by Swami Allotabull
One of my students came to me the other day and asked me, “Swamiji, what is humor? What makes someone laugh?” I pondered this ever so seriously for what seemed like an eternity to my young charge. Then, when the silence had reached its nadir, I smiled a big swami-grin, the one that I am known for, and I looked into his eyes and I said, “you following me around, asking about the meaning of life and paying me good money for the answers.”

At first he was stunned, almost like I had punched him in the stomach and then a light went off in his head and he started laughing hysterically, not just a titer, but a deep, cosmic guffaw! Yes, he saw the delicious irony in all of this and in so doing saw that irony is one of the cornerstones of humor.

Once he had recovered from his laughing seizure, he took off his robes and told me that, “he was done, finished, that he had gotten it.” I lovingly received his garments and was proud that he had come to this realization, however, he will return, because “irony” is only pillar of the mansion of laughter and delight. Irony displays the disparity of our human condition and acts as a pressure release from the chains of suffering. By identifying our suffering, but not identifying with our suffering, we create distance, space, objectivity and the ability to say, “I am not that!” Irony is a buffer from the “world” with a lower case “w.”

As our journey towards self-realization might begin with a certain grasp irony, it does not necessarily end there, for to be stuck in the bardo of irony, one might develop an overly cynical attitude, which would prevent the heart from opening, experience more laughter, joy, etc. Look around you and appreciate the irony in your greatest moments of suffering and you will transform your condition within the time and space of one breath, one heartbeat, one thought.