Telling secrets

Cal State Long Beach students revealed their deepest secrets in public this week.

The campus organization Intervarsity Christian Fellowship (ICF) set up several booths throughout campus Wednesday, where students could write their secrets on flash cards and hang them on clotheslines around campus.

Junior theatre major, leader of the Black Campus Ministries and ICF member Monique Sypkens said the purpose of the event was to allow students to anonymously reveal their secrets and offer the campus community a release from the burden of carrying such secrets.

Students could either hand their flashcards to an ICF member, who would then hang it up for display, or submit the card in a box for extra confidentiality, Sypkens said.

While some students shared health secrets and bodily insecurities, others wrote that they had participated to get the free doughnut being offered.

Sypkens said the secret-telling was intended to reflect a story from the Bible. In the story, a woman who was deemed promiscuous and sinful by society confessed her secrets to Jesus Christ, at which point he revealed he was the Messiah.

Sypkens said that ICF aimed to get “quality over quantity” secrets from students who participated.  Some revealed that they were scared to be alone, burdened by their parents’ divorce or molested.

“We offer prayer afterwards a lot of the time,” Sypkens said.

Susie Mayer, senior fashion design major and a Bible study leader, said that reading some of the secrets was “emotionally overwhelming” because she relates with problems other students kept to themselves.

“There are some that are pretty deep,” Mayer said.

Senior computer science major Alvaro Martinez said he stepped out of his comfort zone when he wrote his secret and hung it up himself rather than giving it to an ICF member.

Martinez said he confessed that he is “not ready to grow up” and he is afraid of “getting pushed into the real world” after he graduates.

When Martinez said he saw people had written secrets similar to his, it gave him “a little more encouragement to pull it off.”

He said he thinks the event is a great way to encourage people to get out of their comfort zones.

“It shows that we’re not afraid to let go of the things that hold us back,” he said.

The event will be held near the College of Business Administration again from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. today and next week in other locations throughout campus.