By Jonas Shellhammer

“You don’t know, but I’ve made up my mind to leave you,” the postcard reads. “I’m just trying to decide when.”

This is one of the many anonymous secrets that are part of the official PostSecret blog, a community art project that displays secrets submitted on homemade postcards.

Earlham’s chapter of Active Minds is emulating the project for its own campus-wide experiment. The project utilizes Post-Secret boxes across campus in which students can anonymously submit their own secrets.

Active Minds is organizing the project as part of its goal to further mental health awareness.

“People can anonymously unburden themselves,” said co-convenor of Active Minds Ian Cross, senior. “We see this PostSecret idea … as a de-stressor, and a way to start discussion about mental health on campus.”

The group hopes to hang up the submissions on the walls of the new student-run coffee shop before it opens.

The secrets will be tallied and reviewed before being posted. Cross mentioned that Active Minds “understands that there might be joke ones, or fake ones. We won’t post just about anything.”

Active Minds’ faculty advisor Brad Kelley, a counselor at Counseling Services, feels that PostSecret is a positive venue for mitigating stress and that it has potential for students.

“There’s been a lot of success on other campuses,” he said.

Kelley hopes that one person’s secret might be shared by others. By displaying these secrets, those who may choose to remain silent might recognize that they are not alone and this event will provide a space for dialogue.

Counselor Jessica Sanford, Active Minds’ former faculty adviser, also thinks that PostSecret will be a good addition to campus life. She feels that it fits with Active Minds’ mission statement of de-stigmatizing mental health issues, and thinks it might encourage people to go to counseling.

Senior Reuben Goldstein felt that the purpose of the project was not communicated well enough for a clear understanding.

“I think it’s a very interesting concept, but it needs to be more explicit as to what it’s for,” he said.

Goldstein said he had not submitted a secret for the project.

“I don’t have any secrets that I think are important,” he said.

Senior Hannah Reed said that she thought of submitting a secret to one of the boxes, but that the question of anonymity dissuaded her.

“I feel like, on a campus this small, there’d be probably 10 people who wouldn’t know who it was from,” she said. Cross said that the inspiration for the activity came from an internet- based art project.

PostSecret was originally a weblog created in January 2005 for the purpose of posting anonymous secrets that had been mailed to the artist, Frank Warren, on a homemade postcard.

The items displayed on the original PostSecret blog range widely in tone and topic. Posted secrets that are illustrative of this breadth include ones related to: having sex with one’s sorority sister, fear of using the bathroom at a girlfriend’s apartment, only getting along with one’s partner while under the influence of drugs, and preparing a suicide potion for a terminally ill father.

Warren continues to update the blog with new secrets every Sunday. He has also published five books based on PostSecret since its creation.

Earlham’s chapter of Active Minds stems from the national organization, which seeks to reduce the stigma and negative connotations that surround mental health issues. It was founded in 2001 by a University of Pennsylvania student after the founder’s brother committed suicide. It has since grown, and is today a registered non-profit organization.