For years I lived a secret life. There was a side of me that I purposely did not share with the people who had known me for years. My secret life didn’t seem like a big deal at the beginning, but over time it grew unmanageable – until finally I had no choice but to confess and come clean. The realization that it was time to face the music was terrifying. What would I tell my family and friends? How would colleagues at work take it? Would they accept me? Why had I allowed this situation to develop in the first place? In fact, there wasn’t anyone else to blame. I had played an integral part in nurturing this situation along; fanning the flames so to speak. I often wondered if I had some sort of surreptitious desire to create turmoil in an otherwise uncomplicated life. It was all a little overwhelming, frankly, but whether I understood it or not, this train was going off the track and I was bracing myself for the repercussions.
What was the secret? That I had changed my name. For years I had been introducing myself to new friends as Marly. They didn’t know that there was a different name given to me at birth. That I had been using this birth name most of my life. But I hadn’t told my family or old friends that I was using a new name. I had been living a double life.
In the end, I changed my name. Now everyone knows me as Marly. The transition wasn’t always easy, in fact sometimes it was downright messy. Some friends surprised me and totally embraced the name change. “You never seemed like your old name to me in the first place” one friend exclaimed. Other friends were not so supportive, suggesting that maybe I was going through some sort of midlife crisis (a little too early for that if you ask me). I’m not one who likes a lot of conflict. In fact, to be more accurate, I can dodge conflict better than Keanu Reeves can dodge punches in The Matrix. So I didn’t automatically jump on the idea of asking people to change the way they referred to me. In fact, I cringed at the thought of it, but something deep inside was calling me to make this leap.
Even armed with the knowledge that this was an important step in living my authentic life, something still held me back. I felt I was standing on a precipice, afraid to take the next step. I was terrified of telling other people about this change.
I read recently about a black bear who was cornered into a tree by a cat. A yellow, tabby, 15-pound cat scared this fearsome bear high into a tree. Now, I should tell you that the average black bear stands around 5 feet tall and weighs between 100 and 400 pounds. Each paw has 5 large claws. They can kill a large elk with just one blow from their powerful front paws. Here was this fearsome black bear cowering in a tree because of a domesticated cat!
I realized I was a lot like that bear. Not aware of the power I had within me, I let the fear of telling others about my name change keep me cornered in a tree. It felt safe there; much safer than facing that hissing, growling creature below. Had I realized that the people I feared most to tell about my name change were simply (and metaphorically) tiny housecats whose “bark” was much worse than their bite, I could have come out of that tree and lived a self-expressive life so much sooner.