Abraham Lincoln and Humor

Humor facilitates hope and mitigates despair. When confronting a real problem, first laugh at it to clear your head. Prescribe a solution and set a deadline. If this is not possible, remember the Serenity Prayer. If the problem is a lucky problem, count your blessings. A lucky problem is a flat tire on a car which you are lucky enough to own.

Remember, the word problem comes from Latin for "better dancing"--pro ballet. With the right attitude, every problem is an chance to dance better on the stage that is your life. Avoid the unnecesary distraction of worrying. With a little clear-headed thinking, you might enjoy another Latin word if you find and sell a solution to the problem: Profit (pro esse, better  existence)

Abraham Lincoln understood this principle. On the train back from Battle of Antietam, Lincoln was reproached for telling a joke after visiting the battlefield that recorded the greatest one-day casualties of the Civil War. Lincolnd responded that in such troubling times, if he could not find something to laugh about, he thought he would go mad. He knew the need to keep a clear-head.

Lincoln was a great self-deprecator

1. Lincoln was riding the circuit one day when he passed a lady riding the other way. The lady stopped him and said "Sorry, sir, but you're the ugliest man I've ever seen." He replied "Well, there isn't much I can do about that, is there." The lady said. "You could have stayed home."
2. In an early campaign for public office, Lincoln was accused of being two-faced. When beginning his speech, Lincoln said that if he was two-faced, don't people think he would have worn the other face.
3. When asked in the early 1840s why he was not married, he responded that he would not marry a woman who would have him as a husband.

"It is true that you may fool all the people some of the time; you can even fool some of the people all the time; but you can't fool all of the people all the time." Hitler learned this the hard way.