How To Conquer Crying At Work

Sitting across from my male boss discussing an emotionally tense situation, suddenly- to my absolute distress- I found my throat getting tight, I began to choke up, tears forming behind my eyes and to my mortification, they started to slip out!

I was conscious that as someone in a position of leadership I had revealed vulnerability. Something that many people- myself at the time included, would perceive as a weakness.

Have you ever noticed that the way women and men are socialised to see crying in the workplace can lead to harsh judgements? The key one being that of incompetence- maybe this person isn’t mature enough, maybe they’re too emotional. The doubts begin to form that the person who cries might not be able to handle difficult or intense situations.

Even as I began to judge myself for the tears, I found this illogical and mysterious because I know myself, what I’ve achieved, how I’ve contributed, the situations and circumstances I’ve been exposed to and experienced, at times intentionally- in order to deal with extreme challenges, face my fears and deepen my commitment to and experience of life. And I trust you’re the same!

Think of the many times you’ve overcome your doubts and fears, the successes you’ve had, the way you’ve led, the times you’ve been kind, helpful, humble, wise, brave, bold, successful, adventurous, joyful.. the many hardships and situations you’ve weathered and learned from.

So how can this simple human response trigger such doubt in our abilities?

After the experience I found myself fascinated and driven to understand more. Why do we cry? I know crying is an entirely normal and healthy response to a vast range of emotional stimuli, but sometimes, especially when it’s not going to be helpful, I don’t want to cry in front of other people.

And I thought of you dear reader, if I’m having this experience maybe it will help you too… Maybe you would like know why it happens? Is this a common experience? And what can you do to save face? These were my burning questions!

Here’s what you’ll discover too.

So what are some mental, physical and social approaches that you can use to conquer your crying so that you either stop the tears, handle the situation if it does occur and successfully reset the dynamic back to normal afterwards?

There are times that an emotional situation or conflict catches you unawares. In these cases, here are 11 simple and effective tips for stopping the tears.

Dr. Ad Vingerhoets, a professor of clinical psychology and the author of “Why Only Humans Weep: Unravelling the Mysteries of Tears,” said that the reasons why we cry change as we age. Babies and children will cry from physical pain but adults rarely do. Adults may cry from strong positive emotions such a team victory or a moving performance but according to Dr. Vingerhoets, there are two major consistent triggers for adult crying. “The first is helplessness and powerlessness,” he said. “The second, separation and loss.”

Think of the risks you take when you are in business and the complexities of an evolving marketplace, the demands from your bosses, your clients, your staff, the challenges of working with difficult personalities and navigating toxic workplace politics, the pressure to succeed and the times you failed and lost a major contract or client. While the opposite positive experiences happen too, it makes sense then doesn’t it? Underneath the calm facade and busy typing, workplaces are like hot houses, incubating the kind of experiences that trigger the need to release the pressure of these emotions through a normal human response like crying.

So if you only do one thing, do this. Let go of your both your judgements of crying as a weakness and as something that hurts your professional reputation- it doesn’t help anything. What if you allowed yourself to see the truth- that it’s a normal human reaction? According to this recent study in 2018, just under half of employees surveyed in this study acknowledged that they’ve cried at work. The study found that the occasional tears from pressure, a stressful meeting or failure, strong emotions from caring about the people you work with and what you do- is not really a big deal, 69% of employees and 74% of executives surveyed reported that they thought it was ok, it shows you’re human.

Contrast this to the 32% employees and 26% of executives studied who viewed tears as an unacceptable weakness. This response likely stems back to childhood events. Think back for a moment, when you cried were you comforted or shamed? What messages did you receive about how acceptable or unacceptable it was to cry? It would be interesting to examine that and trace the pattern of your thought development through your life experiences. This helps you better understand not only yourself but others around you- an essential skill in workplaces and businesses. The interesting thing about that statistic is more employees than executives double down on embarrassment and shame after crying in the workplace- which are emotional states that hurt your ability to be effective and professional. The research actually shows that crying doesn’t typically hurt your professional standing- depending on how you handle it and respond. Have you ever heard the saying- ‘if it’s not a problem for you, it’s not a problem for them?’

