I don’t think I have ever met a person who was so insensitive that nothing would ever bring a tear to their eye. The trigger may be a thought of a deceased wife or child. It may be a moment of grief or a moment of extreme relief or happiness. It may be when they are on their death bed and they come to realize that they should have been more loving and caring about another in their life, and now it is too late. On the other hand, some of us are so sensitive that it is sometimes an embarrassment. Based on my observations of people in general, most humans are somewhere in between the hard and the soft in respect to emotional sensitivity. I am one of an elite group that are sometimes ridiculed and often described as ‘softies.’ What is it that will bring a tear to my eye: Another person crying, sometimes I don’t even have to know why they are crying. The birth of a new grandchild, whether I am present at the event or am just notified that it has occurred.
When I see one of my adult children holding and loving one of their own grandchildren. In the Spring of the year when I see the first little bud on a tree, the bud struggling to spread out and become a leaf, trying to fulfill its destiny. A little chick trying to peck its way out of a shell. When I see a transient lying on a park bench trying to sleep without sufficient clothing to keep him warm. When I hear of a child in a poverty stricken area crying because their little tummy hurts for lack of nourishing food.
When I see a deformed person’s struggle to do a normal task, a task that I take for granted, something that I do with little or no effort every day of my life. When I see an accident and know that someone, maybe a little child, may have been hurt or even killed. When I look at a beautiful sunset, a majestic snow capped mountain with the sun shining in all its splendor. When I see a beautiful wild animal in its natural habitat. When I see a helpless animal in the sights of a hunters rifle, knowing that it is soon to be killed, even while knowing that God gave us certain animals for our sustenance. When I see a cruel act committed against a child or an animal, such as a cat or a dog. When I read the scriptures and see for the first time what Heavenly Father has been trying to teach me by that verse. When I hear a sincere testimony and the spirit is touching me at the very center of my soul. When I read stories of faith where families and/or individuals had to bear extreme hardships, such as those suffered by many pioneer families. When my children have suffered with some heart-breaking problem, when an answer was not eminent. When my wife was in painful labor and the child seemed to fight against coming into this world. When I hear about natural disasters where hundreds of innocent people have died.
The above list represents some of the things that will bring a tear to my eye. I will not go on because I believe anyone reading this will have already gotten the point. Some will assume that because I am as sensitive to life as I am, that I must be a very unhappy person who cries all the time. That assumption is the furthest from the truth, because the emotions that make me shed a tear for those who hurt are also the same emotions that make me shed a tear for the beautiful things of the earth. Happy tears! The beauty far outnumbers the cruel and the sad. Sometimes I am so happy that I may just shed a tear just to prove it! How could one so blessed, as I have been, all of my life, ever be unhappy? I love this earth that was created by a loving Heavenly Father for His children’s growth and experience. I understand that there will be hardships and even cruel things happen to the good and the innocent but I also know that a just God will make everything right by and by.
My tears, bitter or sweet, that are brought about by the beautiful as well as the sad, are merely expressions of my humanness. I am happy for all of those emotions knowing that I share them with Heavenly Father. In the Book of Moses God saw the wickedness of His children: “And it came to pass that the God of heaven looked upon the residue of the people, and he wept; and Enoch bore record of it, (Moses 7:28) Why did God the Father of us all weep? Because He, too, is a ‘softy’!