We Need a Cultural Container to Hold Each Other's Pain and Tears

Our culture is largely inept when it comes to rituals that help us process pain and suffering.

This essay was originally posted on May 1, 2024 and is now updated, with a poll added near the end (make sure you fill it out — it takes only a second!), and republished as part of the month-long collaboration with 12 other Substack writers who contribute to Victoria @Carer Mentor: Empathy & Inspiration’s September anthology on crying.

Dear Ponders,

In this dispatch from Lily Pond, I’m going to raise an important but uncomfortable issue for you to ponder. My mission here is to get all of us to ponder on important but taboo subjects that are nonetheless parts of the human condition. So today, I invite you to think about how our modern culture could do better to support those who are suffering from invisible, psychological pain.

Let me start with a personal anecdote. Yesterday, I attended a virtual wedding shower for a colleague. Everyone put a quote about love on their Zoom background. Somehow, in my absent-mindedness, I didn’t see the link to the background “templates,” so I just randomly selected a celebratory picture as my background. The bride-to-be read every quote with much delight, while I rolled my internal eyes, feeling jaded and cynical about the notion of romantic love.

Photo by Sandy Millar on Unsplash

After a painful breakup as a result of sexual betrayal, I was in no mood to celebrate romantic love with anyone. But to be a “good employee,” I had to show up as a supportive team member, put on a happy mask, and hide my misery. The longer I sat in the party, the more pain I felt in my gut. I just wanted the party to end as quickly as possible.

It was extremely hard to compartmentalize my feelings. “Your pain shouldn’t overshadow the joy of your colleague,” a voice in my head admonished. “But you’re being fake by going along! Can’t you just excuse yourself?” Another voice pleaded with a sob.

As much as today’s “enlightened” corporate culture celebrates “showing up as your whole self,” I doubt its sincerity. Yes, if you show up with your happy, enthusiastic self, that’s fine. You’d be liked and rewarded. But if you show up with a sad face with tons of personal struggles, you might be considered a pariah. In fact, managers are generally ill-equipped to handle situations where their staff members are struggling with personal issues that could affect their productivity at work.

The overall sense I get is that people don’t want to be involved in your “mess.” Your personal problems — particularly relational problems — is your own “dirty laundry.” So don’t hang it where we can see it. We don’t want to deal with it.

This kind of attitude is not only present in the workplace, but within families, social circles and in the whole society as well. If you tell someone about your “dirty laundry,” you would be seen as spreading gossip or, in the context of “toxic positivity,” spreading “negativity.” Those who put themselves on a moral or spiritual high ground would try to stay away from it.

My experience of sitting through the virtual wedding shower prompted me to consider how our Western (Westernized, depending on where you live) and individualistic society fails to fulfill an essential human need — to be emotionally supported when going through psychological pain.

In America, people who are suffering emotionally and mentally are shooed to therapies and support groups automatically. I am a big proponent of these therapeutic channels, from which I have benefited a great deal.

But there’s got to be more.

Friends are naturally people we turn to in times of emotional crisis and needs — a shoulder to cry on. I count myself lucky to have a few really close friends with whom I can share my sorrows and tears. But no single friend or group of friends are supposed or equipped to help shoulder the entire load of this person’s suffering. They have their own life issues and even grief to deal with. And that’s where our collective society has failed us.

How can we create a culture where community members can come to one another’s rescue in times of crisis? How do we ensure each person has access to a network of people who can be present with us physically in times of need? I’ve found this to be an extreme challenge, especially after the pandemic.

What kind of container can we create in our culture and the places where we show up most frequently, to allow for the person in pain to be honored, embraced and accepted?

These questions led me to revisit an interesting African custom that I heard years ago:

In the Babemba tribe of South Africa, when a person acts irresponsibly or unjustly, he is placed in the center of the village, alone and unfettered. All work ceases, and every man, woman, and child in the village gathers in a large circle around the accused individual.

