By Sarmishta Ramesh, Special to India West, Oct 25, 2002

San Jose- In modern times, when nearly everything can be packaged and marketed, why not the simplest things of life --such as laughter?

Well, that’s precisely what the Bay Area’s own “lord of laughter”, Arya Pathria, thought. Pathria has been a serious practitioner of laughter therapy for almost seven years now. (A quick search on Goggle reveals many other such laughter therapists around the world.)

Meet up with this 58-year-old balding engineer and you’ll soon be laughing with him for no reason. He begins to laugh and soon, involuntarily, you end up doing the same. That’s the whole idea behind the laughter concept. There are no funny jokes or slapstick comedy involved here. Call it any name – Arya’s Laughter or Yogic Laughter or Laughter Meditation – it begins with a simple smile and soon ends up in thoroughly enjoyable, loud full blown, gregarious laughter.

Pathria follows a simple procedure – same basic yogic inhalations and exhalations, funny poses such as “baby laughter” and “lion laughter” and the “mudra” of his “hasa”- “Ho Ho Ha Ha Ha”, to induce others to laugh along. Some may call it silly and even weird-but in the face of such silliness it is definitely difficult to maintain a poker face.

Pathria claim that this kind of open laughter is extremely therapeutic, and that yogic laughter can prevent, retard and even cure body ailments. He has been practicing this “therapy” under the banner of “Laughaway” throughout the United States, though more so in the Bay Area. Look around and you can find little groups gathered in parks across the Silicone Valley, laughing their heads off, leaving the casual on-looker a wee bit perplexed and lot more suspicious.

But now, the man who has sort of revolutionized yogic laughter in U.S. is taking his concept to the next level. Last year, Pathria quit his job with Sprint in order to focus all his energy on promoting laughter as a form of stress relief.

India-West recently caught up with the laughter guru at Carlton Plaza in San Jose as he conducted one of his laughter sessions to a group of senior’s citizens.

“I see a lot of tension and stress among engineers and IT professionals, especially in the Silicone valley,” Pathria told India-West. “In this recession-ridden market, there is an additional pressure on people to cling on to their jobs and all this worry is taking its toll on people. They have forgotten how to laugh with open heart. I was in the same situation not too long ago and I know how stressful life can be.”

So what’s the solution-A business model to promote the goodness of laughter. Pathria says that several senior members of the TiE entrepreneurs group have been urging him to take his laughter therapy to corporate groups. “The idea is to offer laughter therapy sessions to company employees so that they can work out their stress and be more productive at work. Now that I’m not working fulltime I can offer these sessions during any time of the day.”

Of course, all those would come at a price-that’s where the business part of laughter juts in. Till now Pathria has been holding his laughter camps either free of cost or at the price that is comfortable to the group. But now, as he shifts his focus to his corporate cohorts, a flashy price tag would be displayed. And as he fine-tunes his business strategy (bringing out book son laughter and creating promotional materials for his sessions like caps, T-shirt, banners, etc.), the laughter guru of Bay Area is also talking to IT bigwigs like HP, Yahoo and Cisco to finalize the deals.

Pathria hopes to use the money he makes from these corporate sessions to fund one of his pet projects – to provide monetary aid to bright and financially challenged students in India through the Foundation for Excellence (FFE) with which he has been attached since 1994. He says that whatever the outcome of his new business venture, he would continue to hold his free laughter sessions and spread cheer among those not financially enriched.

“I’m not here to make fast money,” Pathria explained to India-West. “I’m pretty content with life right now. My children are settled and I’m living comfortably. Laughter therapy is not like making microchip as or setting up dot-com. I’m not going to kill my self trying to make money in the process of making people laugh,” he quips.

So, as he wound up his laughter sessions with the group of seniors citizens, Pathria make a point remark to the crowd:” if you ever feel sown and want to cry, then go ahead and cry openly. There is no shame in shedding tears. The tears of pain and joy taste the same. Both emotions can be healing. The point in life is to feel at peace.”