Stephen Yeargin

My wife and I went a week ago to a lecture by Frank Warren, the founder of PostSecret.com, at Vanderbilt University. He spoke at length about how his art project escalated to a global phenomenon, yielding four books and numerous national media appearances. Interwoven within all of that was a discussion of the human condition and why all of us keep secrets from one another. Warren’s anecdotes all revolved around how cathartic it is to share something that gets bottled up inside of us or a repressed memory that in some way affects our everyday relationships with other people. The mantra seemed best summed up in “You do not keep secrets, secrets keep you.”

The outlook of seeing each day as a gift while battling one’s own inner demons takes a fair amount of levelheadedness and temperance of spirit. I am blessed with a patient, loving and listening spouse that I feel comfortable sharing whatever is on my mind or my heart. In short, I usually do not edit or dull my thoughts and reactions before sharing sharing them with her. That can (and has) backfired, but read again that part about being “patient, loving and listening.” But I also realize that not everyone has that benefit. It has also been my experience that people who go through each day with the best attitudes are the same that have some of the toughest struggles with events or people in their past.

I am not sure I could handle as much information as Frank Warren receives on any given day, but there are other ways to be supportive of people without having them tell about something traumatic that happened in third grade. The weather is getting colder and the days even shorter. Take care of one another as best you can.