Then each person in the tribe speaks to the accused, one at a time, each recalling the good things the person in the center of the circle has done in his lifetime. Every incident, every experience that can be recalled with any detail and accuracy, is recounted. All his positive attributes, good deeds, strengths, and kindnesses are recited carefully and at length. This tribal ceremony often lasts for several days.

At the end, the tribal circle is broken, a joyous celebration  takes place, and the person is symbolically and literally welcomed back into the tribe.

~KindSpring.com

Notice how the tribe celebrates the person who engaged in wrongdoing? I’m not sure if a ritual exists that celebrates a person who has walked on a difficult emotional journey. But wouldn’t it be nice to have one?

How could we create a culture where community members can come to one another’s rescue in times of crisis? What kind of container can we create in our culture and the places where we show up most frequently, to allow for the person in pain to be honored, embraced and accepted?

In American culture, celebrations exist for stages of life where there’s growth and expansion, such as birthdays and weddings. But when it comes to life stages where people experience separation and loss, we hardly have any rituals. With the passing of a loved one, we do have funerals, or celebration of life as some call it. But that ritual lasts just one day. As any of you who have gone through grieving knows, grief may visit us any time for years or decades.

What about other difficult passages of life in between birth, marriage and death?

What about divorce or separation from partners? The latter isn’t even recognized because somehow, if you are not officially married, your pain of separation isn’t considered as bad?!

What about estrangement from parents, siblings or friends?

What about losing your job, home or possessions?

What about traumatic experiences and betrayals?

Because so many people are relegated to dealing with the painful moments in life alone — in private — without support, is it any wonder that we turn to whatever means we can lay our hands on? Because therapies, coaching, retreats and the like are expensive and not accessible to everyone, things that temporarily boost our dopamine levels have become the go-to methods to help us numb, bypass or ease our pain.

Some of the things that people turn to for quick doses of pain relief include drugs, alcohol, sex, porn, gambling, video games, compulsive spending, disordered eating, binge-watching TV shows, and more.

Is it any wonder why America is saddled with addiction problems? Over 46 million Americans struggle with substance use disorder. Statistics show that addiction and substance abuse affect more Americans than heart conditions, diabetes or cancer.¹ Between 3- 6% of Americans have sex addiction² (but given the shame surrounding this, I believe the figure is underestimated.) And those numbers are barely scratching the surface of the depth of pain that people feel.

My intelligent and indomitable Ponders, what do you suggest that we can do, to create a cultural or collective container for people to process and integrate emotions that are often put into a dark and shadowy place?

In my article “The Healing Power of Tears,” I wrote:

shouldn’t workplaces instigate a “Feeling Room,” “Emotional Processing Room” or a "Crying Room”? Just like the lactation room, which normalizes breast feeding, it’s important to acknowldge the need for people to take care of their normal human function of “emoting” and crying. When we’re not allowed to cry when we need to, we end up developing various kinds of mental and physical illnesses as a result of repression.

An idea has been brewing in my mind since I wrote that passage, and I want to invite you to participate in the shaping of this idea — a virtual crying room. But it’s not only about crying. It’s about sharing a together time in a mindful way. It’s about offloading what’s been heavy on your heart, receiving warm and non-judgmental witnessing, while sipping tea in a slow and mindful manner.

Would you be interested in a regular virtual meet-up where we’ll sip tea, share what’s in our hearts, and cry and witness one another?

I’ll leave you with a little “word gift” that I hope will create a ripple not just here at Lily Pond but in the community where each of you live:

Ubuntu: A collection of values and practices that people of Africa or of African origin view as making people authentic human beings. While the nuances of these values and practices vary across different ethnic groups, they all point to one thing — an authentic individual human being is part of a larger and more significant relational, communal, societal, environmental and spiritual world.³

I believe that if we can adopt this philosophy of “I am because we are,” we may stand a chance of restoring some of the humanity that modern civilization has stripped from our human existence.

