Because he knows you have to laugh at the things that hurt you just to keep yourself in balance, just to keep the world from running you plumb crazy.… - Ken Kesey

He knows that you have to laugh at the things that hurt you just to keep yourself in balance, just to keep the world from running you plumb crazy.

But he won’t let the pain blot out the humor no more’n he’ll let the humor blot out the pain.

Because he knows you have to laugh at the things that hurt you just to keep yourself in balance, just to keep the world from running you plumb crazy.

...you have to laugh at the things that hurt you just to keep the world from running you plumb crazy

"...you have to laugh at the things that hurt you just to keep in balance." [Chief Bromden]

He knows you have to laugh at the things that hurt you just to keep yourself in balance... He knows there's a painful side, but he won't let the pain blot out the humor no more'n he'll let the humor blot out the pain.

This is what I know. The ward is a factory for the Combine. It's for fixing up mistakes made in the neighborhoods and in the schools and in the churches, the hospital is. When a completed product goes back out into society, all fixed up good as new, better than new sometimes, it brings joy to the Big Nurse's heart; something that came in all twisted and different is now a functioning, adjusted component, a credit to the whole outfit and a marvel to behold.

"McMurphy tied a chunk of meat to each end of a four-foot string, tossed it into the air, and sent two squawking birds wheeling off, "Till death do them part.

He's what he is, that's it. Maybe that makes him strong enough, being what he is.