Secrets
I skipped my 9:00 class today and ate breakfast while watching the Today show instead. Most of the stuff they featured today wasn't very interesting, but one thing was awesome--it was an interview with the guy who started PostSecret, and they talked about the new book he's just released. PostSecret started as a blog where he sent out a call for people to snail mail him postcards with a personal secret on it--completely anonymously. Most of them are really incredible, and I think it's an amazing idea. You can see some of the cards at the blog, which is here.
I loved this project so much that I tried to think of a secret that I could send in... but to no avail. Pretty much the only two requirements for a post-secret secret are that it must be true and it must be something you've never told anyone before. I've got plenty of things that are true, but I don't think I have any real secrets that I've never told anyone. I have no secrets! How depressing is that? I'm sure there's *something* about myself that I've never told anyone, but it's probably something really lame and boring, like "I brush my teeth for less than two minutes." Ooo, scandalous.
Seriously people, it makes me feel really boring and uninteresting that I don't have any real secrets. I have a *lot* of quasi-secrets--that is, things that *almost* no one knows, and that I don't reveal to people unless I've known them really well for a very long time. But I don't have any true secrets. I think it's caused by a combination of the fact that I haven't really experienced anything very illicit, and that I'm not really ashamed of anything. I don't do things that I know I'll be ashamed of later--I just don't have any desire to. It never occurs to me to do something privately that I would be embarassed to admit later; you know, aside from stupid things like listening to Mandy Moore, and that's not even a secret either.
So what does it really say about me that I don't have any true secrets? It definitely makes me *feel* like I'm not as mysterious as I wish I was, but on the other hand, maybe it is a good thing. Maybe it's good that I don't build my existence around some dark truth, that I don't define myself by the things I'm ashamed of. It probably points to a certain openness of character, a tendency to embrace others in an effort to be known. Again, though, it's possible that real reason I'm secret-less is because I want so desperately to be known and understood that I put myself out there as much as possible in some sad effort to construct intimacy?
Therefore, gentle readers, I ask you, do you have any true secrets? Would you be willing to share them with us anonymously in the comments? And most importantly, what the f#%! is wrong with me?
I loved this project so much that I tried to think of a secret that I could send in... but to no avail. Pretty much the only two requirements for a post-secret secret are that it must be true and it must be something you've never told anyone before. I've got plenty of things that are true, but I don't think I have any real secrets that I've never told anyone. I have no secrets! How depressing is that? I'm sure there's *something* about myself that I've never told anyone, but it's probably something really lame and boring, like "I brush my teeth for less than two minutes." Ooo, scandalous.
Seriously people, it makes me feel really boring and uninteresting that I don't have any real secrets. I have a *lot* of quasi-secrets--that is, things that *almost* no one knows, and that I don't reveal to people unless I've known them really well for a very long time. But I don't have any true secrets. I think it's caused by a combination of the fact that I haven't really experienced anything very illicit, and that I'm not really ashamed of anything. I don't do things that I know I'll be ashamed of later--I just don't have any desire to. It never occurs to me to do something privately that I would be embarassed to admit later; you know, aside from stupid things like listening to Mandy Moore, and that's not even a secret either.
So what does it really say about me that I don't have any true secrets? It definitely makes me *feel* like I'm not as mysterious as I wish I was, but on the other hand, maybe it is a good thing. Maybe it's good that I don't build my existence around some dark truth, that I don't define myself by the things I'm ashamed of. It probably points to a certain openness of character, a tendency to embrace others in an effort to be known. Again, though, it's possible that real reason I'm secret-less is because I want so desperately to be known and understood that I put myself out there as much as possible in some sad effort to construct intimacy?
Therefore, gentle readers, I ask you, do you have any true secrets? Would you be willing to share them with us anonymously in the comments? And most importantly, what the f#%! is wrong with me?
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