“Deliberately using our capacity to be amused is one of many ways we can cleanse the mind of pollutants. Laughter is letting go. Laughter — true laughter, laughter that makes us all feel closer as opposed to laughter that makes us feel uneasy and separate — is instantaneous release of anxiety, discouragement, and all other fragmented states….
“Children are predisposed to laugh. They are pre-amused. Because of this, children can often prevent disturbing thoughts from getting a foothold in their minds in the first place. Under most circumstances, they instinctively shift their preoccupation from a subject of disstress to a subject of delight.”
— Hugh Prather, The Little Book of Letting Go, p. 139