnet style of humor to instigate can really bring people together.

That was all super helpful. I actually wasn't really just asking for myself. I was more asking for people who might work in a culture where it's scary, it's intimidating and they don't feel safe to be themselves or to be funny. Yeah, but even in that case, the little story that I just shared, more anchored on you, is applicable. So if they understand what is their authentic humor style and everyone usually has one or two, and then they want to be able to use it in the culture, but offset risks,

they might lean into one of the styles that are natural, but also do tend to be associated with more minimal risks. Another style that really tends to uplift others and doesn't overstep or create friction is the sweetheart. Again, they're not trying to be funny. They're trying to really often uplift others and their humor is more earnest and understated. So, Herokia Si, who was at Apple now at Airbnb, he scores very high on sweetheart.

And so, as he instigates humor, it's not only in the way that he manifests it, but it's the other people that he pulls in, like, these hidden jobs. One last practical question. Any advice for when somebody in the room has made an inappropriate joke? What's the best way to handle that? Yeah, and you're phrasing it as inappropriate joke. So let me zoom out for one second and say it's really important to make a distinction about different types of humor fails because we tend to code all humor fails the same. If someone doesn't laugh, then that's horrible. I've done something wrong. I'm never using humor again.

There's actually research to suggest that if you use humor in a professional context and it doesn't get a laugh, as long as it's appropriate, it still increases other people's perceptions of your confidence and doesn't have a meaningful impact on status. So, it just want wanna debunk the fact that all humor fails are bad. They're not actually,

they can sort of help other people feel comfortable bringing their full self-stort. Now, if you do say something inappropriate and it ruffles feathers, it's really easy in that context. And hopefully this is getting less common, but it can be really easy in that context to say, oh, well, they just didn't get it.

They didn't get the joke. They're too sensitive. They're taking it too seriously. And this can be really dangerous because we know that humor that's derogatory can actually have a real impact on how people think and how people behave. So it can make prejudice people more likely to act on their prejudice. So humor that's demeaning and that's derogatory can be really unsafe for us as communities. So if you cross a line, if you offend someone, it's so important to lean in and understand what went wrong. So first, obviously, a genuine apology, right?

Hey, I clearly miss something. I'm really sorry. I didn't mean to. And then second, understanding what you were missing that caused you to go so wrong. Hey, help me understand. I'd really love to learn from this. So leaning in and not assuming that it's someone else's fault,

really assuming that this is a blind spot for you. It's an empathy fail, even more so that it is a humor fail. And you need to get to the bottom of what's going on. And for this reason, we often coach the leaders that we work with. If you want to get real feedback from your team, after a session where you've tried to use some humor, instead of asking the question, hey, do you think that humor offended someone? Ask the question, hey, can you help me think about how the humor I used might have landed wrong? Can you help me think about how what I said could have been inappropriate?

And that often makes other people feel safer to voice some discomfort or to surface if people are just laughing because you're the boss. That's all great advice. You really took the question in the direction of what to do if you feel like you've said something that's inappropriate. Are there thoughts on what you can do if you're witness to somebody saying something inappropriate? I think naming it, if someone has a specific story, we

break down exactly what went wrong and what they would do, it is so context dependent. So sometimes the right thing to do is to name it in the moment in front of everyone to sort of make a stand. Sometimes the right thing to do is to approach that person afterwards and let them know and have a one-on-one conversation to give them the time and space to come back, name it for themselves and apologize. Just personal interaction, just pulling one person aside, and oftentimes we find that when you just pull someone aside and have that kind of open conversation, that relationship actually becomes closer because people are so appreciative and the costs associated with calling it out and naming it are so minimal because it's

just a one-on-one conversation. So one example of this is one of our interviews, Thomas, who is the CEO of a small digital media company. And he had about 30 full-time employees, and he had this one problem employee who we'll call Jackie. So everyone on the team had let Thomas know that she was not performing up to the standards. She was showing up late. She was missing deadlines and not following through. And more than that, there was feedback that her demeanor was really destructive to the standards she was showing up late, she was missing deadlines and not following through. And more than that, there was feedback

that her demeanor was really destructive to the team culture. So this is a woman that had been with the organization from the beginning and everyone knew that there was sort of a problem there. So Thomas went through this whole process. He gave her a performance improvement plan, gave her all this feedback, it really wasn't working. So he made the hard choice to fire her. So the first bank team meeting was one that Jackie would

