Quote of the Week
Over the past week, I have been listening to a podcast called What Now? with Trevor Noah on Spotify. I love it because Trevor is a brillant interviewer with an inquisitive mind and a refreshing perspective.
One of the episodes featured the actress, producer and author, Kerry Washington. I had been hearing about her new book, Thicker Than Water: A Memoir, that speaks about her private life, childhood traumas, challenges and victories. One story in particular, speaks about how she processed finding out that her father is not her biological father and the pain that it caused her parents to hold onto this secret for 40 years!
In the episode, Kerry said in conversation with Trevor that “we are a sick as our secrets” and it resonated with me. She also stated that in her Dad’s era “family was almost defined by your loyalty to the secret”, while giving additional metaphors to the mafia and not telling where bodies are stashed.
In many families we do the same thing. We are violated and we are told not to tell. We are hurt and we are threaten to keep it to ourselves and to never speak of it. We don’t like our family dynamic, but instead of confronting we choose silence over our own freedom. We are literally inflicting our own pain by not speaking up.
If this is you: