Juggling as stress management therapy

“Berkowitz is looking at a crying girl. He is supposed to stitch up her leg. Suddenly, he says to her: “look at this!” and he takes three gauze rolls and starts to juggle them – in front of him, over his head and behind his back. The girl starts to giggle when she watches the doctor entertaining himself. And after a while the child allows him to take care of her leg without complaining".

Do you think that this is a scene taken from some short story or a novel? Not at all. This is a true story and a real person – Dr Barry Berkowitz from San Francisco, being one of many who at the end of 1990s began to use juggling as a stress relief and relaxing therapy.

Juggling at the hospital

He began to juggle in 1978 while he was studying to become a doctor. When he saw his friend juggling tennis balls, he started to learn it himself as well and by the end of the first day he was able to do it. He kept practising and when he felt that he had mastered this skill to a satisfactory level, he gradually started using juggling in the admissions room at the hospital and do shows in hospital wards. The props he used while juggling at work included a stethoscope, syringes and balls taken from bearings or made of gauze. The patients started to call him Dr Juggles. What he also discovered, was that juggling gives him some rest and relieves stress. As he says – "juggling teaches you not to bother your head with unnecessary matters”. Berkowitz started to teach others how to juggle after he realized that it brings about stress relief during his work and in his patients. “I came up with the idea of juggling workshops for people from the medical field but also from other industries such as trade or business. These workshops and learning how to juggle are intended to help people reduce their stress level.”

Stress management workshops

Another person using juggling at work is Dr Carl Simonton, director of The Simonton Cancer Center, a pioneer in the field of stress and cancer studies. He uses it in his work with the patients. Learning to juggle was his lesson in life, an insight into his own self. “For 35 years of my life I was absolutely sure that I would never learn how to juggle and I kept repeating this to myself all the time. However, one of my friends at the hospital taught me this in 15 minutes!” recalls Simonton. He says that this allows patients to divert their attention from stress and suffering. “Laughter and amusement instils hope and juggling itself cures through entertainment” adds Simonton. “My major goal is to give people joy and laughter. I’m trying to do two things: I provide intellectual and emotional grounds for enjoying a good mood and I allow people to understand that they can be happy and cheerful every day. Juggling enables exploitation of fun and time in a creative way; it allows one to discover again the joy that comes from amusement and learning, discover the meaning and value of unusual achievements in our daily duties” he says.

By: Mirosław Urban

References:

1.Lanter Orrel (1987) Juggler's World: Vol. 39, No. 1

2.Urban Mirosław (2007) “New dimensions of the art of juggling, vol. II” KuglArt – Alternative Circus Arts Magazine (issue no. 2/2007)