normally lead. So everyone who walks into the room sits down and her absence is palpable, right? It's this tense moment. So in an effort to break the tension, Thomas opens the meeting by the tension, Thomas opens the meeting by making a joke. He says, all right, Jackie, take it away. And this could not have been a more inappropriate joke to make. So the room just goes completely silent. One of his employees breaks the silence and says, I don't think that's funny. And to his credit, and he talked about it later, he stopped on a dime, he shifted and he said, you're absolutely right, I'm so sorry. And then he named what was true for him. He said, I feel a lot of guilt

and a lot of personal responsibility for making that decision. I feel a lot of tension right now, and that was my way of trying to break the tension in the room. It was super inappropriate, and I am so sorry. Can I start over? And another one of his employees said, yeah, absolutely. So he physically walked out of the room.

He walked back in and he started over. He said, hey, everyone, I want to have a real conversation about Jackie's departure and I want to give space to answer any questions. And then he jumped into the agenda. So that's a great example of having it go wrong in the moment, one of his employees having the courage to say something about it, and also that being such a kind and generous way of allowing this leader, of allowing Thomas to name it, to name what he had done wrong and to try and make it right.

So much good stuff and a lot of courage and self-awareness all around on that story. As we vector toward the close here, let me just ask the question, I asked John Tuchito, which is, is there anything I should have asked you that I failed to ask? There were a lot of questions that you did ask us that you shouldn't have asked us. So now I mean one thing that I think we we really end our class with is well there's two things one is you know just this idea that humor is a choice. And it's one that we can make in small moments, but also big ones. And that's it's so important to us as we think about training new types of leaders, you know, it used to be that leaders needed to be that revered and respected and kind of mysterious and walk-and-water types.

And now we really find that they need to be understood. They need to cultivate trust. You need to feel like you know them. It's a really different type of leadership model that we need in the world right now, not just in the United States, but globally. And what's really powerful is that if people can understand how to better wield the tool of humor and know how to use it

to lift others, or even just eliminate truth, you know, we really believe the world could be a different and better place. One of our favorite stories to help support that is Secretary of State, Madeline Albright, who came into our class a couple years ago and she told us about the time the Russian government had bugged the US State Department, a serious breach in

international diplomacy. And after learning about the bugging, she arrived at her next meeting with the Russian Foreign Minister, wearing this enormous bug pin, like this enormous bug pin. And he couldn't help but smile when he saw it. And students say anything, it this enormous bug pin. And he couldn't help it smile when he saw it. And students say anything, it wasn't a joke. And she shared how the energy in the room shifted

and it changed the entire conversation. And so we hope to illuminate these ideas. Like, what are those small and big moments where you can change the energy in the room? And the second thing is just this idea that the balance of gravity and levity really give power to both. We're living in what feels to be very serious times.

And that if we can somehow aim toward this goal of doing very serious things without taking ourselves too seriously, knowing that we can often do them better and more fashionably, that what would work look like and what might life look like, what might relationships do and could you ultimately cultivate more love? I love it. Super quick. Can you just remind everybody of the name of your book and any other resources you've got out there in the world? Sure. Our book is humor seriously and we just gave a TED Talk. We have a TED Talk called Why Great Leaders Take Humor Seriously. Also, figure out what your humor style is. If you

just go to humorseriously.com, you can take a two-minute quiz to find out what your own style is. And that becomes so generous to it, because then you can start to play with this tool and more authentic natural and fun ways. Excellent. Naomi and Jennifer, thank you so much. Thank you, Dan. Thank you for having us. Big thanks to Jennifer and Naomi. And big thanks as well to everybody who worked so hard on the show. Samuel Johns, Gabrielle Zuckerman, DJ Cashmere, Justin Davie,

Kim Baikama, Maria Wartelle, and Jen Poyant, and the good folks over at Ultraviolet Audio, who do our audio engineering. Coming up on Friday, a bonus meditation that plays off of the themes we've been exploring on the show about how not to take yourself. So seriously, that's coming up from my friend Jeff Warren on Friday.

So seriously, that's coming up from my friend Jeff Warren on Friday. Hey, hey, prime members. You can listen to 10% happier early and ad-free on Amazon music. Download the Amazon Music app today. Or you can listen early and ad-free with 1-replus in Apple podcasts. Before you go, do us a solid and tell us all about yourself by completing a short survey at 1dory.com slash survey.