rain

The words written above didn't really mean much to me when they randomly popped into my head last night. I was trying to come up with a description for my "sad songs" playlist on Spotify when those words seemed to slip off my fingers onto the keys of my laptop. I reread what I had just typed. "Even the sky cries, darling. If it didn't, nothing could grow." I reread it again and thought to myself, where the heck did that come from? Also, what is that even saying, other than telling someone their tears are valid? Tonight, I took some more time to think about what those words meant and I came to this explanation (grab some popcorn and buckle up, 'cause it's a long one):

Often when I experience something negative or painful, I feel numb to it...for a long time, sometimes even forever. I'm able to carry on with life as if it didn't happen, even though I know I should be hurting over it. Why then do I so desperately want to feel that pain and cry over it? Why don't I simply appreciate the fact that I'm not affected by this thing, and move on with my life?

The answer comes to me when I'm finally able to cry and actually feel the hurt; when I do that, I get a huge wave of peace and relief. Much of that instant relief is the result of chemical releases in the body that happen when we cry...but there's more to it than science. Over the past couple months, I've realized that if I don't "cry it out" (whatever it may be), I feel stuck in it; like I'm constantly living in the moment of that terrible thing, even if I don't feel the pain from it.

Picture this,

There's a room in your home that's filled with junk and hasn't gotten cleaned in years. It's plain nasty. But you never go in that room anyway. It's not necessary for normal life in your home and you're able to work around it pretty easily. When people visit, all you have to do is shut the door and forget about it. 

Every once in a while, you have a fleeting memory of what that room was like before it was a disaster. It used to be a beautiful music room; not necessary, but nevertheless, a sweet part of the house. 

Over time, the memories get more frequent and hard to overlook. Then one day a family member kindly urges you to finally clean up the room. They even offer to get knee-deep in the mess with you and help you. You've been thinking about it for a while already, so you finally do it. It's hard, it's messy, it's also a little embarrassing. But it's so worth it. You realize how good it feels to have that room open and clean again. It's not exactly how it used to be before the mess happened, but it's still good. Very good.

We all have a mental "home". A negative or painful experience can make a nasty mess in one of the rooms, but when we cry, we get knee-deep in the mess and work through it.

When I cry over a painful experience, I know I've felt it, my body has processed it, and it's finally been released through the tears flowing down my cheeks. I'm then able to move on and look at it as something of the past...I can grow from it. In the place of the darkness, grows a flower, not to cover up the past, but to honor its reality and represent the growth that came out of it.

See? Crying is okay. Even the sky cries, darling. If it didn't, nothing could grow.



 - {just joy}