Funnies first


	Alan Bodnar, Ph.D. is the Co-Director of Psychology Training at Westborough State Hospital, Mass. and a consultant in the field of leadership development.

By Alan Bodnar, Ph.D.

For some, a bad day starts by getting up on the wrong side of the bed. For me it usually begins by reading the wrong page of the morning newspaper. All it takes is a quick glance at the headlines to realize that there are things going on in our world that it would be best to approach gradually and certainly not before fortifying the body with breakfast and the spirit with lighter fare. There are things going on in ourselves and in our patients that require the same kind of preparation. For all of these purposes, you can't beat the funnies.

Samuel Johnson once said "when a man is tired of London, he is tired of life; for there is in London all that life can afford." The same might be said of the funny pages. At different times of my life, these simple cartoons have provided me with role models, health advisors, girlfriends, soul mates and idealized family members. Dick Tracy's Crime Stoppers' Textbook taught me how to recognize bad guys, usually by the shape of their heads and how to stay safe on the streets of the big city. Popeye is still one of the best spokespersons for spinach and, when it comes to anchor tattoos on your forearms, he was way ahead of his time.

High school awakened interest in all-American girls like Archie's Betty and Veronica, and what young man could ignore the allure of Lil Abner's heartthrob, Daisy Mae? You just knew that one day you would marry one of these fine young women and raise a family like Dagwood and Blondie's or perhaps settle into the mold of the Mitchell family and buy a house next door to George and Martha Wilson. And when you really needed a friend, a soul mate who had experienced your disappointments, shared your insecurities, and never stopped hoping, there was always Charlie Brown.

Today, the funny pages are a lot more sophisticated but just as likely to provoke a laugh sparked by the recognition of our common human follies. Dilbert mirrors the absurdities of life in the corporate world. Doonesbury takes on the more ambitious task of giving us the geopolitical picture through the eyes of characters that have grown up with us from the Vietnam era to the present day. Reading between the lines or looking between the panels, as psychologists have been known to do, we surmise that not only our cartoon heroes but also their creators are growing and changing much like their readers. My own son went off to college the same year as a favorite cartoon character and, as I followed the story daily, I could easily imagine the cartoonist reacting to personal challenges represented by the adventures of his protagonist. Recently, another cartoonist brought her family-oriented strip to a bittersweet conclusion and, urging her readers to hang on, changed direction by reversing the aging process and replaying the lives of the same characters. Wouldn't we all like to have that kind of magic?

It's not that cartoonists have all the answers. Some of my favorites make me laugh by the sheer absurdity of their statements. Read the nonsensical musings of muumuu clad Zippy the Pinhead and then try to take yourself seriously. The ability to take oneself seriously or otherwise is a hallmark of the capacity for self-observation, the source and bedrock of insight and, ultimately, behavior change. Even better is learning how to take yourself lightly. Our best teachers for that lesson are usually family, friends and especially our children. If you want to see what you look like to others, just pay attention the next time one of your children of any age favors you with an impersonation.

If you are lucky enough to have this lesson over and over, you start to get the hang of laughing at yourself. I am learning to laugh at my tendency to confuse similar sounding words so that when a new patient known for dismissing therapists tells me that I'm "fired," I reply that I am actually quite rested. Impressed by my steadfast unwillingness to take no for an answer, she sticks around to finish the session. Laughing at yourself allows you the freedom to laugh with your patients at the symptoms they are trying to recognize and control. The woman with schizophrenia who discreetly wiggles her fingers when the doctor passes because she is reminded unaccountably of a centipede she once saw in a Rorschach inkblot should have left well enough alone. However, because she did not want the doctor to feel targeted by a behavior that he probably never noticed in the first place, the woman felt compelled to explain that she was just mimicking a centipede, "Nothing personal, Doc." As she told me this story during a therapy session, the humor of the situation became apparent to us both and we laughed.

If I ever doubted it, I knew then that my patient was well on her way to recovery. She had turned a corner on a long, bumpy road paved with failure, loss and disappointment, and every once in a while, a laugh worthy of the funny pages. The scene she described would have made a terrific episode in a comic strip, if only one of us could draw. Daily life is filled with comic moments and starting with the funnies just might help us to find them.

Funnies first (December 2008 Issue)

By Alan Bodnar, Ph.D.

Funnies first
(December 2008 Issue)