Do you want to hear a secret?

(Originally posted June 25, 2009, Wisconsin State Journal)

"Psssst…Do you want to hear a secret?"

See, it's seductive, isn't it? You wanted to know what I had to say, didn't you? Did you lean a bit forward in your chair? Did you crave, just a little, to get the inside scoop?

Look at the cover of your basic women's magazine. "Such and such celebrity REVEALS their __________." We readers are invited to get in on their secret. Whether a celebrity shares some inane, boring detail of their life, or some strategy for dieting success, the magazine dangles before us the carrot of the inside scoop. And we bite.

My youngest daughter, Bee, is an astute little tyke, and she told me that she likes secrets because they "surprise" her. They're like a little informational package she gets to unfold, examine, and pass on -- a form of social currency.

April's introduction to secrets and secret-telling began this spring during her second semester of kindergarten. Around that time, the youngest kids in school begin to learn how to exercise their social power. They've mastered the school's routine. They've gotten to know social rules for behavior. They've formed friendships. Some of them have become "best friends" for the first time ever with someone else. And then these lovely youngsters, it seems especially the girls, begin to tell secrets.

This whole process of telling secrets -- the business of parsing out silly tidbits to favorites in the relationship circle -- reveals our kids' simple hunger for social power and acceptance, and their fear of rejection. A kid sees two friends whispering together, and she feels left out. What are they saying? Are they talking about her? If she asks what they're snickering about, will they tell her? Or will they shun her, as she dreads?

Competition and insecurity thus enter the friendship drama. And I confess to feeling a little depressed to observe April shedding a bit of her charming artlessness in her effort to navigate the strange world that turns beneath her feet. Whispering behind cupped hands while obviously looking at a hapless friend is not my idea of attractive behavior. It is a form of artifice...a type of artifice I want my daughter to avoid.

She is all too human, as am I. As I try to communicate (clumsily) how treating people respectfully and kindly means not telling secrets or making fun of them in any way, I realize I am asking a lot of her. I am asking a very young child to think about the consequences of her attitudes and words. In a way, I am asking her to be practical and objective about her emotional and relational wants. She's capable of this, but she also wants mom to respect her independence and simply allow her to have "fun" -- fun that she doesn't quite comprehend can hurt someone else.

The world needs people who think carefully before they speak and to respond judiciously when faced with the temptation to engage in relational power-plays. We have enough social cannibalism going on already: our air-waves and public meetings are full of it. As I work on my corner of the world, I want my daughter to learn how to be a considerate kid. It's one thing to share confidences -- I want her to understand -- it's another to tell secrets. Helping her discern the difference is tricky.

Fortunately, April's "best" friend (a little girl I love) has parents who are also trying to model and teach openness and tact. We talk about our kids' challenges together. We want them to learn how secrets (not confidences) are damaging -- how secrets are by their nature negative and potentially harmful. There is one secret, though, that can be positive. The best kept secret. Everyone gets invited to be a part of it -- that is the exuberant surprise party, where a person is celebrated and feted, esteemed and blessed, and everyone gets luscious scoops of ice cream on lavishly frosted cake.