The Display

Just recently I found myself standing amidst a crowd in a train station, looking at the display and welling up with tears – my train was ten minutes late. I’d had a long day, my back was killing me, and my hormones were all over the place. I just wanted to go home.

As my vision blurred, I could hear my mind panicking “No no no…NO NO! You can’t be crying over THIS!!”

I discreetly dabbed the corners of my eyes and did everything I could to keep those tears from rolling down. I opened my eyes wide, blinked a million a minute, looked up and away to help those drops cheat gravity… you get the picture.

When the moment passed, I was proud of myself for the success of the secret operation -No Tear Casualties Recorded!

However, the pride did not last long. I got to thinking about how uncomfortable I was with the idea of letting a stranger see me cry…because that would be weird, right? They wouldn’t know what to do with me. Worse yet, what if they knew what to do and asked me if I was going to be okay? I’d probably be embarrassed, deny the crying and say I had dry-eye syndrome or something!

The truth is that I was concerned about upholding my ‘got it all under control’ image more than allowing myself to let off some steam.

(Yeah…next time I’ll write about how to burst your own bubble without a pin!)

What if I’d allowed the tears to stream down? What if I’d told myself that it was okay to have a weak moment instead of trying to hide it? What if I’d simply embraced my humanness?

As I asked myself those questions I realized that I need to give myself the space to be human in moments like these. Not only to become more comfortable with myself but also to be able to hold space for others when they’re going through something similar.

Hence this reminder for myself and for you if you need one – It’s okay to be human.

Yours Rawly,

PS: Train delays normally don’t make me cry!