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Hello, and welcome to chutzpahd, real life lived better, where each week we apply Jewish tradition and the skeletons in our closets to answer a letter sent by you, the listener, about an issue that is live in your life. I'm Rabbi Shira Stutman.

And I'm Hannah Rosen. So, Hannah, today we're going to be hearing from a listener who has a secret that they're trying to figure out whether or not to tell. So I think it's only fair if we begin with me

asking you to reveal a long-held secret. So on behalf-

That was good, Rabbi Shira. Thank you. That was good. You even kept your voice like, real like, this is just logic. I'm just doing logic here. So obviously, what's your longest, deeply, most deeply held secret? Not telling you. I'm not telling you my secret.

Anyway. Let me ask you a different question then. Like, how did you feel when I asked you to tell your secret?

It's like a thrilling and scared thing because secrets are one of those things, especially when a rabbi asks you, because you feel, I mean, it's like, that's what a confessional booth is. You feel burdened. Secrets are inherently burdensome. There are secrets that people take to their death. Secrets are heavy. And so religion has devised a space for you,

a small space. I mean, maybe the confessional booth is, is the original safe space,

where you're supposed to have this person on whom you put your secret as perhaps a first

step to moving beyond the pain of holding onto a secret.

Because isn't it, I don't know what's true in your rabbi experience, is there ever time

when someone cleanly holds a secret? Like the secret is just with them, that's the right thing to do.

It doesn't torture them. Is that a thing? All the time. All the

time. Oh. I mean, like, there are the types of secrets that you are holding because if you say it out loud,

it'll hurt someone's feelings. And there's just like no need to say it out loud, right? There are the

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