behind closed doors....

There is an Amy Grant song about how if walls could speak, how they would have tales to tell of laughter and tears. I thought of that song today... and I couldn't stop thinking about it! And how behind the walls of everyones homes, my neighbors, my friends, my family, there are things that we don't speak of there. Wonderful things, that are too private to share.... that really we shouldn't share, as they would cheapen the experience! But also sad, terrible, or heavy stressful things that we are afraid to share... and it's those that I wonder about? Is it that we don't want to burden people? Or is it that we are afraid that our issue, our circumstance would change the persons view of us? I know why, I don't really need an explaination, there are many things that I only share with a select few. And even then some of those things are only discussed when I feel I must discuss it, when I can no longer hold it in! But I just kept thinking today about how really we would be better off sharing, it would be better for our well being to share our pain and our burden or stress with our friends, our family, even our neighbors... we would find that people are much more understanding and ready to lend a helping hand or a shoulder, if they just knew that they were needed! I think about how that is something that has changed so much over the years. Our neighborhoods have gotten closer and closer together, and yet we know less and less people in the houses around us! As our society has come to talk about those dark secrets that were not to be spoken of back when my parents were growing up... we've gotten more secretive instead of less in some ways. We watch Dr. Phil and counseling is mainstream but our neighbors, and even some of our friends know nothing of our lives, what we are really struggling with. We are still afraid that our friends or family will not be able to handle our issue or what is it that keeps us closed? I know this blog is similar to one I wrote last week about how I was going to be more open and less afraid of rejection, but it just hit me in a different way today when I started thinking about all the friends I have dealing with BIG issues, loss of jobs, premature babies, infertility, the death of a child, surgery, the list goes on, I know so many people with big struggles in their lives. And I just got to thinking, how can I lessen their burden? How can we really be there if we are too afraid to really talk about the hard stuff? If we want the hard stuff to stay behind closed doors??