On Keeping A Humor journal

by Barry Roberts

“Now that’s a funny cartoon!” As soon as that thought struck me, I’d cut it out and paste it into a notebook I was keeping. After a time, I started writing in any and all funny experiences I’d gone through. Once in a while, I’d specifically try to recall humorous episodes from earlier in my life and add those, too. My book was growing and this was fun, my new “hobby”; keeping a humor journal.

Once I had decided to keep this humor journal, I was on the lookout for all things funny and soon realized that this hunt for humor had become a major factor in brightening my average day. In fact, on those rare (for me) days when I might be feeling a bit down, I’d go to my humor journal and find enough things, that were funny to me, to cheer me up! Hey, this little book I had created has become a rather valuable tool for my personal life. I told my friends about it and some of them liked the idea enough to try it. After a few months, most of them reported back to me that they found great value in it as well.

Here comes the big payoff! When I am preparing for a speaking engagement and want to add some original humor, appropriate to my subject or audience, I’ll always find something to use from the countless entries of personal, funny anecdotes in my humor journal! Fantastic! If you are ever running any sort of meeting, large, small, formal or informal, and wish to add some original humor, your humor journal is perfect. Review it for some humor, appropriate to either your audience or your topic, insert that into your talk and there you have it!

I put everything in there…jokes I hear (those are more for me and not to use in my presentations or keynotes), funny “people watching” moments (airports are great for that), advertisements that make me laugh (there’s the ad on the plumbers truck that states, “Remember, a flush beats a full house!”), funny road signs (oh, they’re out there. I recall one that says “LODGING NEXT RIGHT”, beneath that is another sign, “STATE PRISON”), newspaper clippings, I even take photos of things I see that you just wouldn’t believe. I have a picture of my car, my tag says HAHA1, parked totally at random, next to a car with a tag that reads, VRY FUNY.

In my keynotes on minimizing day-to-day stress, I share all of this with my audience and the feedback has been wonderful. People just love the concept and find real benefit in keeping a humor journal. I believe you will, too. Get yourself a notebook, think for a moment or go out exploring and begin making your entries. If you have a moment, I’d love to hear from you on this.