Why We Need to Learn That It’s OK to Cry

For my entire life, people have told me not to cry.

“There’s no need to cry” and “Crying won’t fix anything” were common phrases in my life, but they didn’t help me. Hearing this type of opinion causes me to repress my emotions, especially around people who I know are “against” crying.

Some people who don’t like it when others cry around them may feel that way because no one encouraged them to express themselves. Many of us learn early on that crying is “negative,” and it’s not OK to show that we’re sad. It’s even worse for young men — they often learn that crying isn’t “manly” or makes them “weak.” This mindset creates adults who bottle up their feelings and have to teach themselves when it’s actually acceptable to cry.

Nowadays, it’s more socially acceptable to cry without shame or guilt. People are more open about mental health than ever, and all kinds of people, from influencers to everyday Instagram users, have posted themselves crying on social media. While some find this behavior attention-seeking, it’s a good reminder that even people who seem to have “perfect” lives need to cry sometimes.

We don’t need to hold back our tears to make other people feel comfortable around us.

It’s great that we’re finally working against the idea that crying isn’t OK, but those of us who have seen this shift in society’s attitude towards crying often have to learn to cry. Our parents taught us that crying is unacceptable, so we tried our hardest not to cry, but now we have to break years of old habits as crying becomes less stigmatized. We may only feel comfortable crying in private, but we need to slowly adjust our attitude towards crying in other settings before we pass our views on sadness to a new generation. The next generation shouldn’t have to constantly hold back tears like we did, but it’s up to us to make those changes in our own lives first.

People who are against openly crying often say that expressing “negative” emotions inconveniences others.

However, openly showing a variety of emotions can actually help our friends and family because it may encourage them to be more open themselves. And of course, true friends are willing to listen when we’re in a bad mood — and we’d gladly do the same for them. It may be difficult to help our sad friends in the moment, but it could make many more people feel safe and comfortable to share their own emotions, no matter how “negative” they are. Emotional expression can be great for mental health, especially for people who previously never felt comfortable crying in front of others.

Many of us feel like our parents never truly learned to help us work through our emotions because they encouraged us to push them down instead. Some people in previous generations still aren’t willing to accept that their grown children have feelings or learn to express their emotions themselves. This is problematic, but even if our parents don’t change, we have to break the cycle of emotional repression instead of staying in a “comfortable” bubble where we never cry.

Learning that it’s OK to cry is difficult, but we can get out of the habit of repressing our emotions. When we pay attention to how we feel, start letting our emotions out in comfortable ways, and find supportive people who let us be ourselves no matter what we’re feeling, we’ll learn that crying is normal and healthy.

Others forced you to repress your feelings for so long, but that only hurt you. If you need to cry, please cry. Everyone needs a good cry sometimes, and you deserve to express your emotions.