1. Fast Facts about Addiction. https://drugfree.org/article/fast-facts-about-addiction/

2. Sex Addiction Statistics. https://www.addictionhelp.com/sex-addiction/statistics/

3. Ubuntu philosophy. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ubuntu_philosophy

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Care to Share?

An article, a Substack note, a poem, art, a great quote or music?

A personal experience with tears or crying.

1. Here’s how:

   1. Create a piece about your tears or crying

   2. REFERENCE The Carer Mentor Collaboration ‘Caring About Crying’ OR Simply draw a Heart with ‘I CARE’ inside it.

   3. SHARE the URL Link in the comments below with the TITLE in CAPS

   4. FIND and READ someone else’s piece, comment and restack.

   A few catalyst thoughts: When did you last cry? Tell us about your most profound experiences of crying. Do tears come easily? When someone cries, what do you do—how do you receive tears?

Here are some great Substack resources that I recommend for anyone trying to understand the complexities of grief:

1. Debbie Weil, writer of Bold Age:  Please don't say "Sorry for your loss"

2. Victoria Chin, writer of Carer Mentor:  Grief is Messy: It’s Not a Tidy Five-Stage Path

3. Anne, writer of The Future Widow. ‘Intentionally Building Resilience One Day at a Time’

4. Victoria Chin, writer of Carer Mentor: Grief Resource Articles

The Caring About Crying Anthology. We All Cry. You’re Not Alone.

• Sept 1 Launch article: Caring About Crying. We All Cry. You’re Not Alone By Victoria at Carer Mentor: Empathy and Inspiration

• Sept 2 Crying: 'Did you know?' Resource: Tears the science and some art. By Victoria at Carer Mentor: Empathy and Inspiration

• Sept 3 Cry, Baby. Why Our Tears Matter' A Podcast Interview. Dan Harris and Dr Bianca Harris of Ten Percent Happier with Reverend Benjamin Perry. By Victoria at Carer Mentor: Empathy and Inspiration

• Sept 4 ‘In Conversation with Rev. Benjamin Perry’. Victoria interviews the Author of 'Cry Baby: Why Our Tears Matter' By Victoria at Carer Mentor: Empathy and Inspiration

• Sept 5 My stoic mom's parting gift: Making peace with tears By Sarah Coomber at Sandwich Season

• Sept 6 We Invite You to 'Care About Crying'. By Victoria on behalf of the team.

• Sept 6 ICU Special Edition: There's Crying in Baseball? By Nurse Kristin  at HCT:Heal Cure Treat

• Sept 7 Triggered. Caring About Crying Anthology By Kristina Adams Waldorf, MD at After He Said Cancer and Anne at The Future Widow  

• Sept 8 'Can't Cry. Want to Cry??' A Caregiver's Paradox of Human-ing. By Victoria at Carer Mentor: Empathy and Inspiration

• Sep 9 AWC Town Bulletin - On Crying By Tiffany Chu and Bakhtawar at Asian Writers Collective

• Sep 10 The Healing Power of Tears By Louisa Wah at Lily Pond

• Sept 11 My Tears are not a Grief Gauge By Anna De La Cruz at Gen Xandwich

• Sept 13 Sweet Relief After He Said Cancer | A Memoir by Kristina Adams Waldorf, MD at After He Said Cancer 

• Sept 15 When was the last time you cried in public? Moving from private grief to community healing By Mariah Friend at Heartbeats

• Sept 16 Crying While Parenting: A Mindful Approach By Amber Groomes,Ph.D. at Dr. Amber_Writes.

• Sept 17 Cry, Baby, Cry By Louisa Wah at Lily Pond

• Sept 18 Why we stop crying by Rachel Ooi at Conscious Living

• Sept 19 Carer Mentor Collaboration: my cup overfloweth with my tears By Christa Lei (They/Them) at Is This What You Want?

• Sept. 20 Rain, Drought, Wherabout By bakhtawar at Stories and States

• Sept. 24 Dark Night of the Soul By

  Christine Vaughan Davies
  at Journeying alongside.

Coming up next —

Tiffany Chu

!