The Skeleton Code: A Satirical Guide to Secret Keeping
230
The Skeleton Code: A Satirical Guide to Secret Keeping
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Overview
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9781630479534 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Morgan James Publishing |
| Publication date: | 11/01/2016 |
| Pages: | 230 |
| Product dimensions: | 5.40(w) x 8.40(h) x 0.60(d) |
About the Author
Ken is a public speaker, writer, humorist and minister enjoying the second and truer half of life. He holds two graduate theological degrees and is trained as a life coach, conflict manager and transition specialist. He enjoys laughter, golf, and traveling, but finds his greatest fulfillment helping other people discover their true value as human beings. Ken is a native Texan who loves the beauty and the people of North Carolina, where he and Alla reside.
Read an Excerpt
CHAPTER 1
Dress For Diversion
Dressing well can open all doors.
— Adapted from Thomas Fuller
Dressing well may open some doors, but it can also close a very important one: the one to your skeleton closet! We agree with Euripides, who 2,500 years ago said, "Know first who you are and then adorn yourself accordingly." We say, know first how you want to be perceived and what you're hiding, and then create a persona to emphasize the former and cover the latter. Who better to dress to impress than those with counter-impressive secrets to hide?
In this chapter, we will address two Skeleton Code approaches to dressing for diversion. First, you will need to create a general and overarching identity as a fine upstanding citizen of unquestioned character. Don't worry, it's not as difficult as it sounds.
Second, you will need to craft a more specific alter ego based on the unique skeletons you are hiding in your closet. If you're hiding racism, for instance, you may want to join the NAACP or maybe just get one of their bumper stickers. We call this technique Accentuate the Positive. Let's look first at the big picture ...
The Big Persona
We all judge books (and people) by their covers. Thank God we can create a good cover. Anyone can manage appearances. Your mission, and it's not impossible, is to cover up well, to dress the part, and to perfect the pretense. Attractive works, but only if it attracts people away from your secrets. You can learn to give your audience visual clues that give a Mother Teresa affect, even if you have Paris Hilton DNA.
Seldom do people discern deception behind an expensive dress, classy suit, or fine array of the right accessories. And yes, we are speaking literally and metaphorically. The "Shallow Hal" world is not limited to Hollywood. Ours is a skin-deep culture from east to west, enamored with outward appearance and surface judgment, unless there is a compelling reason to go deeper.
A careless scandal would be one of those reasons. Don't give your audience any cause to be curious about what's beneath your polished exterior. We don't have to go deep with your persona, but we do have to be thoughtful and thorough.
We need to move beyond the limited help of a publicity agent or image consultant. These professionals may help you present yourself in a way that is most advantageous to your professional career, but they have ethical limitations that make them ineffective for skeleton work. Modifying a resume to keep a skeleton at bay would be a case in point.
In the professional world, some curious prospective employer could pry into your reality. They could get access to official documents like transcripts, birth certificates, and criminal background information. For closet concealment, you'll need more than any marketing make-up artist can provide.
When it comes to your personal image, think big. You need to stretch your façade from horizon to horizon. You are not limited to the present or to recent history in this effort. Clear and consistent stories from childhood are powerful shapers of image, especially if they are stories of overcoming tragedy. Be careful to avoid too much drama. Some people will try to uncover old news stories if the episode is too fantastic.
Your visible and verbal image is your first and most important line of defense against closet invasion. The more grounded you seem on the surface, the less curiosity or concern you will create. The more "padding" you can use in the creation of your character, the better — especially when there are significant risks rattling around in your closet.
Certain liberties in massaging your image are not only acceptable; they are also absolutely necessary. You can also be certain that your friends are doing the same. They are dropping names of people they've never met. They are telling about how they stopped to give aid at the scene of an accident when all they really did was slow down to gawk. You can develop better skills than these and rise above their clumsy and ill-fated efforts.
Too Close For Comfort
The greatest challenge to big persona success is a too close relationship like marriage or deep friendship. It's really hard to have secure closets in close quarters. If you have large skeletons and an impressive image to protect, you might want to stay away from both of these, or at least recognize the long-term challenges and risks. They can be overcome, but not without real finesse, such as we found with this couple.
Matt and Tiffany learned to dress for diversion because of a marital skeleton. They met and fell in love during college. Matt was from New York and Tiffany was from South Carolina, but they found each other 'different' in the most intriguing ways.
Matt was an outgoing and confident young man — a real straight-talker. Tiffany thought his honesty and openness was a refreshing change from the young southern men she had known. Tiffany was intelligent and refined, but soft-spoken and tender-hearted, which made Matt feel a warmth and connection he had never known with anyone in New York.
Their relationship quickly became passionate and exclusive, and the two became inseparable. The warm emotions of the relationship came in waves ... over and over again. They felt completely alive and in love.
