With the holiday season now upon us, you’ll be dealing with family gatherings. Anytime there are family gatherings, there are secrets. Sometimes the secrets might be deep dark family scandals, other times it could something as simple as keeping a secret stash of cookies or liquor.
It’s often easier telling or keeping secrets than squarely facing the issues and the consequences that come with them. The temptation is that secrets are smoother than dealing with hard truths.
Since the temptation of secrets is now with us, it’s a good time to spill the beans on secrets.
The irony of secrets is that they are meant as a way of preventing discovery or hurt, yet end up doing the opposite. Although the secrets are intended as a way of ‘keeping the peace’, before it’s over, the secrets are what end up dividing the family.
One of the main temptations with secrets is that everyone wants to avoid confrontations or public scenes. That’s how families get dysfunctional because instead of facing problems, they hide them. Or worse still, take their hidden issues out on others who don’t know what’s going on.
When family members have problems, be they mental, emotional or physical, you’ll be tempted to keep secrets. Those very secrets usually end up triggering conflicts. And the longer you keep the secret, the bigger it grows.
Family problems are like water; they need to be drained out of the system before tensions rise and someone gets hurt–or before resentment bubbles over and ruins an entire holiday. It’s better for one person to stand up and face it head on than having everyone else standing around doing nothing.
That irony struck me. What’s intended as a tool for preventing hurt and keeping the peace is what ends up dividing people.
What makes them hurt worse is that it’s the family members closest to you that end up being hurt the most. You end up being divided from those you need to be closest to.
Affairs are surrounded in secrets. There’s many reasons for this. One article I read made the observation that most, if not all secrets concern ‘secretions’.
On first glance, I thought that observation was ‘off base’. The longer I work with affairs, the more I recognize the truth in it. Most affair related secrets involve secretions to some degree. They also end up causing more division than healing.
Secrets also damage trust. The point of hope is that trust can be repaired. The relationship damage doesn’t have to stay damaged. Most infidelities are ended because the unfaithful spouse finally understands that without trust, they have nothing. If you are the betrayed spouse who is tempted to stick with an affair because ‘you’ve invested so much’, remember it’s your investment in trust that has been ripped out.
In the video, “How Can I Trust You Again?“, you can learn ways of repairing damaged trust. You can know ways of joining rather than the dividing your relations with those you love.
Rather than letting the damage worsen, you can start repairing the damage in a short period of time.
Keeping It Real,
Jeff
