Confess yourself to Heaven,

Repent what’s past

Avoid what is to come.

And do not spread the compost on the weeds.

— Shakespeare, Hamlet III, 4

Is it really best to confess, tell everything, spill the beans, purge yourself of what’s burdening you, bearing you down, sinking you into the quagmire of guilt? Well, Shakespeare seems to think so, as he says we’re to confess to heaven, repent what’s past and avoid what’s to come. The Bible writes many times about confession, but other people also have their own opinions.

“It does not spoil your happiness to confess your sin. The unhappiness is in not making the confession,” said Charles Sturgeon.

“Confession is always weakness. The grave soul keeps its own secrets, and takes its own punishment in silence,” said Dorothy Dix.

As you can see, one person says that it does not spoil your happiness to confess your sins, while the other suggests that confession is a weakness and it’s best to take your punishment in silence. Take it to the grave.

What are we really supposed to do, especially when the confession has a historical perspective and can impact directly on your current relationship? It may pose a clear and present danger.

We’ll find out right after these responses to my take on the ‘Un-Factor’.

Hi Tony,

If only we could use that prefix Un to erase and correct some of the faults of people who are selfish. To be selfish in a relationship is possibly the worst trait that a partner can have. By being selfish, they see nothing but themselves and only cater to their needs. Oh, if only by putting that Un before selfish could change their ways, but sadly that is unimaginable, unthinkable, unfathomable. Very clever Tony.

Winsome

Hi Tony,

Regarding your footnote, as a former member of the Wolmer’s Boys’ Chess Club in the 1960s I am proud of Jaden Shaw for winning the Checkmate Coronavirus Rapid Open Online World Chess Championship while representing Wolmer’s. I can safely say that by today’s standards, my chess playing in those days was unproficient.

Charles

It is said that confession is good for the soul, and it’s also said that confession is an act of honesty and courage. So many different things have been said about confession, ranging from ancient scribes who predated the Bible, to those who actually wrote about it in the Bible, and now by modern writers.

What is true though, is that certain religions take confession so seriously that it’s actually a ritual that they go through regularly, as they sit in a darkened booth across from a priest and confess their sins.

“Father, Father I must confess, I left a girl in a terrible mess.”

“Oh my son, a condom you should have trusted.”

“I used one, Father, but the damn thing busted.”

Usually after the confession the person is told to recite Hail Mary numerous times, depending on the severity of the sins, and atone for his or her transgressions. Many people spend a lifetime doing this, and I actually know of a few who have been going to confession for years, and they do say that it makes them feel better after doing so.

I guess it’s a sort of catharsis, an unburdening of your sins that makes you feel lighter afterwards. Some men confess to bartenders, while others seek out psychiatrists. Some women may confess to their friends, but that can be dangerous as people do tend to chat and carry your business all over town.

Anyway, all that advice about confessing being good for the soul was from long ago. That was then, but I really wonder how wise it is to confess your past to your current partner in these modern times. Remember the old Jamaican saying, “Is not everything good fi eat good fi talk.” Some things are best left unsaid, and if ever there was a case of the devil being in the details, some detailed confessions can be quite devilish.

If you truly love your significant other, shouldn’t you be able to confess any historical transgressions that you may have committed? Or should you leave well enough alone?

If you saw the wife of your best friend sneaking around with another man, holding hands, kissing and snuggling, should you tell him what you saw, or carry it to your grave as one scribe suggested? After all, the old saying may just hold true: “What you don’t know won’t hurt you.”

To compound matters, to add to your dilemma, the conundrum, should you tell your bredrin that his wife who you saw sneaking into a hotel room with that other guy, that many years ago you also dated her?

For some curious reason you somehow never mentioned that fact in all the years that you were friends. Now you can see the dangers of confessing to not only what you saw, but also what you did in the past. That can seriously impact the present and shatter the future. Should you let sleeping dogs lie, or lie like the dog that you are to protect the guilty?

Sometimes people do not take confessions very well and many even resent the confessor for unloading all that disturbing historical data on them. “If you were my true friend, you wouldn’t have told me all that hurtful information, especially after all these years.” Should you have protected him from the truth and not confess what you saw, how you saw it and your involvement in the whole situation?

And yet, on the flip side, the person may say, “Why did you wait so long to tell me? Thank you anyway.” Shouldn’t there be a statute of limitations on confessions? There was this lady who confessed to her husband that she had an affair 50 years ago, a year after they got married. They man filed for divorce immediately.

“I don’t care how long ago it was, I’m outta here.” Imagine, filing for divorce for infidelity at age 80? But such is the power and the danger of historical confession.

There are women who choose not to confess their history of transgressions to their men, for they know from experience that a man’s fragile ego cannot handle certain types of confession, especially the sexual ones.

How would you feel if after being married for 16 years, your wife came to you and said, “Honey, I have a confession to make. Before I met you, I used to sleep with your best man!”

Her conscience bothered her for years, drove her to make that confession, for it’s been proven in many quarters that confession really is good for one’s emotional well-being. “There, I said it, got a load off my chest, I feel better now.”

But what about the person hearing the confession? That burden that you unloaded has to go somewhere, landing right in their lap. So is it wise to confess, why not bury that romantic history instead? Sadly, it’s often too much to bear, so the pressure has to be released.

There are women who also confessed to having secret children prior to their marriage but gave them up before for adoption. After years of torment, she confessed to her husband with disastrous consequences.

“Say wha, yu breed for anodder man an neva tell me?”

“Our life was a lie, how can I ever trust you again?”

If that’s bad, can you imagine confessing to a ‘jacket’?

“Babes, the second and third children aren’t yours.” It was Albert Camus who said, “A guilty conscience needs to confess, a work of art is a confession.”

On the other hand, there are men who sire children out of wedlock while still married to their wives and never confess this fact. It happens more often than you may think. For the few who do confess, there are mixed results. I know of wives who have walked out upon hearing that confession and I have known others who forgave the man and accepted the reality of that child.

Then there are current confessions that people make to each other after suffering in silence for many years.

“I never really enjoyed having sex with you, I just tolerated it to have children.”

“That’s okay, I’ve been sleeping with your best friend anyway. She told me that you confessed that secret to her.”

Confession and counter confession — nature abhors a vacuum.

It really is a tough call though, and many sayings about confessions were from a nobler time, where honour, civility, class and forgiveness were the order of the day. Nowadays in this rough and tumble unforgiving world where everything goes, it may be quite risky to lay a history of confession on your spouse. The consequences could be dire.

Imagine your husband telling you, “Honey, I must confess, I’m a bisexual and I’ve been sleeping with your brother,” or your wife saying, “Babes, I was a part-time call girl while in university to pay my tuition.”

More time.

seido1yard@gmail.com

Footnote: This Black Lives Matter movement has taken on a life of its own across the entire world. Mr George Floyd, who died so ingloriously, couldn’t have known that his death would have triggered such a global movement. Hopefully it’s the beginning of an education for people who weren’t aware. Peter Tosh sang many years ago, “You taught the youth about Christopher Columbus, and you said he was a very great man; you taught the youth about the Pirate Henry Morgan, and you said he was a very great man.” Well, the statues of those men and others are now coming down. Peter Tosh was a visionary and I had the privilege of working with him. The miseducation of our youth was real, but eyes are now opening.