I love educating about the science of humor and laughter, and its health benefits. I love engaging them, hearing them laugh, seeing them smile and realizing their own inner strengths. My mission: I want to create peace for our inner and outer world, one gentle “ ha” at a time!

Four years of oncology/hospice/home nursing “back boned” my belief in the marriage of humor and spirituality. Whether people were doing their damnedest to live or their damnedest to die, humor always restored their dignity. People receiving healthcare are constantly “being done to” which promotes the indignity of helplessness. Jocularity (or jestful play) restores the balance within the spiritual ecosystem of “giving and receiving.” Appreciative contributions of wit, winks, and smiles, coming from my patients, strengthened my courage to go into the next room, bandage a horrific gaping wound or place a loved one on a morgue cart. – Debra Joy Hart in 21 Peaceful Nurses

Humor in nursing is a lot like gardening in wild prairie. I plant a few seeds of silliness and never know what will sprout up. Sometimes my tears are the water and my sarcasm is the fertilizer. Words like “We need to be serious”, or nurses that are afraid to laugh and condemn those that do, trample the tender seedlings of hope and faith that grows from humor. The beauty of it all is seeing blooming rainbows connect the mind, body and spirit. Burnout in nursing begins when there is no crop of rainbows. – Debra Joy Hart in 21 Peaceful Nurses

Keynotes, Workshops, Breakouts and
Team Development Activities

Each program has a general theme that is “tailored” for your specific group. I speak with each client, gathering information and details to create an atmosphere of safe and healthy humor. I have written specific programs for:

• Alzheimer/Dementia
• Death, Grief. Resilience and Loss
• Caregiver Burnout and Support/ Compassion Fatigue

Holding the Light: The Healing Power of Humor, Laughter and Mirth

What happens when a clown, a minister and a nurse walk into your conference? You get a program, that has you laughing, loving and learning. Debra Joy Hart will lead us in laughter exercise, play-filled jocularity and mindful planned spontaneity. Debra also touches on hard subjects such as “when to laugh and when to cry.”

Injections of Joy: How to Self-Medicate with Humor

Feeling stress before you get to the office? Thinking about creative ways to punish your co-workers before you step out of the shower? Whether you have one more funeral service to officiate, chart to write in, fractured funny bone to set, or one more class clown to teach, you need a shot of joy (not tequila) to help with burnout and stress. This presentation combines spirituality, humor, and self-care techniques.

Teardrops and Jellybeans: Embracing Your Grief with Humor

Humor and grief are both very personal and unique experiences. Giving ourselves permission to laugh during times of grief is very difficult to do. Humor is one tool to help reframe pain-filled death and/or loss experiences. Using humor can be a safe way to change cultural or religious norms and tailor your grief process for a custom fit. It takes courage to go outside a perceived norm. The truth is that there is no norm in the grieving process.

Remember Life in the Sandbox? Balancing Work with Your Mind, Body, and Spirit

Life seemed easier when we could play with our dolls or trucks in the sandbox. The only stress back then was Mom would call me back to the house before I was done playing. This presentation portrays work stress in a humorous way and gives suggestions for “lightening up” our emotional workload. The audience participates in laughter exercises and playful recreations of the different “voices” we hear inside our head that added to our stress in the first place Positive “kid-like” affirmations can make all the difference in our energy levels and attitude toward work tasks.

Healing Your Heart with Humor: Mind, Body, Spirit Healing in the Health Care Setting

Loss of our humanity, dignity, and faith sums up the shortcomings that happen while being part of most health care systems. It doesn’t matter whether you are the patient or caregiver; all of us lose focus of the bigger picture when attending to our health care needs. Different types of humor and mirth have their own healing potential. Myriad of examples on “how to” use and create more humor in health care settings are part of this presentation.

Joy Sundae (with a Cherry!): Using Humor to Nurture Your Soul

Used the metaphor of a favorite celebration treat, Debra Joy encourages the audience to create their own “Joy Sundae.” The recipe includes 2 scoops of laughter, drizzled with warm memories, a whipped topping of mirth and sprinkled with all the nuts in your life. Debra Joy encourages the audience to celebrate everything from accomplishments to life’s losses. Nurture yourself with laughter and joy and celebrate life with friends.

Keeping In Touch Tomorrow By Being Present Today

What does it mean to be mindful about yourself, work and family? How do you simply and efficiently practice and apply mindfulness every day. In this presentation, we start and end with gratitude, laughter and love. In between we discuss the physiological, psychological physical effects of gratitude, worry and stress. You are guaranteed meditation and belly laughs, and food to feed your mind, body and spirit.

No More Peanuts, Popcorn and CrackerJacks(tm): Resilience Reflections with Humor and Hope

As we age, we process loss and anticipated losses every day. We may lose our car keys, our teeth, or parts of our digestive tract. We no longer can depend upon our usual ways of comfort. We may face the big C (cancer), have a partner or a child die. Or get crushing news that your husband has Alzheimer’s. A loss is a loss is a loss, with no judgement as to its impact on you. This presentation is set to educate, engage, and empower the audience with 3 simple resilience practices and identify and incorporate ways to build on their own resilience strengths.

Dyed Laughing:  Integrating Humor, Death, Dying and Bereavement

Humor is one of the ways people confront feeling oppressed, scared, out of control, or lonely. Using humor at any of these times, gives us back a little more internal power, and just for the moment, allows us to see things differently, so that we can take a breath and move forward.  And, humor is just one of the colors of a rainbow to use therapeutically when providing death education, palliative comfort to the dying and verbal support to the bereaved.