May 29, 2008

• Love and Trust (Trust, Part 3)

  I didn’t know where I was going with this trust topic when I started.  That is probably why the first entry started out so cerebral and then turned visceral on me midway.  Anyone who thought that I wrote the first paragraphs as a lead-in to what followed gave me too much credit for coherency.  I simply had a sudden insight that derailed my train of thought.

  Part 2 dealt more with what trust is not than with what it is.  Lending money you can easily afford to lose, to someone who needs it,
  and thinking of it as a gift, or at the very least as a risky
  investment, is not what I mean here by trust.  In many instances it is
  easy to treat people as if  we trusted them without risking
  disappointment if they prove untrustworthy.  Some people pretend to trust people they don’t trust, just for the opportunity to play gotcha!  when their negative expectations are fulfilled.  I enjoy surprising such people by doing what I say I’ll do.

  One sense of the word that I emphatically do not call “trust” is the hope or wishful thinking
  often expressed as, “I trust that you will…” or “…that he will….”  I
  read this as some sort of affirmation by a positive-thinking person afraid or unwilling to express
  doubt about something strongly desired.

  I refer here only to the trust that expects fulfillment and risks significant
  loss or serious disappointment.  What I mean by trust is confidence, “the trait of believing in the honesty and reliability of others.”  There is no such thing as unconditional trust in the sense that there is unconditional love.  Trust denotes expectation and requires something in return if it is going to endure.  Only a seriously demented person would or could continue to trust others who had time after time betrayed that trust. 

  One might transfer trust to another person when betrayed by one, but the general human tendency is, after being betrayed a number of times by various people, to learn to withhold trust from everyone.  That kind of traumatic learning can, when sufficiently traumatic, create psychological issues severe enough to require therapy to enable a person to get by in society and relate healthily with others.

  Many people believe that one cannot love someone that one does not trust, and think that one must be trusted in return for love.  I hear that a lot, and I find it mentioned frequently in personal blogs.  I do not doubt the honesty or sincerity of those who say this.  It is their wisdom I question.  I think their attitude reflects a basic misunderstanding about the nature of love.  One can love anyone or anything that one chooses to love, if one chooses to love unconditionally.  Unconditional love demands nothing in return and risks no disappointment, because it has no expectations.  In that sense, it is the antithesis of trust.

  There is no intrinsic risk in unconditional love.  Its reward comes in the giving, in knowing love, doing love, and being loving.   If one needs something in return for one’s love, then there are other words besides “love” for that kind of attachment.   Demanding trust or expecting trustworthiness of others is more an expression of fear than of love.  It seems perfectly reasonable to me, for example, to refuse to lend money to, and to decline to move in with or have sex with, someone who has not demonstrated trustworthiness.  On the other hand, I cannot think of a single good reason to refuse to love anyone.  As long as no risk is involved, what’s the problem?

  This, I know, is all very pretty in theory, but can be pretty hard to put into practice.  I think I demonstrated my own difficulties with trust, forgiveness and universal unconditional love, in the first of these three essays.  As I said then:  mea culpa.  I know some people too well to trust them.   I have one friend I’d trust with my life, meaning that I’d rely on him to back me up in an armed confrontation or come to my rescue if needed, but I wouldn’t repeat any story he told me without a disclaimer.  The guy just isn’t generally truthful.  Most of the people I know, I can trust to act in their own perceived best interests even if that means letting me down or breaking their word to me.  In other words, I wouldn’t trust them in anything of vital importance to me.

  I tend to be fairly trusting of anyone unless or until that person demonstrates untrustworthiness.  I’ve gone through maybe seven or eight local wood sellers because when one of them doesn’t deliver what I paid for, I find another one.  I say that I am “fairly trusting,” because there are some risks I’ll take and others I won’t.  I don’t lock my house (can’t lock it, and trust my dog to guard it when I’m out), and I don’t leave my keys in my car.  I sometimes hitchhike, but I don’t get into a car if I smell alcohol on the driver’s breath or if the hair on the back of my neck stands up when he looks at me.  I don’t trust anyone with my secrets, and I trust everyone, including you, with all my innermost thoughts and feelings.  If I have any secrets, I have forgotten what they are, which is a prudent course of action because that way I cannot inadvertently reveal them. 

  I don’t ask for trust, but I have noticed that I tend to get annoyed if someone assumes I’m lying, so I must be expecting to be trusted.  I shouldn’t let it bother me if someone doesn’t trust me.  It’s their problem, and I’d be better off just making note that this person expects to be lied to, meaning that he probably lies.  In general, my experience suggests that those who make the biggest fuss about trust are those least deserving of being trusted.

  I started this whole thing with these words:  “Trust is an expectation . . . unless it isn’t.  There is a state of
  mind beyond expectations, where we are not invested in the actions or
  reactions of others, that is practically indistinguishable from trust.”  That’s my position, most of the time.  I’m more into observing, seeing what happens, than into forming expectations or setting up needs that I feel must be met.  My lack of surprise when things don’t go the way I thought they might, and my lack of disappointment when people surprise me, indicate that I’m doing okay.

  

  • 6:27 pm
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