Secrets
Listen: “Secrets” by OneRepublic
How many secrets do you keep? There are two categories of secrets most people harbor in their hearts from time to time. One type of secret resides in hopes and dreams we have for ourselves and/or our loved ones. Parents have dreams for their children hoping they find happiness, meaningful work and true love, but how much dream detail do you reveal to your children? Do you tell them you want them to go to Harvard, become a surgeon, marry a specific person and have three grandchildren? Or is it better to keep some dreams secret? Maybe you secretly dislike your professional career even though your successful. You have a secret dream of being a painter or a musician, but your afraid of failure and losing the status you have already gained. Secretly, you’d rather move to the mountains and paint.
According to Jesus, sometimes its better to do some things in secret instead of making a public spectacle of it. Sometimes its better to pray in secret, give in secret, or fast in secret. Some secrets are healthy, or at minimum, not harmful.
Another type of secret resides in the fear and shame of being known. In this situation, we hide what we don’t want others to know about us for fear they will reject us. The insecure person hides deep envy and jealousy and poses as a friend to those they envy. The alcoholic hides the amount of alcohol consumed in an effort to protect the overuse because alcohol numbs the hidden emotional pain inside. The thief determines it won’t hurt anyone to secretly borrow from a slush fund and pay it back later. The food addict is bingeing and purging in secret in an effort to control their broken self-image and self-hatred. The lover is hiding the affair because they’ve finally found someone who understands and makes them feel alive. Or the victim is hiding the sins of their abuser for fear of the backlash from exposing the family secrets.
In the long run, these secrets of fear and shame bury us. The public image we have fashioned through half-truths and self-deception becomes too heavy. Only people with antisocial or narcissistic personality disorders fiercely maintain these facades over the course of a lifetime. Most people crumble under the guilt and shame.
The way out seems counterintuitive. Since shame festers in the darkness of secrecy, you are only as sick as your secrets, which means, shame is healed through confession and vulnerability. This is ancient wisdom. In the Hebrew scripture, the Psalmist declared: “When I refused to confess my sin [or secrets], my body wasted away, and I groaned all day long” (Psalm 32:3; NLT). And in the New Testament: “Confess your sins [or secrets] to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed” (James 5:16; NLT). Step Five in AA is: “Admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs” (AA, p. 59).
I recommend finding an experienced therapist, sponsor, priest or pastor. Start by sharing your secrets with someone who is safe and experienced. Don’t share all your secrets with anyone or everyone. Not everyone is safe or wise. There is an art to confession.
But confess we must. If we want to be healed. If we want to be whole. If we want to know the freedom of guilt-free, shame-free living. The freedom comes through the love of another who truly knows us and continues to love us. The unconditional love of another is sometimes exactly what we need to kick-start loving ourselves. The courageous act of vulnerability through confession leads us to deeper levels of self-compassion, love for others, and love for God.
“God is love, and all who live in love live in God, and God lives in them” (1 John 4:16; NLT).
Shalom
©realfredherron, 2022
