Personal Privacy or Secret Keeping?

How many times has someone told you something and said, “Don’t tell anyone?” A natural response is to agree. You now know a secret which according to the website Rewire is one of 13 secrets the average person holds at any given moment.

Often we rationalize our decision to “keep a secret” by equating it with respecting someone’s privacy. Not so. According to Bruce Muzik, a relationship repair expert, “Secrecy is the act of hiding information. Privacy is about being unobserved— being able to have [one’s] own experience of life without the eyes of anyone else.” The former U.S. Justice Louis Brandeis defines privacy as “The right to be left alone.” According to Dr. Robert Weiss, a relationship specialist, “Secrets break trust… privacy is simply not sharing parts of your life.”

How challenging it is for us to distinguish between privacy and secrecy in our own lives but even more so as parents trying to help our children develop critical life skills. According to Louise Jensen, author of Being Honest: The Difference Between Privacy and Secrecy, “Keeping a secret is about hiding something from the world, separating yourself. It is ok to be private—not to share something if you feel uncomfortable doing so.” What happens, however, when privacy becomes unsafe — that uncomfortable feeling leads to a behavior that can be harmful to children themselves or others. Muzik elaborates that “We can’t know ourselves without being alone,” but when the possible uncomfortable feeling turns into fear motivating your behavior, privacy may become a secret. If someone tells a child not to tell their parents something, for example, they are trying to protect themselves or someone else. That secret can have a devastating consequence.

Here are ways we may help our children learn to distinguish between privacy and secret-keeping>>