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Everyone has heard that laughter is the best medicine, but could it also the best aphrodisiac? If you ask most women what they find attractive in men almost all of them will have “sense of humor” within the top three traits. So why is being funny an ingredient for a successful relationship?
The ability to make your partner, or a potential partner, laugh has been linked to closer, happier, and more intimate relationships overall. There are a number of things about humor that can help bring people together. But, keep in mind, being able to tell a joke is not the same thing as being able to make your partner laugh.
What A Good Sense of Humor Looks Like
We have all been at a party with ‘that guy’ (or girl). You know the one. They have an easy smile and seem to always have something funny to say. People are drawn to them.
Having a good sense of humor helps project an image of confidence. People are drawn to confidence and made comfortable by humor. There is a feeling that a person who has a good sense of humor is intelligent and generally positive—traits that are sought after by women and many men as well.
Enhancing a Relationship
When two people are getting to know one another they can feel nervous and awkward. Being able to find ways to laugh together helps eliminate those feelings. When you laugh with someone you create a connection that immediately sets a tone of comfort and intimacy.
During a conversation with a friend recently she told me that when she and her husband met she really didn’t feel attracted to him at all. It wasn’t until her third encounter with him that she realized how funny and sort of silly he was. That humor and lack of self-consciousness made him seem confident and her feel comfortable. She said that once he had made her really laugh twice that night, all she could do was think about what it would be like to kiss him. After 10 years of marriage, she is still laughing and kissing him regularly.
That ability to make your partner laugh creates bonds. There are very few places that you are as truly open and just yourself as when you are laughing. And, laughter itself releases endorphins that help you relax and smile more. We all know there is nothing more inviting and intimate than a smile. The connection that is created when two people laugh together and/or make each other laugh helps strengthen the closeness needed to maintain a relationship.
Laughter and Sex
Sex and laughter have several things in common, although many wouldn’t initially think so. They both can:
• Strengthen neuropathways in the brain
• Create a feeling of closeness
• Build the bonds in a relationship.
So they are a natural pair, right? Yep. Sex has many of its own alluring attributes that few of us can deny. But the chuckle factor isn’t generally one we think of.
Sex, however, is not often a perfectly orchestrated event with violins, silk sheets and gauzy curtains blowing through an open window. It is two people creating an intimate moment and often there is some fumbling and a mishap or two. When people are close enough to find the humor in those awkward moments the sense of intimacy can actually be heightened.
A greater feeling of comfort and trust develops when we laugh in those private situations. Frankly, laughing during sex can be one of the sexiest things you can do (there is a timing factor though,) because it means you are comfortable with one another and you are creating a greater feeling of intimacy.
Humor is personal. There is a bit of a lock and key effect to it. Not everything that tickles your funny bone will tickle someone else’s. Which is why when you find a person who tickles you just right you are more likely to form a strong and healthy relationship. Perhaps even laughing yourself all the way to the bedroom.
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Photo: Getty Images