Five years later, Tiffany was wishing Matt would die — a rather striking skeleton in her closet. She was taking Prozac and Trazadone for her depression. Matt actually had an appointment at the World Trade Center on 9/11 that was cancelled at the last minute and Tiffany kept fantasizing, "if only he had been up there in that office." She was miserable and couldn't tell a soul.
Divorce wasn't an option in her family, nor did it seem like a secure move for her future. She had put her career on hold so that Matt could get established in the financial world. If she divorced, she would have only settlement money and no job. She didn't know how she would survive or where she would go. It would be so much better if he would die in an accident. She would have the insurance money and an outpouring of support rather than judgment about a failed marriage.
What she didn't know was that Matt had the same feelings about her. He was sick of her Southern passive aggressiveness. He had no real qualms about divorce, only financial fears about the settlement. Of course, he would never do anything to actually hurt his wife. He just wanted her to go away — permanently and inexpensively.
His and hers closets with matching skeletons are more common than you can imagine. And what a great challenge and frequent necessity to keep important secrets from those you live with! Matt and Tiffany did this well because desperation really is the mother of invention. They knew the personas they had developed to be successful in life were not sufficient to secure their new secrets. They needed big personas because they were hiding their skeletons from someone living in the same house.
Tiffany masked her marital displeasure in public like a true Southerner. She always adorned herself with a smile when others were around. She pursued every possible outing with friends, which accomplished two purposes. First, she could actually enjoy some company and laughter, neither of which she experienced at home. And second, in these settings where mingling was expected, she could stay disconnected from Matt in a way that did not raise suspicions.
Matt was less creative. He simply spent more time at work, but made sure he kept pictures of his wife in prominent places on his desk, and spoke "lovingly" to her when they were in public. It was a typically male strategy with short-term prospects for success. Matt kept collecting more skeletons in his closet and eventually they went on parade, followed by a divorce and expensive settlement.
We are not surprised. Not many understand the challenges of closet maintenance in up-close situations. Had Matt had access to the insights in this book, he could have made his image bulletproof.
To protect the skeletons of marital discord, we suggest that you:
• Happily attend large group events together during which you can evade time with your partner/spouse.
• Share stories about what your spouse is doing, especially when those stories show them in a positive light.
• Avoid public disagreements, which usually means keeping your distance in public.
• Do not exceed your closet's maximum capacity. A closet can quickly reach a tipping point.
• Many marital skeletons require closet agreements (I won't look in yours if you won't look in mine).
The Power of Trajectory
There are many ways to dress for diversion or deception in order to keep your skeletons tucked away. If you promise not to become complacent, a cardinal violation of the Code, we will tell you some good news. Use it to your advantage, but don't make it your only strategy.
Here's the perk. If you make a good first impression, it goes a long, long way! Most people tend to trust their initial assessments of others. Once you've taken a trustworthy trajectory in someone's mind, it's difficult to alter that course. Assumption work is alive and well in our world and it's almost priceless.
The power of trajectory is a huge advantage when maintaining an image. It's like mass and momentum. The more gravitas you give to your persona, the harder it becomes for anything to alter its course. When the arc of your identity is moving in one direction, it tends to keep moving in that direction.
This is why you need to launch your personality in the opposite direction from your secret. What that means, in the vast majority of cases, is that you don't have to overwhelm people with your virtue or character. You don't have to dress to the 10's all the time like they do on Downton Abbey. Simply exude confidence in your persona, stay on course, and avoid any serious wardrobe or closet malfunctions. Most people will assume you are who you present yourself to be. Like we said, it's not as difficult as it seems.
The Second Nature Principle
You may be wondering how you can constantly maintain your persona, even with the power of positive trajectory. We understand the concern, so here's more good news that we call the Second Nature Principle. The more you dress for diversion, the more you'll feel the part. It's a psychological dynamic familiar to every actor who gets more and more into a character. Walter found this truth accidentally.
Walter, an older gentleman, would no longer attend his Baptist church because he didn't have a good suit to wear. This word came to the attention of the church deacons who took a collection to buy the man a new suit. It was the nicest suit he had ever owned.
The next Sunday morning came along and Walter never showed up at his church. With a bit of alarm, two deacons went to his house to check on him. They rang the doorbell and soon he appeared, still wearing his new suit.
The visitors were confused and said, "We missed you this morning and wanted to make sure you were OK."
"I'm fine," Walter said with a smile. "I got up this morning and put on my new suit, looked at myself in the mirror and thought, 'you know, you look good enough to go to the Episcopal Church.'"
The great thing about dressing for diversion is that it not only works on others, but after a while it also starts to work on you. You begin to believe the ideal you is the real you. Use the Second Nature Principle, live into your character, and soon it will fit like a glove, and we don't mean O.J.'s.
