KEEPING A SECRET

IT HAS ALWAYS SEEMED THAT A FEAR OF JUDGMENT IS THE MARK OF GUILT AND THE BURDEN OF INSECURITY 

(Criss Jami)

You did something you cannot tell anyone! Yes YOU!!! And your nerves and all that secrecy is making it difficult to hide it from the people who know you too well. The desperate attempts at keeping it a secret are turning you into an introvert, are leaving you traumatized and throwing you into a deep dark pit where you feel you are all alone.

The more you try to keep your deed hidden, the more threatening it will become for your life as Gail Saltz, a renowned psychiatrist, has explained that keeping something hidden starts making the person anxious as he/she is constantly fighting an inner battle. The person has raised levels of stress which leads to several problems ultimately causing depression.

Disclosure of your secret might put you to shame and you may be hesitant of confiding in someone as many people have first handedly experienced the truth behind the quote by Ben Franklin,

THREE CAN KEEP A SECRET IF TWO OF THEM ARE DEAD

Obviously you are scared but all the secrecy eventually starts weighing on you. Your relationships with people get affected and you get shrunk into your own little shell. You become distant and lonely, lose self-confidence and go through a phase of slow and silent destruction of your personality.

In order to avoid these health and social hazards, all over the world neuroscientists and psychiatrists now encourage people to try and share their secrets instead of keeping them bottled up inside them. They lay increased stress on the need to confess to someone. 

As a result of a research by Tom Frijjins, it was found in a comparative study that the people who confessed about or shared the burden of their secret with someone felt immensely better than those who held onto the secret. Confessions from different people state the kind of depressed state their secrets led them into and how relieved they felt after confiding into someone whom they did not know.

So if you are uncomfortable in talking to someone you know because of the perceived negative consequences, how about talking to a total stranger, no strings attached? It will surely relieve you of that nagging feeling occupying your mind 24/7 and give you that sense of serenity that you are so deprived of.