You can't have trust without taking a risk

We value being trusted; it's a mark of a good relationship. Conversely, we don't like being distrusted, or the sense of suspicion that comes with it, for this strongly undermines a relationship - we become guarded, careful about what we share, less open and more distant.

There is another part of us that wants to be certain about things, to know for sure. We are wary when we don’t know all the details - are we being ‘taken for a ride’, is there something hidden and not being shared, is there something underhand going on?

But there is a paradox involved in holding the above two common characteristics together, which is at root a battle between love, which is willing to take the risk of trusting, and power, which controls and minimises any risk of threat and not knowing.

Think of a close personal relationship: in order to build trust the people in that relationship need to act in trustworthy and consistent ways as trust develops. Even once there is a considerable degree of trust, the people in the relationship do not know everything about the other, or even need to know everything - for there is willingness to trust that the other’s attitude and actions will be loving without our trying to exert any control over them.

Such confidence and trust is not based on full knowledge or on power, but rather on shared values and experience, and a willingness to believe in the other’s benevolence.

Now think of the national security services: their business is not trusting, but gaining all the possible information about others that they can, just in case there is some deception or latent hostility or threat to be uncovered. When this intelligence gathering is aimed at political or military enemies, the mutual distrust may make such intelligence gathering understandable, even necessary for self-protection. But where this takes place between allies, or is directed towards ‘innocent third parties’, then this is not a benign protecting against threat; it destroys trust, builds suspicion and increases the level of threat!

The paradox is that we must take the risk of trusting another in order to get close to them and build a safer world. Where we seek to eliminate that risk, then we inevitably endanger relationships and increase the level of threat.

Those who say they act in our best interest to protect us whilst also spying on us, may or may not be sincere, but either way they are mistaken. For you cannot have trust without taking a risk, and you cannot have security without a good deal of trust.

Do you trust yourself?

Trust comes from repeated experience. The more times we experience someone else following through on their promises, etc., the more we come to trust them. Equally, when we experience them not doing what they said they would do, trust quickly evaporates.

Has it ever occurred to you that this applies to yourself? I don't mean how others see you, but it applies in how you see yourself!

Think of all those times you have said to yourself "I'll do that tomorrow" but not done it, or "I really am going to cut down on eating junk food" but not followed through. Well if you heard someone else coming out with all these fine sounding but empty promises, would you trust them over such matters? Me neither!

So it's not very surprising if we end up not trusting ourselves...

At the very same moment as we are saying "I'll do that tomorrow", there is another, quieter, voice in our head saying something like "that'll never happen", or "who do you think you are kidding?". And very soon we don't believe a word we say. Empty words, empty promises, from an untrustworthy character - the person in the mirror! You may fool others some of the time, but will you really fool yourself?

So, along with losing trust in oneself, self-esteem also goes out of the window. You look at yourself and see a person whose word means nothing. No-one else believes you, and you don't even believe yourself.

Do you know how to regain trust in yourself?

Trust grows, albeit slowly, from repeated experience that someone is trustworthy. So, if you were to follow through on something you said you'd do, that is the beginning. Hence it is much better for us to say we'll do something really small and achieve it, than to say we'll do something much more significant and fail to reach it. For example, it's better to decide to do 2 hours work today and achieve that, than to say we'll do 8 hours work but only manage 6 hours. The first builds trust, as we followed through on what we'd said we'd do; the latter destroys trust as we didn't achieve what we said ... despite actually having done more work!

Of course, if doing just 2 hours work isn't really a challenge, then the trust built is very small; a promise fulfilled, but not a promise of very much.

But if your self-esteem is low and you don't believe much that you say, then starting with really small steps makes sense. And if you are not really intending to follow through (however good an idea it might be) then it's much better not to say you'll do it in the first place.

But this involves a ruthless commitment to honesty. Say what you are doing to do; don't say what you are not going to do!

