"There's nothing like deep breaths after laughing that hard. Nothing in the world like a sore stomach for the right reasons"

Deep breaths after a fit of laughter are a kind of reset, the body’s way of saying it has survived an overwhelming surge of joy and is returning to balance. The lungs expand, the diaphragm relaxes, and clarity rushes in. That pause after the chaos carries a hush that feels cleaner than silence, like air rinsed by rain. It’s not merely relief; it’s proof that a person can be flooded by something bigger than worry or routine and come out more alive.

A sore stomach from laughing marks joy’s residency in the body. The ache is a souvenir, a small bruise of happiness. Soreness usually signals damage or stress, the aftermath of anxiety or illness. Here it signals the opposite: a wound incurred in play, a tenderness earned by connection. The phrase “for the right reasons” draws a moral and emotional boundary. Not all laughter is equal. There’s the brittle kind that mocks, the hollow kind that performs, and then there’s the kind that dissolves defenses and folds people together. The right reasons are shared delight, surprise, recognition, the relief of being fully seen without judgment.

Such laughter is a rebellion against isolation. It synchronizes breath, blurs edges between people, and restores trust in the world’s capacity for lightness. It does what arguments and explanations often cannot: it dislodges fear. Afterward, the deep breaths feel like permission to start again, to return to ordinary life carrying a hidden ember. The memory of the ache keeps meaning close; it says that something mattered enough to leave a trace.

There’s wisdom in preferring this kind of soreness: choose experiences that stretch the heart without breaking it, that make the body speak of joy rather than dread. Seek the moments that leave you tender for the right reasons, shared, honest, and harmless, because they reaffirm that being alive is not just to think or endure but to feel, fully and together.