As a kid my mom embraced my tears. She let me cry. Ironically, her embracing my tears helped me get over them easier and faster. She would say: “let your tears flow. They cool you down. They cleanse your heart and mind.”
I don’t overthink my tears. If I feel like crying, I cry. My husband hugs me warmly of I cry. But I know he worries. He worries more than he should. For a long time I thought he feels the same about tears: they are healthy and a natural expression of emotion.
I oscilate between strong emotions. If I feel frustration building up onside me. if I find it in me to let my guard down and cry, my frustration deflates like a balloon. Easy. If I get angry, I know better not to say or do things that I’d regret later, so I find that limit to confront my anger and open the door to the other side through tears. They activate something healing in my brain.
I cry when I pray. I cry when I sing worship songs. I cry when I read something that stir strong emotions. I think tears are a gift for humans, and I tried to pass the same gift of understanding to my kids. I heard them say to my mother in law: “mommy lets us cry. she says it’s good for us to express our emotions.” and frankly, just like me, they rarely milk the tears. I mean, they are not criers in general.
This brings me to an interesting stage in my parenting. I have gone through a rough season and I took the crying escape route often. I felt discouraged in the face of disobedience or kids fighting each other, or straight up defying me. I would use my words, with clarity and kindness. I would use my voice with thundering firmness. But I’d change tactics adapting fast. And I would find myself crying. Not sobbing. But letting tears flow down my face as I would consider the next steps.
This often stopped my kids in their tracks. They would look expectantly. Honestly though, instead of shouting matches, to have them calm down and listen to my voice… this was the best course of action in the end.
My last two published books, “the poems of waiting” and “becoming mother”, share many of tears. That was a weepy season. I look back and I feel just a tad lame, but because of my core belief that tears of acceptable but anger is not, I take pride in not roaring my way through the preteen years, but crying to God, and crying to cleanse my brain.
Yet, as my eldest daughter read through the book, she said to me: “my gosh you cry a lot!.” “Who wants to read this book filled with emotions and tears and vulnerability?”
She probably sees me as lame, through her preteen glasses. At this stage, though it hasn’t always been this way, she finds vulnerability embarrassing.
We’ve had half a year of kindness and happiness and playfulness as a standard mode of operation in the house. Though I’ve been tired, we’ve found our rhythm and conrad stepped up his game of playfulness and involvement. Mostly because I put in everything I was and had, and as reaching my rock bottom of energy.
She mentioned it the other day, as a matter of fact, that she appreciates how happy our household feels and that I haven’t cried in a long time. Little does she know that I shed a tear here and there, but they haven’t pushed my buttons with quarreling and disobedience as if they have an emotionally maturing growth-spurt.
I try to keep and healthy balance of emotions, and I am not afraid to express my frustration when they do frustrating things, but I always use words and I find a way to grow from every challenging instance. Same with anger. There is such a thing as holy anger. Even sadness has its place. Much like unencumbered joy, silliness, playfulness, cuddling, telling stories or enjoying a comfortable silence. We are not unidimensional. And as I feel more alive and awake, I can listen to my intuition. Thank God for intuition. May we all rest well and stay alive and feel all the emotions God gave us and let them pass through us.