My Crying Consciousness

I cried yesterday. I teared up a few days ago. I’ll probably cry again sometime in the near future. Am I abnormally sad or upset about something? Am I weak because I keep consistently crying? No and no. I’m simply human.

Until fairly recently, I never was a crier. Whenever I got upset about something, I would internalize it and feel sad enough to cry, but never actually allow myself to do so. No matter how badly I wanted to feel the release of sobs and water dripping from my eyeballs, I couldn’t quite allow myself to feel it. One of my best friends is really good at allowing herself to cry. My friend is an incredibly passionate person and thrives on deep connections with others and with things she does for herself. Since she feels everything so deeply and intentionally, she does a great job of allowing herself to feel tears as well. I admire anyone who allows themselves to feel their emotions so intentionally and purely. When I used to struggle with crying, my friend would always congratulate me whenever I’d allow myself to cry about something. That’s a sign of true friendship, folks. For whatever reason, basically since the end of the summer, I’ve been able to allow myself to cry whenever the feeling comes over me. Crying when I’m upset, or when I’m happy, or sometimes when I’m not sure why I’m crying has become a thing more familiar to me recently than it ever has been.

Since before winter break I had been watching Gossip Girl on Netflix (I blogged about that here, check it out). The other night I watched the final episode of the whole series, and I teared up when Chuck proposed to Blair. What the heck? Why in the world was I emotionally moved by fictional characters in a sub-par television show, doing exactly what every audience member knew they would end up doing anyway? These people aren’t real. The show wasn’t particularly moving or emotionally gripping. Any do-do bird watching from the first season would assume Chuck and Blair would end up together. So why did I tear up? The simple answer is I have no idea, but it was weird and cool to feel something in an instant that made water fill my eyes, even if the reason behind it wasn’t super profound. 

Allowing myself to cry lets my emotions explode into a physical, tangible expression, allowing me to partially rid myself of whatever feelings are hiding inside me. Just because I cry doesn’t mean I’m sad or depressed; it means that emotions take over sometimes and cannot be explained. I still feel surprised by my visceral reaction to an emotional situation every time I cry, but I truly just need to accept the fact that me crying about things has become more and more a part of my current self, and that’s a-okay. Just because I haven’t always been one to cry doesn’t mean that me crying is unnatural or unwelcome. I used to never like pickles, but recently they’ve been tasting pretty nice to me; same kinda thing. Just because an aspect of your human person is slightly different than it always used to be and causes you to understand yourself in a different way does not mean this aspect is wrong or needs to be rejected. People change their likes and dislikes all the time, so why can’t emotional aspects and self-perceptions change just as naturally?

This isn’t to say that I just walk around crying all the time, because I definitely don’t, but I certainly do feel my emotions in a more profound way than I ever used to. This deeper understanding of how I’m feeling in a particular way might in fact lead me to tears. Whether they be happy tears or sad tears, I’m glad I’m feeling something deep enough to make them happen.