Over the years, there are two things I have found to be necessary in creating a successful secret society. The first is members; a society of one is not secret, it’s just lame. That doesn’t mean you have to be friendly with your members, it just means that you have to have some. The second thing is a purpose; what secret society is secret for no reason? I’ll tell you. A lame one.

To begin, you must acquire the help of your first chair (as the leader of this society, you are entitled to, well, be awesome. Your first chair helps you remember everyone’s names). I hired my good friend Mazda (Meet the Characters) and our counterpart The Baconator (How I Plan To Take Over The World) as my two assistants. Mazda was put in charge of the people side of the society: who joins, who gets kicked out, and who brings me my jelly doughnut with raspberry filling. The Baconator was put in charge of our destinations and purposes, a.k.a. what we’re doing.

Now it’s time to name your society. I dubbed ours: One Power Under Average. You may choose your own however you please. Next, I decided what we were actually going to accomplish as a secret society. I got to thinking that it would be a wonderful time to get some things checked off my bucket list, so I started at the top and went down.

-Find the Loch Ness Monster (Nessie for short)

-Find the Templar Treasure and become rich (like Nick Cage but fo’ rizzles)

-Go to an archeologist dig and discover the remains of a VIP, then go to one of their conventions and brag about it

-Break into Fort Knox and leave behind a bumper sticker with a tennis racket on it that says: You’ve Been Served.

and lastly,

-Find Waldo (in real-life)

All of these things deserved to be recognized but—and now is where the title of this instructional post comes in—they must be secret! By this I mean, as the discoverers of such magical items and things, our names and faces must remain covert (and by this I don’t mean like Batman who everyone in Gotham City actually knows is Bruce Wayne). I’m talking ninja secret!

In conclusion of this post (more to come later) the most important, non negotiable, essential, catastrophically necessarily vitally indispensable part of creating and maintaining a secret society is to, in fact, be secret. But how to be secret? That is the question! I suggest changing locations often (more to come in part 2) as well as keeping your members happy; unhappy members mean slippery tongues, and you can take that to the bank! I will, along with all of the treasure we have found thus far. Too bad they’re chocolate coins.

Thinking back on it now, I don’t suppose my society is very secret anymore. Oh well. Forever and Average,

Mel