Since the goal of my programs is to show audiences how humor can both help them heal as well as deal with not-so-funny stuff I decided to discuss the events of the previous week the pain all of us were feeling and how humor and some laughter might be beneficial.

Laughter and the broader category of humor are key elements in helping us go on with our life after a loss.

Honest good humor is the oil and wine of a merry meeting and there is no jovial companionship equal to that where the jokes are rather small and laughter abundant.

True humor springs not more from the head than from the heart. It is not contempt its essence is love. It issues not in laughter but in still smiles which lie far deeper.

There is a thin line that separates laughter and pain comedy and tragedy humor and hurt.

Through humor you can soften some of the worst blows that life delivers. And once you find laughter no matter how painful your situation might be you can survive it.

You can turn painful situations around through laughter. If you can find humor in anything even poverty you can survive it.

You learn timing on the road. You learn structure and how to read an audience. You learn so much about the business of laughter that you can't learn on a set because it's all on you. Sometimes you bomb and you know not to tell that joke again... You just hope people find the humor in the awkwardness.

I hope you will go out and let stories happen to you and that you will work them water them with your blood and tears and you laughter till they bloom till you yourself burst into bloom.

The appreciative smile the chuckle the soundless mirth so important to the success of comedy cannot be understood unless one sits among the audience and feels the warmth created by the quality of laughter that the audience takes home with it.