For a very long time I have not been able to laugh. As I have watched others laughing themselves silly at the simplest remark or the stupidest of jokes, in my opinion, I have not even been able to squeak out the littlest chuckle. I have struggled to find something to laugh at, despite all of my efforts to do so and, except on the rarest of occasions when I am loosened up with liquor or a little “smoking mixture”, as they euphemistically call it in smoke shops, nothing happens. I have even tried forcibly to laugh, which has angered some because they believe they can see through my forcefulness.
So, can I find a shadow by looking for a need of why to laugh, as I discovered in my last posting?
One need I can think of right away is the need of fitting in and being accepted. Another is about my need for authentic self-expression or perhaps my need for avoiding inauthentic self-expression. Either way, if I mirror this need what I get is that I project on people who laugh at everything my shadow of inauthentic self-expression. This is a big shadow for me because it puts me in a position of distancing myself from people which is surely a mirror to my need to fit in and being accepted, if only I could laugh spontaneously and genuinely. And while I’m making it my business that other people have often been showing up for me as being inauthentic in their self-expression when they laugh, I am forgetting that at the same time, this projection of mine is keeping me stuck in my presumptuousness and being right.
In other words, the joke has been on me all of this time.
