Courage to Trust -Ladies' Home Journal Aug 2005
No one is born knowing how to trust. Life gives us many teachers, some caring and others cruel. Few of us receive the solid base of trust as children. Even fewer are taught how to trust ourselves. Regardless of the lessons we each received, we need to learn how to trust as adults.
But we don't have to be condemned by our early life experiences. Trust is a skill to be learned and a choice to be made. It's a gift to be shared with those who appreciate its importance.
Trust is also fragile and must be handled with great care. Careless words and impulsive actions can easily damage trust. Some decide early in life to seldom trust anyone, keeping their authentic selves hidden from any possibility of rejection or betrayal. This is a safe but narrow path.
Wisdom comes from taking the risk to reach out and trust others, although we know that we're likely to make some mistakes and we know that the bond of trust may not last forever. This is where courage comes into play. Why? Because it takes courage to confide in others. When we let down our guard in the hopes of a compassionate response, we take the risk that others may judge us. With a shift of the emotional current, the door of tenderness may shut, and support transforms to criticism. If continual betrayals happen to us over time, the world may seem filled with potential dangers. and we'll be tempted to limit how vulnerable we dare to be.
Confronting those fears takes deliberate and brave efforts. Those who had relatively painless childhoods may find that even the most trusted people can fail them. Friends and lovers say unkind things. Lust runs over commitment. Employers make bad decisions and go bankrupt, costing people their jobs. Selfish desires often override promises made to others.
So why should anyone bother to expand the ability to trust more deeply? Because it can bring tremendous comfort and joy. Trust is the heartbeat of every significant relationship. Without trust, love has no place to grow. There's a sense of safety and comfort when trust is present, and little inhibition. The return to trust after disagreement with a loved one is a very special return to love.
In an ideal world, trust would be the standard, and betrayals would be unusual. Trust would rarely need to be discussed, because people would be honest. There would be a shared awareness of a greater good being served, and we would follow the rules we were given as children:
Tell the truth, even when it hurts, because "honesty is the best policy."
"You're only as good as your word."
"Think before you speak."
"Treat others as you would like to be treated," the Golden Rule of love applied to all.
We were taught that good people obeyed these guidelines and were punished when caught being unable to do so. Later we found out these rules were constantly broken by parents, teachers and friends. Although the rules are based in common sense, the aren't common practice.
We also quickly figured out that these rules were seldom enforced, and many of out peers considered us foolish if we insisted on sticking to them. We were taken advantage of if we held them to ourselves: No one who's playing by the rules can win if everyone is cheating. The immediate gratification of being accepted means playing along.
A conflict between what we see and what we feel plays havoc on our developing beliefs. This confusion is carried into adulthood and makes trust one of the most important riddles we have to solve. And yet every day, we're put to the trust test. From accepting a doctor's diagnosis to assuming that a car will stop at a red light before we cross the street, trust plays a role in our actions and assumptions. Just to get through the day, we are called upon to make many leaps of faith.
If you're not exactly sure what trust is, you're part of a very big club. We all hunger for the ability to believe in others, and yet we may fall into self destructive trust patterns that lead to stress-riddled relationships. We complain about the other person or situation but remain enmeshed. We're stuck in a self-defeating cycle, deepening the distrust in ourselves and almost Everyone else. Here are some of the common traps:
If your boss, spouse, best friends and children seem to take advantage of you, it's probably because you're not asking for what you want. Why? Because you don't trust them to listen without criticizing or rejecting you.
If you stay in jobs, relationships or even homes that aren’t satisfying, you may lack trust in your judgment and ability to handle making big changes on your own.
If you have a dream career or healthier lifestyle in your sights but aren't taking any steps toward making it happen, it could be because you lack faith in a positive future. Many of these problems occur because we don't have a strong enough sense of self-trust. To say "I trust myself" means taking care of one's own needs and safety and being a loving force in one's own life.
It's scary to be truly honest with other people until we know we can count on ourselves.
Keeping our promises to ourselves is fundamental to achieving the independence necessary to feel like a real adult. That's the key to self-confidence, to having the ability to explore new choices and tackle big challenges. Self-trust is not a steady state of self confidence, immune to fear of failure and rejection. We may still be tempted to defer to others' opinions or pay heed to the inner voices that echo the people who never encouraged us to believe in ourselves. But learning self trust will help us quiet those voices. As we change, we will attract others who believe in themselves--and in us.
Trusting someone is not an all-or-nothing proposition. A child wants to have perfect trust about all things, at all times. An adult learns more moderate expectations. Each relationship has a different place in our lives. A certain friend can be a shoulder to cry on but is irresponsible with money. One friend can keep a secret, while another would make a perfect gossip columnist. You discover that a new pal's casual "See you later" is actually more to be counted on than an old friend's sworn oath.
We are in charge of the depth of trust we want to offer. Once we recognize our patterns, get comfortable with our instincts and find confidence in our skills, the choices will be clearer. And we will posses the courage to create meaningful and lasting relationships. By increasing trust in ourselves and others, we gather the courage needed to have faith in a positive future for ourselves, despite the risk of failure. Faith in the face of uncertainty is based on a sense that there is something intrinsically good about life. When we have this kind of faith, we can name what we want and overcome obstacles to achieve it. We will develop confidence in our ability to move forward into the future.