REVIEW
September 2020 Monthly Luncheon Phillipa Challis OAM
‘I love coming in here – it’s always good for a laugh’ and I did lots of business while I laughed with them!”) and in the corporate sector in Geelong, then moved to Geelong, where she now lives (her OAM is “for service to the community of Geelong”) and from where she travelled the world. In 1984, Phillipa started her own business, PPS – Phillipa’s Promotional Services, which dealt with promotions and public relations, “and in those days, secretarial support which became special events, hence the MCing (Master of Ceremonies)”. She then became a public speaker and her most requested topic then, as it is now, was “Your Number One Asset is You”. A dean at The University of Adelaide, many years ago, introduced her as “Phillipa Challis … Phillipa has a degree from the University of Life and she has a PhD in people and her speciality is laughter”.
It’s always a good time to have a laugh, so laughter it was at the September Monthly Luncheon on Wednesday, 2nd September with our guest speaker, Phillipa Challis, CEO of Live Life Laughing, also known as The Laughter Lady. Phillipa first spoke at Graduate House in 2011 and was warmly received, so she was invited back for a second time, as we could all do with a good laugh! This was an online only event due to the continuing pandemic and Stage 4 restrictions in Melbourne, but Phillipa had all attendees warming up their homes and offices and filling it with laughter.
In 1995, she realised “there was an opportunity to take it to the community”, to spread the word about the benefits of laughter to improve people’s lives, resilience, productivity and wellbeing. “There are many people that don’t have laughter in their life.” She took laughter seriously enough – “I thought there’d be benefit in people knowing more about it” – to take it to the level of being trained and becoming a certified professional laughter practitioner, a laughter yoga teacher, a laughter yoga leader and, now, a laughter yoga master.
Phillipa’s story with laughter started with her growing up in Fairfield, Melbourne in a home “filled with laughter”. The eldest of three girls, Phillipa had a large extended family – her father was one of 12 children and her mother one of 10 – so there was “lots of people there and lots of laughter”. When she left school and started work, she said, “I was blessed. I always picked good executives to work for, which meant they had a balance in their work life, and because of that, again, lots of laughter.”
In 2002, she started her company, Live Life Laughing and her job title is Laughter Practitioner and Trainer. Phillipa has never been busier than during the current pandemic, doing lots of one-on-one consultations and speaking to people in organisations to talk about laughter, and to share some laughter with them. “It’s so important during this episode that we’re living through.”
She married, moved out of Melbourne, lived in Anglesea for 10 years, worked in retail there (“I did particularly well, because everyone said, www.graduatehouse.com.au
Phillipa took the attendees through a series of breathing, smiling and laughing exercises 26
