"You are only as sick as your secrets"

[villager]

it's a line from 12-Step recovery work, that I've been meaning to post here.

I think it's utterly germane in the wake of the Wikileaks tempest -- and goes a long way toward explaining the continuing implosion/fraying of the United States....

[Brickbat]

1. Meh, I think what's wrong with this country isn't much of a secret.

However, I appreciate the quote on an individual level.

[villager]

2. Yes and no -- but I think there are layers of un-truth that have built up over the decades

....and, somewhat Hamlet-like, continue to leach poison and decay from within...

[LiberalLoner]

3. Very true! Thank you! K&R n/t

[EFerrari]

4. I compared Wikileaks to an intervention the other day.

I knew all this was sort of familiar. :)

[villager]

5. very accurate analogy -- except in this case, the patient is still shooting up and guzzling hooch

and "hitting bottom" is going to be very very messy indeed... ;-)

[EFerrari]

6. LOL. Well, you know it's a process more than a decision.

:rofl:

[Newest Reality]

7. Nice thought.

Vague though.

Only as sick as? There are other things that cause diseases of mind and body, as well, so how universal is that only supposed to be?

You can fill in sick with anything you want to and define it various ways and it is a nominalization in that you take a process and freeze it into an event.

Does it refer to your secrets, (all of them or simply having them) cause your sickness, or to the kind of secrets you have?

Sometimes, in the process of unpacking the structure of language, you find things you didn't realize where there or that you knew you had.