Losing Trust
If you’d asked me this morning what I would be writing about this evening, trust – or more accurately, losing trust , would not have been top of my list. Not to say trust doesn’t figure prominently in my life; it does. I just wouldn’t have thought I’d be bringing the topic up again quite so quickly since my last post about it.
But here it is, the clock is ticking relentlessly toward the witching hour, and I have only just now managed to get to my MacBook Air (not my Dell, notably!) to write this post.
Trust me (no pun intended), this will not be a long one.
Losing Trust Makes Us Feel Vulnerable and Foolish
Part of my agitation in writing this particular entry is that I happened upon information this evening, out there on the “internets,” that caused me to feel as though the floor had dropped out from under me.
No, I didn’t catch my husband cheating or doing anything nefarious, nor did I discover anything horrible about any of my sons or loved ones that would wreck my world. Or at least my world view.
But I did discover something that made me question a very close business relationship. It made me feel vulnerable and foolish, for if the appearance of what I discovered turned out to be true in its most obvious sense, then I’d been betrayed.
Levels of Trust
Which makes me contemplate the different levels of trust we accord various factions of people who cross our path in life. There are, of course, those who occupy the ‘inner circle.’ Parents, siblings, spouses/partners, children. We usually demand the greatest loyalty from them because they are either blood – or so close to blood they might as well be. When trust is broken in those relationships, we react in a certain manner, depending upon the level of egregiousness.
The next level is comprised of close, deep friends, and perhaps business associates with whom we have a partnership, similar to a sibling or marital relationship, but not necessarily quite as profound. In some cases, I think we may be more profoundly devastated by a breach of trust in this situation than in the first level, because for the most part we’ve chosen these people to be part of our world.
Then there are people with whom we interact on a transactional, day-to-day level. This can be people with whom we work or friends who actually are more acquaintances than anything else, but are perhaps vying for entry into the next level of relationship. Trust in these situations can pervade the relationship, yet not necessarily be needed or warranted. It may be granted, but not be required in order for the relationship to succeed.
And then there are the people with whom we interact on a superficial basis. We basically do not even need to assess the level of trust they deserve, for trust is not an inherent aspect of why we are interfacing with them.
Tonight I experienced what I perceived as a breach of trust of a relationship in the second highest level. It’s interesting, because the person whom I perceived may have ‘sold me out,’ so to speak, I have never met in person, yet actually have cultivated an extremely deep level of trust with and in over the past ten years or so.
Ten years is a long time. And I trust (man, that word – and concept – keeps popping up) my instincts, not only in the short term, as in the sense I get when I first meet a person and make eye contact with them, but also in the long term. I truly believe that one of the gifts of my ‘Owl Medicine’ is to be able to discern the true nature of people accurately. Usually with pinpoint accuracy.
If There’s Trust in a Relationship, Then It Deserves a Chance
So when confronted with the possibility of betrayal, of discovering that someone in whom I had placed great trust on many levels, had possibly sold me out for what was undoubtedly a paltry sum (in consideration of the value of my trust, which is considerable, if I do say so myself), I spoke up. I asked. I confronted – in disbelief, and in the hope that I was somehow misperceiving what I’d discovered – but with conviction that I required clarity.
And I received a response. Quickly. With apparent sincerity, and with what I trust (*) will justify my deep caring for the person and relationship in question.
And with that, I must post this. I truly and sincerely hope my trust is warranted, for otherwise, I will be deeply saddened. And pissed.
(T-1081)