Somewhere in the hills of Hatton in Sri Lanka, I fell and rolled down a mountainside all the way to the base – I was thirteen then. My companions, among whom I was the youngest, were astonished at how I had finished the hike before them. We had sneaked away from our parents during a church retreat to hike up the surrounding mountainous land. We climbed up without any problem. On the way down, I stepped on a shiny black rock and in the next second my spine met the rock. I got back up and began the descent again. Before I knew it, perhaps because of the fall, I felt my legs lose control and I tumbled, rolling all the way down.

Falling is nothing unusual for me. As a kid, I remember my parents taking me to the family doctor many times to have dressings replaced on my wounded knees. At school, I once fell on broken glass. Another time I fell over a hurdle, banged my chest so hard that I couldn’t inhale for what felt like a minute. I have fallen down the staircase at many workplaces. I have fallen in and around the Supreme Court of Sri Lanka. I have slipped and fallen by the pool. I once fell into the drain of my own house and ended up in a cast and crutches.

I have fallen so many times that none of my associates are ever surprised. I have fallen so many times that a neurosurgeon once decided to investigate my heart and brain for an underlying cause, only to find none and hear me say “I told you so”. I have fallen so many times that the prospect of falling doesn’t scare me anymore.

On just the second day of this New Year, I took a walk in the snow. Young and old alike were commuting or engaging in their daily workout. I walked about at Chonnam National University. The snow covered everything as far as the eyes could see. The partially frozen pond was a sight to behold.

It was a very pleasant walk until I fell on an icy road. At first my left foot slipped, but I didn’t fall. I tried to straighten that leg to take the next step, only to have my right foot slip. I tried again and again, only to have each foot slip alternatively. A small boy playing in snow nearby looked puzzled. I may have looked like a cartoon to him. It’s certainly what I pictured myself as. Eventually, my knees hit the ground and I flopped face down into the ice. Putting weight on my hands, I lifted myself on to my knees. Every attempt to stand up without slipping was a failure.

I looked around and saw a dry patch of ground with no ice or snow, and crawled on my knees to that spot. This time I finally rose up and walked cautiously. The next morning I felt like I had been hit by a truck. I am not exaggerating, my family vehicle was hit by a speeding tipper (dump truck) once and the morning after felt exactly like this one. Back then the doctor said I had a whiplash.

I wasn’t familiar with walking on ice. The thought of falling again on ice, gave me chills. But, I found myself narrating a really humorous version of the fall to my friends. I even found myself sitting on a bus and mentally ranking my most epic falls, and how the fall on ice came third after rolling down a mountain and walking into my own drain. The more I laughed about it, the less haunting the fall had become and I walked on the ice again and again, without letting the fear of falling hold me back.

There are times in life that laughter might actually be the best medicine. I have seen this first hand in the Sri Lankan legal scene. Senior lawyers in Hulftsdorp (where the highest courts of the country are situated in), recounted days where they made blunders in Court. They recounted days they faced serious heat. And let me tell you that in my own experience, some of the disasters lawyers tackle on a daily basis are not of their own making. In all of these narratives, I observed one quality – humour. No one spoke with anger, resentment, doubt or humiliation. Not because there was no cause to, but because they chose a positive perspective. Simply said, they laughed it off. It’s not because they were suppressing their true feelings, nor was it pretend bravery in front of junior lawyers. They really had moved on and it allowed them to look back with laughter. They didn’t allow their past mistakes, or the past stresses they faced to dictate an unsatisfactory future. Some of these lawyers have careers older than I am. I could only imagine what a forty or fifty year old career full of resentment or embarrassment would look like. It surely wouldn’t be a happy one.

There were many occasions that I have lashed out at people in anger and frustration, but it never resolved any problem. It never even gave me peace. I now engage in a simple exercise, I don’t recount any stresses unless I am able to talk about it without anger or other negative emotions. I ask myself “Do I find it funny yet?” If the answer is ‘no’, then I work on moving on, until the anger subsides, the humiliation washes away and laughter sets in.