In a creative twist on Spotify's annual Wrapped feature, data-driven Rachel Ginter, a 29-year-old social media marketing professional from Vancouver, Canada, has awed viewers online with her innovative "Crying Wrapped" project.
Ginter's "Crying Wrapped," a unique virtual logbook spanning pie charts and graphs, tracks every instance the marketer cried in 2024, categorizing each episode by date, reason and intensity.
After being shared to TikTok on December 4, Ginter's video struck a chord with many, amassing more than 4.6 million views and sparking a broader conversation about emotional awareness and personal development.
"In 2024, I tracked every time I cried, logging the date, reason, and whether it was a 'Big Bertha'—defined as sobbing or hyperventilating for over 15 minutes," Ginter, who is known as @rachel_ginter online, told Newsweek. "At the end of the year, I categorized the cries by reason, month, and intensity to create my 'Crying Wrapped.'"
Ginter, who has been experimenting with digital content since she started a YouTube channel 16 years ago, pushed her "Crying Wrapped" beyond a personal experiment to become a visually engaging representation of her well-being over the past 12 months.
She drew inspiration for her "Crying Wrapped" from the multitude of "Wrapped" videos that circulated on social media after the release of Spotify's annual summaries in early December.
Ginter's viral video, timed to coincide with the release of those summaries, sees her walking viewers through the color-coded graphs and pie charts on her laptop.
She told viewers: "I tracked every single time I cried in 2024, so here is my Crying Wrapped. In total, I cried 22 times. That's 78 times less than the 100 I predicted."
The visual breakdown of her emotional year is enlightening and relatable, offering viewers a glimpse into her struggles and moments of vulnerability.
The primary reasons for her tears? "Overwhelmingly, it was because of a man," Ginter said.
She endured two breakups in the year, faced burnout, and grappled with grief. Despite the deeply personal nature of these experiences, Ginter approached them with humor and candor, sharing that she categorized her crying into small outbursts and "Big Berthas," which required more time to emotionally regulate.
Her "favorite cry" occurred at a Taylor Swift concert in Toronto, Canada, capturing the broad spectrum of emotions that defined her year. She also noticed that she cried less in the spring and summer, which ties in with existing patterns of people struggling more with mood swings in the darker and colder winter months.
Ginter's approach to tracking and sharing her emotional experiences stems from her background in social media and video creation.
"I started YouTube at 13, teaching myself to write, film, and edit videos—a passion that grew into a career," she said. "Today, I'm a social media manager for a B2B tech company where I've honed that expertise."
Leveraging her skills, Ginter has built a following across TikTok, Instagram, and YouTube, sharing authentic snapshots of her life and offering a range of content from travel tips to candid reflections on her experiences.
While she may be quick at content creation, making her "Crying Wrapped" took more work. Still, she is pleased to have put herself up to the challenge and has benefited emotionally from exercising more awareness around her ups, downs and triggers.
"The tracking process itself was the most therapeutic—taking pause to really confront the reason for crying made it a lot easier to move through the emotion or find a solution," Ginter said.
Ginter's methodical approach to her tears has helped her feel more comfortable with bouts of crying and has transformed it into a shared human experience for her viewers.
Several have shared how many times they cried in 2024 in the comments.
"The most useful thing I learned from posting the video and reading the comments was that everybody cries...And often, too! Nobody is perfect. Crying is a natural, shared experience that helps normalize vulnerability and fosters compassion for ourselves and others," Ginter said.
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