secret time

“I would not be concerned with the secrets, the lies, the mysteries, the facts. I would be concerned with what makes them necessary. What fear.” Anais Nin

The only thing I love more than a secret is burying it.

The ritual.

Trimming off the excess. Smoothing. Folding. Absorbing.

Letting it drift through my core seeking to burrow in a shallow recess. Hidden, yet ripe for triggering.

Le Double Secret — Rene Magritte, 1927 (Art Institute of Chicago)

There’s an undeniable euphoria in keeping secrets — a deliriousness that envelops. I become intoxicated with each unspoken truth I harbor. In those furtive moments, I’m the shape-shifting curator of my existence, meticulously pruning and cultivating the identities I present to the world.

I am simultaneously player and pawn — revealed and concealed. Succumbing to societal expectations and wielding power through the secrets I hold and the stories I create.

An indelicate, messy balance.

I can pinpoint the exact moment I fell hard for secrets. My life erupted into chaos. I’d been ripped open by loss and was uprooted. Years of safety and stability gone in a flash.

I remember feeling like the world was jabbing me. How pain flowed out of every pore. I was a heavy-breathing, overheated computer on the verge of crashing. So, I forced myself to shut down.

I turned inward and started withholding, and I felt my soul begin to settle like an anchor on a seabed — dragging slightly but rerooting.

But it wasn’t just about secrets, it was about constructing narratives that offered explanations and resolutions, I regained feelings of coherence and understanding. And by externalizing and reinterpreting my experiences through narrative construction, I gained a sense of distance from overwhelming emotions, preserving my psychological well-being.

Weirdly, secrets became my lifeline, the glue that held me together. I no longer felt exposed and vulnerable, because I rewrote my story until I felt resilient.

I don’t judge myself for this. I think it was necessary. There were few tools available to me then and I made do. I created safety for myself, a space where I tended to my wounds quietly and consistently.

But with distance, I see how secrets also allowed me to push back against my good girl image without causing any waves. “You want me to be open and giving? Fine,” I’d say. Nobody else knew there was a caveat, that I was walking away giddy thinking of all the ways I could hide myself. I was an architect, sketching personas with deft and decisive hands until I became lost in the illusions.

It took me too long to realize that nobody else really cared, so long as I continued to play my part. I was the only one taking myself seriously.

It took even longer to realize that I’d inadvertently birthed two real but diverging lives — myself versus my false self. And every day, I walked both of my selves through the tent toward the high wire; “Be good and be a liar.”

It didn’t take long for me to overheat…again.

But that time has passed, my temperature is comfortable and I’m fine. Actually fine. I no longer see the need to fracture into shadow selves. I’m safe. I’m loved. I’m happy. And it’s becoming obvious how the path I treaded for safety grows more perilous by the hour; I’ve gotten worse at the act, not better. There’s a risk of self-obliteration.

Still, I cling to women within, some inherent others manufactured, all deliberately veiled and controlled. I’m holding them close, fearful of revealing the power their secrecy begets. Warry of letting go of this “safe” way, and mucking up being authentic. I’ve spent so long gatekeeping, how will I exist with nothing to guard? How do I say goodbye to decades of hard work, my masterpiece?

It’s a frightening thought, so I’m reframing the question for my sanity — What if I release it all and can joyfully improvise my way through life? What if I find a way of existing that allows me to be both revelatory and mysterious, but doesn’t require me to stumble up to the precipice?

What if I do this and discover that my greatest strength is my capacity to embrace the multitudes within? That I can love the contradictions that make me terribly human.

What if my freedom lies not in guarding my secrets, but in courageously giving voice to the depths of myself — allowing each facet to shine forth, unobstructed by obscurity's intoxicating venom?

What if I pledge nothing but honesty and openness to myself and for myself? And learn that this does not require that I share everything. It’s about setting up a new permission structure; secrecy is no longer the default.

As I type, my mind keeps returning to this story: January 5, 1950. Opening night at the Empire Theater for Carson McCullers' A Member of the Wedding. Julie Harris, Ethel Waters, Phyllis Love, and William Hansen, all isolated backstage, wrecked by their nerves, shaking, desperate for the night to end. Until eight-year-old Brandon de Wilde merrily skips down the hallway knocking on the adult stars' dressing rooms and singing “It’s time, it’s time, it’s time!”

Oh to be a child of such pure faith. Never dipping in just a toe. Or wavering. Head first, always.

To be excited for the spotlight. Shame, fear be damned!

We grow and crash into years and lock ourselves away, forgetting it’s that easy. That we could be that free.

Today, I am feeling a bit like young de Wilde.

I can hear my secrets knocking, “It’s time, it’s time, it’s time!”

And it is. It’s time.

Act I — Unbinding my hands and mind. To write, to release.

Act II — Dropping the veil, welcoming in the world.

I can do this.

3…2…1…

[the curtain raises]

…secret time is over.

P.S.

Knock. Knock. Knock.

“It’s time!!”

What are you releasing? Conquering? Saying yes to? Do you love secrets as much as me?

Tell me. Let’s plow a new path together!

P.P.S.

I’ll see you in two weeks. ❤️