Author and lecturer Leo Buscaglia once talked about a contest he was
asked to judge. The purpose of the contest was to find the most
caring child. The winner was a four-year-old child whose next-door
neighbor was an elderly gentleman who had recently lost his wife.
Upon seeing the man cry, the little boy went into the old gentleman's
yard, climbed onto his lap, and just sat there. When his mother
asked what he had said to the neighbor, the little boy said,
"Nothing, I just helped him cry."
Pain is a funny thing. It hits hard, it creeps up slowly, it cuts deep, it comes in waves, it makes us cry, it makes us crazy. It's something we often hide and show only to a select few. After all, the last thing we want at that point is for someone to be careless with our fragile heart and cause it even more damage.
So what do we do, when trusted with the precious tears of someone else? Whether they blatantly reveal their pain to us, or we happen to catch a glimpse through the broken smiles and forced laughter they patch their wounds with.
We don't pat them on the back and tell them they'll be ok. Chances are, they know they'll be ok. We don't tell them to suck it up, or to look on the bright side, or that somebody else has it worse than they do. We don't give them advice or tell them how they should be handling it.
We help them cry.