ESSAY
INSTRUCTION: Read the question carefully and support your answer. Your answer must be minimum
of 10 sentences and a maximum of 20. See the rubric as your guide.
Question: Do you think that allowing yourself to cry is a health risk or is a contribution to wellness?
In my perspective, allowing yourself to cry is a contribution to wellness as it is the body’s way of
releasing pent up emotion. Suppressing how one feels, may it be pain, sadness or anger, leads to
physical stress and tension on the body. Heightened emotions and mental instability may happen if one
fails to address and confront how one feels, and crying is one way of confronting negative emotions and
thoughts. Emotional restraint intervenes with the processes of the body and may lead to imbalances
that need to be addressed at some point. An example is, if one feels hunger, one must satiate that need
for food in order to feel relieved of hunger and be mentally and physically stable. Same with crying, one
must express emotion and sentiment appropriate to one’s context and dilemma, to relieve grief and
agony – with the aim of maintaining the balance of one’s mental and physical health. Crying also serves
a healthy coping behavior as it is self-soothing and cathartic. Through this emotional release, weight
bearing mental conflicts can slowly unravel and aid in the healing of one’s trauma and suffering. In
crying, we avoid making a disservice to ourselves, because through crying, we process our feelings, so as
we do not go into the path of depression and anxiety. In the process of grieving, crying is a fundamental
part of the process that leads to acceptance and freedom. Though crying is a natural and healthy way of
relieving stress, remember to still have control over what you think and what you do, in the aim of
avoiding further emotional injury. Know your threshold and practice healthy coping behaviors in times
of dilemmas.