Every Sunday I read postsecret, the blog where people from all around the world anonymously mail in a postcard with a secret they want to share. There are all kinds of secrets from all kinds of people. There are funny ones and there inspiring ones, and there are deeply disturbing ones, and deeply depressing ones. And it strikes me that they are all the same in that they represent just a small release of humanity. In just the space of maybe 3 by 5 inches, it's amazing how much raw feeling and emotion sprinkles off the internet page. Every secret is so personal and yet so intensely universal that as the mere reader I feel as if I am at once attached to the sender but also, possibly more importantly, a vehicle for the secret.

Which makes me wonder about secrets themselves. I feel as if they really only exist to be spoken outloud. Once you recognize that a little ounce of matter is really something you are hiding, then, in my opinion, the thing to do is not protect the secret, but rather send it spiraling outward. This can be to a friend, a parent, or a pet, what matters is not who hears it, just that it has been acknowledged. Secrets can be beautiful and special, but sometimes they can also exert a sort of control over the person who guards it too closely. They can haunt us and keep us prisoner, they can invade our dreams and aspirations, and they can leave traces in every facet of our existence. It's as if they live in the dark basin where every thought origins. Or maybe it's not that secrets live there, but maybe they are the fog that keeps the basin dark. 

And after reading PostSecret for maybe a couple years now I am beginning to realize that every single secret released into the world, whether it's read or not, heard or not, serves to wash away the stored rubbage all of us let amass in our brain. And yet I do like to think that as the listener, the secret sharer, I am doing a certain part, I like to think an integral part, in clearing away that rubbage.

I wonder what you all think. Do secrets need to be spoken or can we truly hold on to them forever?