Healthy trust takes time and isn’t something that comes easily, especially if you’ve experienced dishonesty. Often, it is built through seeing how a person behaves in different situations. The more we witness their reliability and trustworthiness, the more we know we can go deeper with them.
If your trust has been broken before in past relationships, overcoming the fear of trusting new ones can be challenging. But understand this, learning how to trust again benefits you. Let’s get into it.
Trust is Not Easy
The area of trust is often full of pitfalls, detours, fears, worries, and old wounds. Most of us have been wounded in our relationships through being taken advantage of, lied to, betrayed, and maybe even cheated on. Building trust takes time, and it is meant to.
Knowing you can rely on someone is a wonderful feeling. But we can’t get to that feeling of safety if we aren’t vulnerable with ourselves and others.
Risk: The Other Side of the Trust Coin
Without complete trust, we can never completely commit to someone. Whether this is our business partner, close friend, or romantic partner. And without trusting at least a little bit, to begin with, we can never build trust.
We must risk getting hurt to see whether or not we can actually trust each other.
There is also an element of control surrounding trust. When we want so badly to control a situation, our emotions, or even a person, we aren’t putting our trust or faith out there. Trust that the situation will have a resolution, that your emotions are valid, and whether or not someone has proven themselves to be trustworthy.
How to Build Trust
Now that we’ve established the importance of building trust, it’s time to take the appropriate steps.
- Approach the topic of trust as if you’re approaching a scared little child, with gentleness and curiosity.
- Keep your eyes open around your friend or romantic partner, instead of trying to force yourself to trust them fully before you’ve witnessed how they behave in different situations.
- With the help of a therapist, explore your early wounding around trust. Are your parents truly reliable and trustworthy? Did they betray your trust when you were a child? Did they betray each other’s trust? Do they know how to repair trust today?
- Trust can be broken and it can be rebuilt. The rebuilding of trust often happens through accountability and making amends.
- Work on your defensiveness. When we are being defensive, we aren’t really listening. Less defensiveness equals more openness.
Keep in Mind
Staying curious is your best ally when it comes to building trust. Keep in mind that each person is unique, and what might really matter to you might not be such a big thing for someone and vice versa.
When we listen to each other, communicate, and see each other’s perspectives fully, we create truly healthy, trustful bonds. Be open to exploring and sharing why something really matters to you, it’s essential when it comes to building trust.
At Georgia Strait Women’s Clinic, we are committed to helping you discover a path in life filled with meaning, purpose, and balance. If you or someone you know is struggling with mental health and/or problematic substance use, contact us today. Our team of trained professionals are ready to help.
