“A moment of complex reflection.”

Almost every day we can add a secret thought of remorse or avarice to the list. Always a private thought, never shared. Or maybe a wish to be somewhere or someone else. Secrets can be prickly sins, and we typically never expose them to those sharing our lives for fear of judgement. And yet, sometimes, we do share them and thus waste a tiny bit of the freedom we aspire. The freedom to secretly think, to feel, to wonder, to explore, to opine, to live, and to pleasure our authentic truth without regret.f the truth be known, secrets are everywhere. Everyone has them, no doubt! It seems we collect them throughout the life we live, keeping them close. From small yearnings to massive, squandered blunders, secrets hang about in our head.

Our true authentic self needs freedom. The burden of this having this freedom, with its associated guilt from keeping secrets may humble us. If we share ourselves and our secrets it can be horribly daunting. Or maybe instead of sharing, we just embrace a lump of guilt whenever we do something for ourselves that someone said we shouldn’t. Our little secret. Secrets keep assembling every day and as our list grows, so do we. Authentic truth can rest comfortably amongst littered secrets. Another little secret.

I’ve imagined it must be easy to encounter no regret in life. To know you did your best and always, always, always, always sought happiness from every thought and task. It must be bliss. But life isn’t like that. Life challenges you with its demand for submission to live a life of compliance. Driving regret.

We often suppress life’s demands with secrets. I’ve never been a sociopath and picture the world in which they may live, striving for indulgence at the expense of everyone and everything. A world where nothing is ever kept secret. They speak their truth… often. Maybe too often.

Disappointingly, life can be artificially shaped by this civic demand for compliance, so we settle for something other than what we wanted, or felt, or imagined, or strived. When we don’t submit to this morose responsibility, we add a secret. Now, that’s truth.

Secrets: I have a few. Who doesn’t?

How dreary life must be not to feel the pinch of deception, the slap of guilt, or the punch of disgrace when holding a secret, never letting it out? But secrets are more than probable guilt. Secrets can give us an edge, a difference, and a confidence to welcome the idea that no one truly knows who we are.

This prized privacy from secrets we’ve kept holds us safe because exposing our truths may mean suffering hurt and ridicule, the scars of which often run deep. So, we keep our truths secret and carry them close, only sharing if we must, which is never.

Nonetheless secret stories are often told without a concern for those obliged to listen. Usually over a beer. Do I really want to learn a dirty little secret? A story of guilt. A story of lies, or perhaps a story of wonder? Maybe their secret shared enriches the enjoyment of their personality adding a twinkle of mirth to an otherwise forgettable moment; or maybe it’s judged, thus defining the truth-teller as dishonourable.

No one is really interested.

On second thoughts, why not keep it secret?

Secrets are ours. Let’s celebrate them.

No one can have them, no one can take them, no one knows them. They are ours. Our truth. Defining us; shaping us. They build character. We learn from their experience. We isolate our authentic truth from others and keep it a secret. Ours to enjoy and reflect upon in private moments. We never have to share our secrets for to do so may weaken who we are. The many secrets we enjoy have built our resilience; and yet, sadly, for many these dirty little secrets can weaken their truth and thus them.

What is truth then if we suffer from the dread of secrets with their inevitable consequences?

The truth is, a secret held too close for too long can kill us, literally. Life may be a paradox that way. To share or not to share, that is its secret.

Richard Evans – August 2021