The Choke of Secrets

if someone were to look just at the private messages I get on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter, they might think I lived on a different planet than the one they live on. The person might wonder who all these people are who don’t feel free to speak, to use their real names when they write.

Yesterday I was talking to a woman who wanted to tell me a story that had made her laugh. She said she was talking to one of her customers, and she had asked him if he had met his wife in Africa, and he had said no, that they had met online in Canada. “Worst day of my life,” he’d said, making a sour face. At that point, his wife had walked into the store and the man had quickly shifted to a smile, “Hello, Dear,” he’d said. He had winked at my friend and then had gone to discuss cabinet choices with his wife.

So many people live with secrets, and these secrets choke off vital life force.

Really good writing is like a clear pane of glass—you don’t see the words—you just see the world they create. When I teach Write or Die, I look for things people say or do that would dirty the glass of their writing. Did you ever do that thing as a little kid where you hide under the long curtains thinking you are not invisible, but your feet stick out from under the bottom edges and so everyone knows you are there?

People who live with secrets are like that. They think they are hidden and that no one notices their feet, but generally secrets are walls and walls are things that can be seen.

I look for the feet sticking out of the curtain, and then I call the person out and ask them to write what is real, and the results are amazing. Beauty walks into the room.

What if you were about to run a race, and someone gave you a great pair of running shoes and a pat on the back and then said you also had to carry a life-size stone statue of yourself? This is not going to be a race you will will win if the others are unencumbered. It might even kill you.

Put a giraffe in a guinea pig costume and that gorgeous long-necked creature is going to be miserable.

Here’s the thing: I have noticed that people are afraid they are going to lose friendships, marriages, jobs, discounts if they are honest. Here’s some advice: lose them. They weren’t yours to begin with.

The world is so full of people. Just try to get a parking space in Boston or San Francisco or Rome! There are plenty of people to be friends with, to marry, to work with, to cut you a break on your new TV, and you won’t have to work so hard at the relationship because you will be on solid ground. The ground of you.

I often have people write, “What I really want to say is…” when they feel stuck. It works every time.

What if you spent your whole life doing that? I know mean, scary things might come out, and so maybe some things you will say into the back of your hand, but, Darling, you will have said them and shown up as your glorious, surprising self.

I want to know what you really think, not what you think I want you to think.

Know what I mean?

Listening to your own voice is such a generous gift you can give to both yourself and the world. Let yourself be four years old today and run around and see what happens. I’m guessing it will be a whole lot more fun than shoulding all over yourself day in and day out.

Let me know what happens. I’m so curious.