To see a video on Frank Warren’s visit to LSU, click here.
A thousand people sat anxiously in a darkened auditorium as a tall, smiling man took the stage. “Hi, I’m Frank, and I collect secrets,” he said.Frank Warren, the creator of the PostSecret phenomenon, spoke Thursday night in front of a sold-out crowd in the Cox Communications Academic Center for Student Athletes.PostSecret is an ongoing art project where people anonymously share their secrets on one side of a post card.Warren shared some of the secrets he has received over the years and the meanings behind the words written on the cards. “If you’re really open to these secrets, there’s a kernel of wisdom that you can learn from each of them,” Warren said. After Warren spoke, he opened up the microphone for audience members to share their stories. “We always used to make fun of my brother for wetting the bed, but I used to be too afraid of the dark to go to the bathroom. So I would squat in between my brother’s legs when he was sleeping and pee,” said one brave audience member. Another University student made an emotional confession about the University community.”I feel like there’s not enough support for the gay, lesbian and transgender community at LSU,” the student said. “People need to know that they don’t have to be ashamed of who they are.”Warren said the confessions he heard gave him chills.”I like talking to young people best of all,” Warren said. “They’re in a very dynamic point in their life so there’s a certain authenticity there, and they’re more open than older generations.”Joshua Newbins, chairman of the Student Activities Board Ideas and Issues Committee, said Warren’s speech would help connect University students.  “We missed him last year, but [former Ideas and Issues chairwoman Cherie Teamer] suggested we get him here,” Newbins said. “With a Frank Warren lecture, the audience will experience a closeness they haven’t felt anywhere else, and LSU needs that right now.”—-Contact Katie Kennedy at [email protected]