The Tragedy of Living a Lie
Holding a secret cuts people off from the very love they're trying to protect.
Posted May 17, 2026 | Reviewed by Lybi Ma
As a mental health clinician with a moral, ethical, and legal obligation to confidentiality, I am often on the receiving end of disclosures and confessions people have kept from the people closest to them. To give one religious community its due, the Catholics were onto something when they recognized that receiving confession is holy work.
People will often endlessly rehearse the scenario of confessing or, worse, being exposed. They imagine the faces, the silence, the condemnation, the disgust. They have projected their own judgment and ridicule onto their potential audience, and in therapy, they wait with bated breath to see if their prophecies will come true. Perhaps some part of them knows that, as a therapist, I am likely to respond with unconditional positive regard. But many still wonder if this response, much like the acceptance they may have experienced in religious communities, is just another front for a judgmental interior.
Thankfully for them, I truly don’t have to fake anything. I have a lot of compassion for people who have held a secret. My tenderness toward the suffering of their circumstance is entirely separate from whatever moral judgment I might be tempted to hold toward their behavior. Those two things can coexist. In fact, I think they must.
When a secret is revealed, whether by admission or exposure, it is natural for the collective compassion surrounding the circumstance to be directed toward the victims who have been lied to. They must reckon not only with the loved one who destroyed their trust, but also with the substance of the secret itself: an extramarital affair, an addiction , compulsive behavior , hidden debt, complicity in someone else’s secret. The list goes on.
This inclination to support the person betrayed is entirely understandable. Much has been written about how to come alongside those whose lives have just been upended and thrown into a new reality they never signed up for. But thankfully, I do not experience compassion as an energy that is bound by the need to choose only one side.
The Holes in the Bottom
If we reflect on the raw experience of holding a secret, separate from a moment from whatever moral violation has been committed, compassion is easy to find. Secrets act as a barrier to receiving affection, admiration, and most consequentially, love. When partners, friends, or family members offer encouraging words, the person holding the secret receives them with a sharp twinge.
“If they really knew what I was hiding, would they still say that about me? Would they still love me?”
People holding a secret are left with an excruciating dilemma. Do they continue to live as an empty receptacle with holes in the bottom, where the kind words of loved ones simply fall through the back end? Does every expression of appreciation get drowned out by an internal dialogue of personal judgment? Or do they throw themselves onto the mercy of the court and value an honest and authentic relationship over a manufactured illusion?
This loss of love and intimacy created by this barrier of secrecy is worthy of compassion. The collective number of potential moments of connection sacrificed on the altar of secrecy is its own loss to be grieved. All those hours of torment on the daily commute alone in the car. All those nights lying awake. All those negotiations with the more punitive aspects of the psyche.
People often discover quite quickly that the judgment and ridicule of external voices are easier to deal with than their own punitive and condemning conscience . As Fyodor Dostoevsky put it in his classic on the subject, Crime and Punishment , “The man who has a conscience suffers whilst acknowledging his sin. That is his punishment .”
Except in circumstances where there is a legal obligation to break confidentiality for the safety of an identifiable person, the decision to disclose a secret is entirely up to each individual. I admit there have been rare occasions when, after hearing all the details of a secret and understanding the likely ramifications of disclosure, I entirely understand why a person would take the secret to their grave.
Yet, even in those circumstances, I do not see them as “getting away” with anything. They may never experience the joy and freedom of being fully known and fully loved by those closest to them. They may preserve the outer structure of their life while forfeiting an inner experience of intimacy . My compassion for this result comes easily. On some level, it feels like the very definition of tragedy.
I suppose I feel some obligation to be a surrogate form of acceptance and care. Even in these cases, there are worse outcomes that can be avoided with appropriate therapy . Individuals may turn to substances to numb out the self-condemnation. They may unconsciously project their own failings onto others. They may become wound collectors, gathering personal resentments to justify their own behavior. There is always a deeper level of personal hell to fall into in the service of holding a secret.
Therapy can at least help stave off some of these inclinations to cope in ways that create even greater degrees of suffering.
Though for most people, most of the time, the opportunity to rebuild relationships, restore some measure of integrity, and experience intimacy, connection, and love is still available to them. This is no guarantee that life will look the same as it did before disclosure; it almost certainly will not. Some relationships may be beyond repair. Some consequences may not be avoidable. Some losses may have to be accepted and grieved. But I don’t think there is a substitute for knowing the person staring back at you in the mirror is the same person you are on the inside. At least then, the self-condemning voice may let you live in peace.
I will always offer this path as an option: I will walk alongside you toward honesty and disclosure. Or, as Dostoevsky puts it: “Break what must be broken, once for all, that’s all, and take the suffering on oneself.”
Secrecy in Everyday Life . Pers Soc Psychol Bull. 2024 Feb. V. Bianchi et al.
Dostoevsky, F. (1866). Crime and punishment (C. Garnett, Trans.). Wordsworth Editions.
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Matt Bishop, Ed.D., LMFT, is a licensed Marriage and Family Therapist, professor, and founder of Sonder Therapy Group in San Diego.
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This article is part of the Bringwise Psychology Journal — daily insights on human behavior, mental health, and personal growth.