And gradually you will come to trust the speaker - yourself. And so will others, as, in time you are seen to be a person of your word, who says what they mean, and means what they say.

Not salvation, but still a useful turn around!

There's nothing magical about faith

Many people talk about faith as if it's something they happen to have, or, more frequently something they don't have; that's just the way it is. After all how can you believe something when you don't?

This apparent quality of faith provides a stumbling block to those who would like to believe and an invulnerable opt-out to those who don't. We have reached a stalemate, a seeming dead end.

But there's nothing magical about faith - we all use it every day. There is no dead-end, and the opt-out clause is a cop-out.

Consider trust. How do we learn to trust something or someone - or to not trust them? It simply comes from experience; trust grows or diminishes based on our repeated experience. We use it all the time: to consider whether our train will be on time, whether the cash-machine will give us the money we request, or whether a friend will stand by us through difficult times. You are showing your faith, or lack of faith, in your train service, your bank and your friend.

So, is faith just the same as trust? Well, yes and no.

Trust starts with a decision - a small decision to take a small risk - in fact, frequently so small we usually don't even notice it. Think about the simple examples above. The first time I put my bank card in a hole in the wall I am taking a small leap of faith to believe that it won't swallow my card and will give me my cash. I only have the experience of others to go on, so I am deciding to put my faith in them and my bank that it will actually work. And as I repeat this experience, I discover for myself that my bank is trustworthy, or not; that the trains usually run on time, or they don't; that my friend really is a good friend, or not.

But notice where trust starts - it starts with an act of faith, a decision to take a risk. Faith is deciding to trust what we haven't yet experienced. Once we have taken that step of faith, decided to take the risk, then we have the beginnings of experience, which in time may become trust. So doesn't all trust stem from an initial leap of faith - deciding to act before we know for sure? It applies to your bank and to your friend. And it applies to Christianity too.

So you can decide that you don't want to take a risk, don't want to take a step of faith, but you really can't say that you just don't have faith and there's nothing you can do about it... That really is a cop out.

Don't trust everything I say; I don't!

The infuriating thing is that I know that some of what I believe to be true is wrong.  And yet I only believe things which I believe to be right - otherwise I wouldn't believe them, would I?

But looking back, I've changed what I believe, sometimes quite radically, at various times in the past, as I've learnt more, seen more, or understood more.

For example, I used to think that Christians were to be pitied, for they needed to believe in fairy tales in order to find any security, and so were clearly not mature enough to deal with the harsh realities of life on earth - the dog eat dog, until we die, realities.  But later on - though many years ago now - I realised that the Christians were the people mature enough to accept the reality that God existed and they were foolish and sinful, and brave enough to say "yes" when asked to submit themselves into His uncompromising hands.

Even after I became a Christian and had a living relationship with Jesus, I thought the Holy Spirit was a mysterious and etherial "it" of little relevance today.  Until I realised that He was just as much God as Jesus is, or God the Father, and we needed the Holy Spirit in order to take even the simplest basic baby steps of faith and that without Him we would be nowhere at all.

So, because I do not for one moment suppose that I have stopped learning or realising more, I know that some of my current beliefs must be wrong, or at the very least must be very pale imitations of what is right.  Of course, if I knew which of the things I believed were wrong, I would no longer believe them!  That's the frustrating part...

Hence I get very wary when I encounter people who seem so completely sure of every 'fact' that they know.  This applies whether they are Christians who - even if they are older and wiser than I - appear to have no room for questions and wondering, or whether they are atheists who are equally dogmatic about their own beliefs.

[Atheists beleving something?  Surely I have that wrong, for they are the ones who have dispensed with beliefs and stuck to the facts?  No, if they say that, they are merely confusing beliefs for facts.]

Beliefs, facts, preferences and opinions - perhaps these are topics for another occasion.

In the meantime, my prayer is that God will show me which of my many crazy beliefs are mere flotsam that I cling on to as if they will save me, and which are revealed solid ground.