At my best, I cry everyday over something objectively small. My heart feels full at the thought of my best friend half a world away, and my eyes get wet. I see a raccoon run over on the road, and my hands start to shake. But when I’m busy, compartmentalized, or closed off, squeezing the compassion out of me is like talking to a wall. I feel nothing and try to do everything; I am efficient yet so much less human. My tears bring me closer to myself, and their long term-absence indicate a failure to feel other emotions such as profound happiness or desire.

Humans are one of the few species with a prolonged period of neural neoteny, aka we keep many of our infantile features. This results in a higher level of neuroplasticity, especially in our late teens and early 20s, and we are mutable and un-stubborn, constantly learning from our surroundings. To continue crying into adulthood is a sign of our neoteny (and so are our hairless features, which are derived from infancy). Would it be so bold to assume, then, that permitting ourselves to cry also exercises our brain’s neuroplasticity? (maybe, but let me cook)

It’s common knowledge by now that aside from moistening and cleaning our eyes by removing debris, crying also releases oxytocin and stress hormones such as cortisol and adrenocorticotropic hormone. A study published by the American Psychological Association revealed that crying helps to regulate breathing and slow heart rate during an emotionally arousing event, which may assist in generally maintaining biological homeostasis. It’s our body’s way of helping our brain deal with overwhelm.

Tears are a bridge between what is stored in the body and what the conscious awareness is now perceiving. Peter Levine developed a trauma therapy called Somatic Experiencing (SE), which is some academic-jargonic way of saying feel your body. Much of the trauma stored in the body comes from stress responses that were never completed, leaving the nervous system stuck in a freeze state and reducing our ability to feel certain sensations. Somatic Experiencing completes the cycle that was perpetually on pause by tracking the body’s sensations slowly and feeling + naming micro-sensations. Many SE clients experience crying as a form of thawing from the freeze cycle, a symptom of releasing the stress/trauma. To stifle the tears would be to prevent the completion of a stress response, keeping the trauma in your body.

I never used to cry when I was little, regardless of whether I sustained injury or punishment. I felt that the display of tears would reveal that I was weak, that the punishment was an effective means of discipline, and that I was the loser. In doing so, I was unempathetic towards my friends (also kids) who would cry to me or express their emotions. I was largely stoic and logical, thinking that my way was the right way. It really wasn’t until I made friends with a group of girls in high school who were such open faucets about their feelings, would cry with me and for me and fight for me, that my waterworks began. And suddenly I would cry at the drop of a penny, the fountain bursting upon seeing my friends give each other dog calendars spontaneously because they thought of each other. I cried when we lost some silly school spirit competition, and I sobbed when we won the competition the next year. It was like all the repressed feelings I thought just went away actually bubbled to the surface, and I finally was making meaningful connections with people because those girls humanized me with their tears and shameless expression.

I also cried when, as an adult now, I realized those girls and I would never share that pure joy and friendship the way we had when we were teens. But that’s sort of the beauty of life, that its only constant is impermanence, and I relearn that over and over again. Holding on too tightly leads to a more painful loss, and my tears facilitate my moving on.