Disclosing to a trusted friend or family your gay identity is not the first step in coming out.
To understand, consider Abraham Maslow’s Theory of the Hierarchy of Needs. He identifies five categories of needs which we all have. These needs include physiological needs, safety and security needs, belonging needs, regard needs and self-actualization. Included in the physiological needs is sex and in the belonging needs sexual intimacy.
Your first obligation is to meet your own needs. It’s like an oxygen mask dropping down in a plane. You must first put your own mask on before helping others. Each person is responsible for meeting his or her own needs.
The way the needs are designed, they do not inherently conflict with each other. That means that you do not have to choose between or among them. All of them can be fulfilled and it is your obligation to do so. (Furthermore, your needs do not conflict with others’ needs so long as there is no interference.)
The problem comes in when some segments of society try to tell you that you must choose between being gay (i.e. meeting your needs for sex and sexual intimacy) and other needs such as employment (a safety and security need) or enjoying the benefits of a family (belonging needs) or having a positive self-image (a regard need).
Society cannot change who you are so they try to attack your identity by trying to convince you that your nonsexual needs can only be fulfilled if you deny who you are. “You’ll be fired from your job” or “You won’t get the promotion you deserve” if you are gay. Gay people come to believe they must choose between, for example, security of employment needs, and their sexual needs. This causes anxiety.
To be sure, some of society is prejudiced against gay people. It doesn’t have to be that way. There is no psychological benefit or need for prejudice against another. On the other hand, there is an innate predisposition to treating everyone fairly. Your inability to get your needs met in certain situations is not because you are gay but because others are prejudiced and unreasonably fearful of gay people.
Once you realize this, the anxiety you feel dissipates and frustration takes its place. Frustration does not paralyze you like anxiety does. You may have to convince an employer of their unfair treatment of you or go to another employer to fulfill your needs. The motivation and obligation to meet all your needs remains intact.
The First Step
So, the first step in coming out is committing to yourself that, notwithstanding lack of cooperation in some parts of society, you will find a way to meet all of your needs and not just some of them. It is a lifelong commitment.
With each generation, we become more and more efficient at meeting our needs. Evolution of our species occurs one individual at a time. Coming out is part of this evolutionary process.