Let's pause and take a moment to review where we've been. To achieve closet security, we need first to have a nice cover, like the cover of our book. We need to attempt good first impressions, regardless of how shallow. We need to be clear about the challenges that close relationships present, and we can celebrate the tendencies that make all of this easier for us: the power of momentum and our ability to live into our upstanding persona.
Two crucial strategies that will support these efforts are:
1. Key Public Relationships
We all do guilt and innocence by association. Make sure you are seen with those who are known to be upstanding citizens. It's that "birds of a feather" thing and it works. Get to know influential neighbors. Volunteering can put you in proximity to image icons.
This principle also applies to organizations. An excellent way to create a general impression about your integrity is to participate in a religious community. Make sure this community has bumper stickers or other identification you can place on your car. What good is being associated with religion if no one knows? Remember to stay away from fundamentalist churches. Those people will try to get into your business. Find a larger church that won't notice whether you attend or not.
One can also drop churchy language into conversation as a way of creating a preferred personality. Stay away from religious controversy and limit your comments to themes such as tolerance, respect, and helping the poor. You may think this is difficult if you are not already associated with a religion, but as the truism suggests: Appearing to be religious is easy, even if being religious is not.
Most churches have activities designed for outsiders like picnics, festivals and concerts. These are great low-intimidation places to start. Try to meet a clergy person and remember their name for use. If there are other public figures present, introduce yourself. Most will not put pressure on you to engage in church life unless you act really interested.
If you feel guilty or get bad vibes in a religious setting, don't give up. Instead, volunteer with a prominent nonprofit in your community. If you take the diet approach, it won't take that much time. One does not actually have to work on a Habitat house to fly their colors. A small donation will let you mention your support. One might also find a non-profit T-shirt or mug at Goodwill. Just browse their store and you'll find all types of non-profit giveaway items that you can place in your workspace or wear to the gym.
We have found that the best way to solidify your image as a true volunteer is to advocate for a non-profit by taking up a collection. This puts you in direct contact with the people you need to impress at work or in your neighborhood, wherever the cover is most needed. If you do collect money, or goods, we recommend actually giving the collection to the non-profit! Otherwise, you'll have another rather difficult skeleton to keep. Just visit their websites. Most will outline how you can help.
In trying to create a general impression of good citizenship, we aren't as keen on joining clubs like Rotary or Kiwanis because they actually expect you to go to weekly meetings. Who has time for that, especially when there are so many less-demanding alternatives? We feel that religious groups are better because they have millions of members who never participate.
Remember, the key to this strategy is visibility. If people can't see your connection to respectability and learn to appreciate your association, what's the point?
2. Keep It Mono-Polar
Consistency is the gold standard for every public image strategy. Whatever rhythm of character you choose, maintain a steady beat. Pace yourself. Stay in your lane. Use cruise control. Your life cannot resemble Ping-Pong balls in a tile bathroom. An erratic persona sets off alarms. Stability is the code that turns them off.
What do we mean? Mood swings, for instance, are a liability. We know there are often chemical or genetic reasons for these fluctuations, so use pharmaceuticals if there's any question (better life through drugs). There are many good mood stabilizers on the market. Some are legal. If you can't get a prescription, you'll have to keep yourself steady using more rudimentary techniques like counting to 100 or putting yourself in timeout.
The point is, when you're a Pollyanna one moment and a poltergeist the next, it raises suspicions about just how close or over the edge you might live! The Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde game will draw unnecessary attention to yourself. You do not want questions or curiosity swirling around your life when you're protecting skeletons.
There are some exceptions to this rule. Men watching sports are allowed to act out primitive warfare rituals. And women who find out they are dating a cheater have permission to melt down and do that Carrie Underwood Before He Cheats stuff. Your big persona can have rises and falls, but it can't bounce around like Twitter stock.
We also encourage you to avoid "splitting," which is a counterproductive defense mechanism that calls too much attention to one's critical personality. We want a good defense to be sure, but not this one. Even if you see the world as "black and white" and naturally think of everyone and everything as either good or bad, resist. It doesn't work! When you demonize and/or idolize others, it raises questions about borderline personality disorder. It also invites others to practice the same exercise on you, which we want to avoid. We want you to be experienced as the consummately balanced person.
(Continues…)
Excerpted from "The Skeleton Code"
by .
Copyright © 2017 Alla Campanella and Ken Massey.
Excerpted by permission of Morgan James Publishing.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.
Table of Contents
Preface,
Acknowledgements,
Introduction,
Chapter One Dress For Diversion,
Chapter Two Mimic the Masters,
Chapter Three Take The Offensive,
Chapter Four Fear Failure,
Chapter Five Plausible Deniability,
Chapter Six One Way Trust,
Chapter Seven Personal Distraction,
Chapter Eight Get Better Or Get Caught,
Chapter Nine Come Out With Flare,
Chapter Ten The Skeleton Curse,
Chapter Eleven The Skeleton Cure,
Bibliography,