For when you need to laugh

MendMaker Exercise: Session written and explained by your coach Claire Anstey

Set a reminder in your phone for 30 minutes of laughter every day.

Session Length: 3-minute read and then 15 minutes to schedule the exercise which is a daily 30-minute commitment to laughing and feeling joy.

Note from Claire Anstey: I've been through times when everything felt dull and laughter was a distant memory, overwhelmed by sadness and frustration. That’s when I realized the power of scheduling daily laughter—it’s like setting an alarm to remind myself to breathe in joy. Initially, it felt odd, almost mechanical, to carve out time just for laughter, but this practice slowly melted the ice around my heart. It’s more than a mere exercise; it’s a vital step towards rewiring your brain for happiness, shifting from a state of sadness to one of joy and lightness, helping to find the sunshine in everyday life again.

MendMaker

Feeling down is crap; whatever anyone says or does just makes you worse. How can people just be so offensive, do they not understand the pain you are going through? Can they not see that you are the lowest form of human ever and that life is mean and cruel to you because you deserve it?

When I felt depressed I would go through moments of hating myself and then hating the world around me. How could I be so nice and try so hard and always have everything in my life go wrong? These thoughts would go over and over in my head and then before I knew it I had spent the whole weekend in bed watching re-runs of friends feeling like a sad do as they had a great life and my life was awful.

If this is something that you can relate to then this MendMaker is going to get you laughing again, remember laughing? Oh what a joy it was way back when you was a happy couple.

Ask yourself this ‘When was the last time you laughed?’

When I got asked this question I couldn’t remember, how is it for you?

I first wrote about this exercise in my debut book “Sort Out Your Crap Life” and found that it really helped when I went through my break up.

MendMaker Exercise:

Your task is to book a time every day where you can do something fun for 30 minutes. At first you may have to force yourself to do this, you may have to even force your giggles but you will get there. Your 30 minutes can include your favorite comedy show, dancing around to your favorite music or calling a friend that makes you laugh. You really can do anything, only you know what you call fun and it has to be fun. It has to be something that you know makes you laugh. When we struggle to smile and can’t remember the last time we laughed THIS exercise makes a huge difference.

Whilst nursing a broken heart we could go weeks without laughing and that is just not good for our soul or our healing. Becoming aware of our lack of laughter enables us to deliberately create it until it becomes natural for us again.

Our thoughts and actions can physically change the networks in our brains. If you do more happy stuff you will end up creating a happy brain and with a happy brain comes a happy heart.

Set a reminder in your phone for 30 minutes of laughter every day.