Why Crying Might Be the Most Healing Thing You Can Do
There’s a moment, maybe you’ve felt it, when you finally let the tears fall. After holding it all in, your chest tight, your breath shallow, your heart pounding, something inside you says, “Enough.” And so you cry. Not the neat, movie-scene cry, but the messy, gut-wrenching, ugly kind of cry that leaves your face blotchy and your spirit cracked wide open.
But what happens next is quietly miraculous.
Your breath softens.
Your heart begins to slow.
And for a moment, you feel…relief.
This isn’t coincidence, it’s chemistry.
Crying is a Biological Reset
We often think of crying as a sign of weakness or loss of control. But science tells a different story. Crying, especially emotional crying (like tears of grief or overwhelm), is a built-in regulation system, a kind of natural therapy session hardwired into the human experience.
When we cry from deep emotional pain, our parasympathetic nervous system kicks in. This is the “rest and digest” side of the nervous system, the one that helps us come down from high-alert stress states. As we cry, our body responds by:
Slowing the heart rate
Deepening and regulating our breathing
Releasing feel-good chemicals like oxytocin and endorphins—our body’s natural painkillers
Flushing out excess stress hormones like cortisol through our tears
Yes, your tears literally carry away stress. They’re not just symbolic, they’re functional.
Grief is a Full-Body Experience
Grief isn’t just emotional; it lives in the body. It disrupts sleep, tightens muscles, alters digestion, and dysregulates the nervous system. Crying can be the body’s way of recalibrating. When we allow ourselves to weep, we interrupt the fight-or-flight response and invite in the possibility of rest and repair.
This is why after a long cry, we often feel strangely clear or even a little lighter. The body has done its work. It’s released what it could. It’s softened the edges just enough for us to keep going.
There’s No Shame in Your Tears
In a world that often tells us to “stay strong” and “keep it together,” choosing to cry is an act of courage. It means you’re allowing yourself to feel the depth of your experience. You’re not bypassing it but by moving through it.
So if the tears come, let them. Find a quiet place, curl up under a blanket, or sit beneath a tree. Let your body speak through the water it releases. Let your grief move. Let your breath return.
You’re not broken. You’re healing.
