The Truth About Trust

Contrary to Popular Belief, Trust in Relationships is not Earned.

When couples meet each other for the first time and fall in love, they are very enthusiastic to trust each other, even though they actually know very little about each other, and the relationship is still all butterflies and flowers. The need to trust each other is actually the need to feel safe both physically and emotionally, trust is a belief and hope in the reliability that someone we have just met and fell in love with, will be faithful. In new relationships we often place our confidence in a complete stranger, therefore trust is often not earned in a new relationship and it is simply given upfront.

Trust in relationships is not something that is ‘real,’ and by this I mean that it is not tangible, you cannot see or touch trust, which is why re-building is so much more complex and difficult. Trust is an emotional and mental concept, a belief, a hope that someone will act in a specific way.

When trust is then broken by a specific act, for example infidelity, how do we re-build something that is not real or tangible and was never really earned in the first place?

Couples are often faced with this dilemma in counselling and present with the idea that the guilty partner should earn their trust back.

Let’s take a look at the process of building trust in a relationship that has been shattered:

Step 1 – Deal with the Emotion First

Trust has an emotional connection attached to it. Angry or hurt people don’t trust nor do they forgive! When trust is broken the emotions need to be dealt with first.

How do we deal with emotions is a relationship? This is where the concept of acknowledgement is introduced. As much as we try to understand someone else’s emotions we have to realize that we will never be able to fully understand how someone is feeling. Feelings and emotions are based on an individuals’ model of the world. It’s impossible. Accept it as a fact. Our job in a relationship is to support and acknowledge feelings and not necessarily to try and understand them. The job of the ‘offended’ partner is too, to hold, support and acknowledge the emotions of the ‘guilty’ partner.

This may seem straightforward and easy enough, however, to really support and acknowledge each other’s feelings, especially when emotions are so raw, takes a lot of work and effort, and only if this is done properly can the foundation for re-building trust start.

If your partner can acknowledge and support your emotions, you are more likely to trust them again. And this is based on the fact that if someone can REALLY see and acknowledge how they have hurt us, hopefully they will think twice about doing it again.

Step 2 – 100% Transparency and Truth

The ‘guilty’ partner needs to be honest and upfront with everything going forward, especially emotions and feelings. People trust emotions more than what people say. Social media and cell phones are a large source of potential mistrust, how are these contributing factors affecting transparency in the relationship and what are the possible solutions?

Step 3 – 100% Rational Decision

As trust is not real and not earned, to re-build trust becomes a 100% rational decision. With this I mean, after working through the emotions, seeing 100% transparency in your partner we finally have to make a decision to trust again.

“When we decide to trust someone again, we are not doing it for them we are doing it for ourselves”

This is one of the most important aspects to remember, when we trust someone we are not doing it for them, we are doing it for ourselves. If you analyse the reasons as to why you need to trust your partner, it all comes back to your own emotions and the need to feel safe. Ask yourself what will the result be if you decide not to trust your partner, which may possibly include, constant anxiety about what the other person may or may not be doing, fear of being hurt again, fear of not being good enough, fear of not feeling safe. Should you decide to keep these negative emotions and not trust your partner, you decide to torment yourself as you are the one who has to sit with the uncomfortable emotions and not your partner. Once we realize that this is a personal decision to lower our own anxiety and negative emotions we can start trusting again.

The process of re-building trust is a delicate and sensitive one, for this counselling is recommended, in order to create a safe space, for both partners and provide an objective point of view.

Chael Nel: Clinical Psychologist
info@chaelnel.co.za
084 868 5270