Rev. Barbara Ann Michaels: Humor As the Harbinger of Hope

About this episode

Send us Fan Mail You can be exhausted, heartbroken, and still human enough to laugh again and that tiny laugh might be the first sign you are coming back to yourself. I sit down with Rev. Barbara Ann Michaels, an award-winning interfaith minister and professional clown, to talk about what humor really does when life is brutal: it does not erase the pain, it puts space around it so you can breathe, feel, and keep going. Barbara shares the story behind Humorville, her immersive interactive art “municipality” in Brooklyn designed for humor and wellness. Picture a post office, a library, a voting booth, a marriage bureau, and a phone booth where you “call” what you have been avoiding. It sounds absurd on purpose, because play and absurdity can slip past perfectionism and performance, letting people say the truest thing in the room. Her guiding line says it all: “You can only do it right at Humorville.” We dig into caregiver burnout, grief, and why “too soon” matters. Barbara breaks down the “first laugh” as a physiological and spiritual turning point, the moment healing becomes possible. We also name the traps: laughing at others, or using jokes to dodge the hard talk, versus laughi