Everybody needs a secret life. It's what keeps us interesting.
Every life is a patchwork of secrets, half-truths, evasions, shams and disguises. The most authentic among us have hidden compartments, shadowy corners and taboo behaviors we keep under wraps for fear of destroying our public image.
I know a Buddhist teacher who sells pot for extra money, a radical feminist whose sexual tastes call for chauvinist pigs to restrain her in bed, a vegan who eats bacon out of town, a priest who doesn’t believe in God, a best-selling author who doesn’t write, a poet who slept with his best friend’s daughter (over 21) and a college professor who used to turn tricks.
These are not immoral people. If you met any one of them on a plane, you’d think they were terrific, engaging and upright. Their contradictions would never bother you because you’d never know about them. Social behavior is always selective; being private isn’t deception. We believe, naively, as tell-it-all Americans, that secrets are indicators of inner corruption (“You’re only as sick as your secrets!”), things to be avoided, wrong. But this is ridiculous. Nobody is an open book.
Denying this, we turn to hypocrisy. Those who keep the darkest secrets are generally the most judgmental. But scratch any one of us and you’ll find other personalities, other masks and mores, other people. We’re shape-shifting, multi-symphonic — moving easily from public to secret and back again. We are not the same in all situations; there would be no room for our contradictions; what happens elsewhere stays elsewhere; this is how we grow as people.
I remember being at Mardi Gras once, watching a bunch of Bible-banging tourists from Iowa cheer on two half-naked leather queens beating each other with riding crops. These Christians were having the time of their lives! Back home, they’d condemn these sodomites and never ever have them to dinner. But on a hot afternoon in New Orleans, with a couple of beers in them before lunch, who the hell cared? Smack that bottom! Lick that boot! They’d left their scruples back at the Super 8 with their Samsonites and rosary beads.
Forgive or Forget It
Forgiving is a selfish act to free yourself from being controlled by your past
It Is Sweet to Do Nothing
Though we live in a culture addicted to doing, being is equally important
A secret life is critical. Everybody needs one. “We are poor, indeed, if we are only sane,” said psychologist D.W. Winnicott. Life without a shadow is hell. We’re not meant to be wholly visible, onstage in the world 24/7. Our secret life is our secret garden, the off-limits place where we can take risks, pretend, transgress, feel free and keep ahold of our innermost strangeness. The shadows of a secret life make the lightness of being bearable. We’re checkered beings, not lily-white, and that’s what makes us original. It is also what keeps us interesting.
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