Do you get the joke?

"What this means is that the world of illusion will end when I can see the humor, the cosmic, karmic joke (karmedy, as I like to call it) of it all. When I can see through the illusion and see to what is really going on, I laugh. Something releases in me that allows me to breathe and relax again; then I am able to fully accept myself and whatever else goes on around me."

https://www.yogaville.org/2017/03/11/last-freedom-choose-miracles/?utm_source=Programs+Newsletter&utm_campaign=ac0db9054e-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2017_03_11&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_aa3ddf97f4-ac0db9054e-68900789

I'd like to tell you about an experience I had some years ago.

I had a temporary break with reality that some might call psychosis and others might call a spiritual emergency or perhaps at other times and places, a prophetic sort of vision. At that time I believed very literally that heaven was right here on earth, that everyone I met was so radiantly beautiful, and that the outward struggles I witnessed were totally unnecessary. I remember seeing a woman walking with a crutch and felt like shouting to her "throw down that crutch and walk! This is heaven for goodness sake!" And during that period there was this refrain in my head... "do you get the joke?" It was so persistent that it was actually kind of terrifying at the time. But to remember it now, after reading the really great blog post above, it seems like a great thing to ask myself when I get caught up in this or that drama: "Do you get the joke? Where is the humor hiding here?"

This is all well and good for those of us whose main struggles may involve turning an entire load of white laundry pink or forgetting where we put our keys for the 1000th time. I wonder about situations that seem very serious. Like famine... like war... like addiction... like environmental collapse. Is there any humor to be found in those situations? Perhaps not if you are looking at it abstractly... those are some big freaking serious problems and its high time we band together and do the required work to solve them. Let's not pretend that anyone living through such difficulty *should* be able to find humor there. But if you are living the experience of famine, or war, or environmental collapse (and let's remember, if one of us are... all of us are. And a heck of a lot more than one of us are) there must be a way to take heart and keep on going. And if there is a way, it's got to be humor. There must be joking. There must be laughter. There must be relaxation. If we are ever to deliver ourselves from these dismal realities, I hope that in the process there will be joy intermingled with our blood, sweat, and tears. I hope that as we apply ourselves firmly to solving the challenges before us as individuals and as creatures sharing this beautiful planet, we find laughter and lightness in going about the important and meaningful work ahead of us. And the way to ensure that we do, if we aren't already doing it and we're lost in seriousness about ourselves and our mundane lives, is to start practicing it now.

As the author of the blog post says, there is a level of reality at which all is absolutely perfect. There is also a level of reality at which we experience life as anything but. If we can ride our human experience in the context of the bigger picture, we can find our way to laughter and relaxation about our struggles. In that relaxation we are able to be fully present and thus we are more capable of riding the experience in an elegant, creative way. We can apply ourselves fully to every single moment, doing as spirit calls, and remain unattached to either to our notions of how things "should" be or to the ultimate outcome of our doings.