What Defines Trust In A Relationship And How To Develop It

2024 Author: Harry Day | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 15:43

“Well, why are you so boring and vindictive? You remember and remember everything … and it happened only twice and two years have passed already …"

This article will not be about cheating, but about trust. About such a crystal fragile phenomenon, the value of which many understand only when it is smashed to smithereens. About where it comes from and where it goes. And is it recovering?

So, the trust - it is an open, positive relationship between people, containing confidence in the decency and benevolence of another person with whom the trusting person is in one relationship or another.

Trust is the foundation of the relationship itself, the foundation of everything. It is a sense of security with those around you. And safety is one of the main conditions and needs of a person.

Trusting - we can move on, develop and develop, try, even make mistakes, we can grow, change together.

Any relationship between children and parents, partnerships, business and friendships is based and determined by the presence and degree of trust. It is the level of trust that determines reciprocity and closeness between people.

Let's start from childhood. You, me, your partner, your friends and parents, every person on Earth was once born. Born to live and enjoy life. The baby absorbs basic trust in the world, people and relationships with mother's milk in the mother's arms. The kid wants to trust adults and explore this beautiful world. And he trusts.

Trust is closely and directly related to security. I can trust, be relaxed when I have the experience (knowledge and feeling) of security.

Situations, circumstances, actions of significant people, our relationships with other people - all affect the function of trust. Strengthens or weakens it.

• For example: they promised that they would come, but did not come / did not do / did not take / did not bring / did not play, etc.
• They tried to convince them that the truth was not punished, and then they yelled so hard that they wanted to hide behind the baseboard.
• They said that we were a team, and then … we shared a sofa, forks and children.
• At the same time (solely for the purpose of caring!) Exaggerated and called for extreme caution: "Beware of thieves, white brotherhood and organ hunters." "If you do not urgently understand mathematics, you will be a bum, a janitor, and in general, do not admit that you are from our family."

Because, the first sensations and experiences we get while in the womb. Even then, we feel when they stroke the belly and turn in a gentle voice, wait and love. Even then, we feel insecure when mom cries, or when she smokes, or when she says something bad.

A newborn baby still does not know anything about trust and values, but it absorbs like a sponge and passes through itself everything that it hears, sees, feels. If he feels warmth, care, love - he is happy, reliable, safe, he learns to see this world in this way and from this calm open position to interact in it.

If there is a lack of warmth, love and security, then he gets used to living in chronic anxiety, being on the alert, trying to achieve what he wants with manipulations, and not trusting. In the future, this feeling will form the basis of behavior, thinking, life strategy and philosophy.

We are talking about healthy adequate reasonable trust. About basic trust - to the world and people. In a life position, it is expressed as I - ok, You - ok. "I am determined to honestly and openly interact and cooperate with you, so that you and I feel good." This is the most mature, psychologically healthy personal position. It gives the opportunity and the ability to see the good, to believe, to be calm, to accept people, to forgive shortcomings, not to enroll everything that happens or other people's actions into your own light.

Also, self-confidence is an important criterion that determines the entire system of trust in principle. Self-confidence is the received permission to feel, think, do, rely on your knowledge and experience, draw conclusions, analyze, work on mistakes. These are formed psychological boundaries and the ability to keep them. It is also an unwritten guarantee that when you feel bad, you are capable of self-support, and not self-deprecation.

Why does each of us have our own ability to trust?

If childhood, or rather its conditions, were unsafe (incomprehensible, constantly changing, full of pain, fear, sadness), then most likely adaptation mechanisms will form such qualities as suspicion, the need for control and power, where power is the illusion of complete control and security.

In such conditions, trust as value is not formed. If we have grown without it (trust / security), then, as they say, we will live further. And therefore, it is not appreciated, not respected and is not an obligatory part of the relationship.

When a child observes that adults are deceiving, breaking promises, betraying, unreliable in their emotional manifestations and actions, children live in a state of constant tension, anxiety and insecurity. Gradually, they "learn" to breathe this air, they adapt to act and survive under such conditions. Projection and transference are formed: that all others think, feel and act in this way.

The trust function is formed or blocked by parent programs, permissions and prohibitions.

For example, with a psychological prohibition “don't feel” - a person can only rely on thoughts, without feeling emotions, sensations, needs, desires. With the prohibition “do not think” - a person is full of incomprehensible sensations, emotions, internal stimuli that are difficult to differentiate and understand. With such parental orders and programs, “don't be yourself,” “don't be a child,” “don't be important,” “try,” “be the best,” etc. - a person does not listen to himself, does not know, does not understand his true desires, what is important to him, what he would like to change. As a result, a person constantly misunderstands something, ignores "intuition", gets into a mess and faces constant conflicts. In such circumstances, there is no need to talk about safety and trust.

