In our culture, there is this powerful idea about crying outward, about crying out for people who we think can meet our needs, and soothe our fears, and comfort us in the difficult times that are so much a part of being human.
Men in particular are often ridiculed and prodded for their inability to show their emotions and talk about their feelings. The man who is broken outside but cannot get help is one of the great cliches about maleness in our world. We all know someone like that. It is said that men or women like that are not in touch with their feelings. Perhaps, I wonder, if they are crying inward.
There is, this idea, I think that crying outward is healthy and necessary to be whole.
There is also a widespread spiritual belief that there is a great split between divinity and humanity.
Human needs for affection, attention, and consolation are seen as something separate from spirituality or worship.
We go to church for one, therapists for another. We are told again and again to cry out for help if we need it, and one of the turning points of my life was to see that I needed help and then went and got some. Help helps.
In my own life, I have rarely, if ever, been able to cry outward. I cry inward, and that is a natural and healing place for me. When young, I was taught to fear the showing of too much emotion, and I still fear it. But I am not afraid to cry inward, and that, I find, is where my humanity lives, where my heart is.
Crying inward is personal and portable. When I am watching dishes at night, alone at the sink, I cry inward. When I am meditating, I often cry inward. When I am sitting outside in a chair, or lying awake at night, I often cry inward.
Does it really matter, I wonder, whether I cry outwardly or inwardly, as long as I can do it when I need to do it? Is the depth of the experience any less because I don’t choose to share it?
No one person can fulfill all of my needs. So I have come to look inside of me for help, and that is where I have always found it. My heart and soul have never failed me, misunderstood me, rejected me, misunderstood me, or hurt me. My community lives inside of me.
The community there can truly hold me and sustain me, beyond my anguish and fear and the great ability of human beings to hurt me.
God helps those who help themselves!!
Please explain how this relates to my piece, thanks…It’s not clear to me. Turning inward in the Christian religion is a way of turning to God, no?
I believe our emotions are God given and it is necessary for us to show them how ever is possible, crying, laughing, celebrating, etc. It is apparent you hold great emotion for I’ve seen it in your writing. Love your books !!
May you be richly blessed. May you know every happiness.
This article is so helpful to me. I am a woman who has seldom cried outwardly. People expected me to cry outwardly when my husband died, but I didn’t. I cried inwardly and found healing in this way. People think I am hard because I don’t cry outwardly, but I tell them I cry inwardly. It’s what works for me. Thank you for this article. It has confirmed my belief in it not being necessary to cry outwardly if crying inwardly works for me. Many thanks