Perhaps if we didn’t see crying as a crippling weakness but as a normal human response to emotional stimuli, then we maintain our ability to gracefully address the discomfort experienced by our colleagues in the workplace. This discomfort occurs because many people are unsure how to respond when someone cries in the workplace. Our natural human response is to be empathetic and supportive but if you are the person crying and you see this as an event that is shame full and weak then you will naturally try to ignore the tears or act as if it isn’t happening- which everyone can see it is. These conflicting messages make it uncomfortable for those seeing the tears and wanting to help or somehow fix the situation. By you refusing to acknowledge what is happening, others are blocked from their natural desire to offer support and you are locked away in a suffering spiral. If you feel as though you’ve done something unacceptable and believe that by crying, you’ve destroyed your professional reputation by looking ‘weak’ - then you will confuse everyone by pretending it’s not happening. Your mind will then find false evidence confirming your tears are unacceptable, in the confused lack of response from your colleagues, which further erodes your ability to regain control of your emotional state, compounding your self judgement and driving your distress higher.

Imagine if you could see crying as a normal response- it’s no big deal and maybe you see the humour in the situation - seemingly professional adults paralysed by the appearance of innocuous tears! Maybe this helps you to be diplomatic and address the experience “as you can see, I’m really passionate about this, it’s ok, I’d find it funny if you feel like crying too now after seeing me get emotional!”, then you can convey whether you need support or space, “I just need some water and a tissue”, gather yourself and take some deep breaths and thank your colleagues for their offers of help and concern.

It’s also more common than you may think. For over a decade, Alison Green has been handling tricky workplace issues on her website Ask A Manager and it’s reassuring to hear her state that “It happens to a LOT of people. I don’t think to everyone, but crying at work is much more common than people realize, probably because it usually happens behind closed doors, like in a one-on-one meeting with your boss. But managers keep boxes of tissues on their desk for a reason.”

According to Anne Kreamer’s book “It’s Always Personal: Navigating Emotion in the Workplace” 41 percent of women and 9 percent of men have cried at work at some point during their careers. Knowing that the percentage is much higher for women than men reinforces that I’m not alone in this experience, it’s ok, it’s a normal part of my human responses as a professional woman and it helps to know this.

Research finds that women have evolved with six times the amount of prolactin- a hormone related to crying, and are biologically hardwired and socialised to cry more frequently than men. Think of crying as a pressure valve that releases to let up steam built up from emotions around experiences of powerlessness/ helplessness and loss/ separation. What makes it challenging to handle for many professional women is the pressure to not seem too emotional in a professional context - which makes crying feel especially mortifying! To make this even more stressful, if you’re a woman who cries in front of a man, you may find concerns arising such as; is he going to judge you as weaker, more sensitive and feel more uncomfortable by it than if you cried in front of another woman? Maybe, and that’s definitely something women worry about.

Once the storm has passed, you may want to compose yourself and clear away signs of your emotional distress. You will likely find that your face is flushed and your eyes puffy and red. When we cry, we stop breathing properly. We hold our breath and that makes the oxygen levels in our blood drop, turning our blood a darker shade of red and causing that telltale blotchiness that accompanies a good cry.

1. Face. To get rid of the flush, start by taking big, deep breaths. You can also apply a green- toned makeup concealer to neutralize any red patches on your skin. A splash of cold water helps to reduce redness and cool the flush.
2. Eyes. To combat puffy eyes, try patting cold water from the sink gently on your under eye area or if you have access to it, put on eye mask or a bag of frozen veggies from the freezer. To address redness, use redness-reducing eye drops like Visine.

Finally it’s important to address the likely concerns that others have. You don’t want the people you work with to worry that you are feeling fragile, and/or can’t handle feedback or didn’t fully process the situation or feedback. It’s helpful to demonstrate that nope, you’re fine, we can continue as normal by creating a positive interaction and by verbally confirming that you received the feedback and are working on implementing it.

So there you have it! You’ve conquered crying at work, by demonstrating a sense of professionalism in dealing with all the human emotions that are triggered- addressing the experience, clearly communicating your need for support or space and then moving gracefully on and helping others do the same.

And that’s far more remarkable than simple tears.