You know your cultivation is working when . . . 

you laugh! 

Laughter! Surely, before Buddhism that would not have been your answer. Imagine the following in your kitchen.

Wanting to add another smidgen of almond milk to a dish, you vigorously shake the bottle. And immediately realize that you previously just lightly rested the lid atop the bottle. And so, with your additional spirited shaking, the top goes flying. What of the almond milk? Liberated at last from its plastic prison, the milk jubilantly makes a run for it! And in the briefest instant of time imaginable, you have almond milk on you, your clothes, the counter, and both upper and lower cabinets. Also, the milk’s mad dash for freedom has landed it on an impressively extensive area of the kitchen floor (washed the day before) and, finally, down the front of the stove across the floor.

Surveying the scene, you do the only logical thing—you laugh. I

t’s heartening test moments like these that assure us that—yes—those years of cultivation are indeed paying off.