Healthy alternatives, correct parenting behavior and trust-building permissions: “You are important,” “You can ask for help,” “You can think and feel at the same time,” “You are smart,” etc. sounds like, for example:

• I believe you! If you say that you are offended / incomprehensible / scared, then this is so.
• You can trust your feelings. I see - you are angry, then the statement of a classmate hurt you. It is really offensive and unpleasant.
• You can try again. I believe you can do it!

Subsequently, our children's emotional experience will form the basis for the formation of the core of the personality, life positions and attitudes towards issues of trust and interaction. Three dimensions “Who am I? What am I? "; "Who are you? What are YOU? " and “What world? What is he like in relation to me? " - reflect the variability of personal manifestation, the attitude of a person to himself, to another and to the world as a whole. This is reflected in the table:

How does the building of trust in childhood determine future behavior?

And now … it takes … -teen years. And once small children - today adults create couples, build relationships and face a different understanding and level of trust. Which certainly causes resonance in the relationship, confusion, embarrassment, misunderstanding, confusion, quarrels and conflicts.

For example, when there are partners who are able to trust and be reliable, they both value and watch out for honesty and loyalty in the relationship. They are able to hear, accept, forgive, negotiate in order to make the relationship better.

When both are with the position of "do not trust" - they are mentally closed, each has its own rules, ulterior motives and principles. The principle of relationships: "ahead of the curve", "if not you, then you", "live with wolves - howl like a wolf."

But sometimes people with drastically different levels of trust try to create relationships. And if one of the partners has developed the value and ability to trust, while the other does not, their relationship resembles a weakened organism, when one constantly “infects” the other. Someone wants to save someone, convince, grow, and this someone projectively takes revenge, asserts himself, “tests” the partner's patience and unconditional love for endurance.

Situations of deception, betrayal, unpredictable and incomprehensible behavior, unfulfilled unspoken expectations, conflicts with total misunderstanding and rejection of the point of view of another - speak precisely of insecurity and a lack of trust in relationships.

A person who grew up in a caring, safe atmosphere of acceptance and unconditional love in their adult life also strives to bring this healthy atmosphere into their relationships. If, being small, he saw and felt the reliability of significant adults, then he himself, by default, will strive to be a reliable partner for a loved one.

Likewise, a person who does not know how to trust it doubts the sincerity of people in principle - has a sad experience of unsafe relationships, tends to doubt the default, deceive and betray trust.

It is people with traumatized trust who most often commit unseemly acts in order to reinforce early formed scenario decisions, that they cannot be trusted, that there is no point in being honest and open, that anyway, something bad is about to happen. Their unconscious life plan is to prove that trust and reliability does not exist.

If “it didn’t work out” with safety and trust in childhood, then in adulthood, you can change your attitudes only by a conscious volitional decision. The realization that an open, sincere relationship can be built solely on the basis of mutual honesty and trust will help the Adult make a responsible decision "I will be reliable / noy" and "I will trust." When both partners make such decisions, their "contract" for honesty becomes a good psychological support and the basis for cultivating trusting relationships in a couple.

To be faithful, honest, reliable is a choice. No one is immune from unpleasant incidents. But troubles usually pass to those who await them.

A few recommendations for those whose trust has been violated

1. The collapse of trust is a lot of stress. Great pain. Great sense of confusion, confusion and danger. It is impossible to draw perspectives of the future while there is a "lacerated wound" in the soul. When trust is destroyed - the person himself is in insecurity, the idea of himself, of a partner, of the world as a whole is called into question. It is important to understand and allow yourself "quarantine". Broken trust is the loss of a very important value that should definitely be mourned.
2. But the wound needs to be healed. And it will take time. Betrayal is very painful. This is a "knife in the back", and strong energy blood loss. During this period, a variety of feelings can sharpen. It is important to resolve them all for oneself and express them adequately. It is normal and correct to ask for help and support. It is helpful and effective to seek professional help.

Anger, fear, caution, extreme attention to details are nothing more than the most adequate (under certain conditions) manifestation of the instinct of self-preservation. It would be strange and unnatural to remain calm and continue to trust if a precedent happened recently.

At the moment, the most important thing is taking care of yourself. It is important to allow yourself to be vulnerable, i.e. to feel pain. This can save you from displacing feelings or falling into the role of the Victim. It is into it that they often run away from in fact not to live painful feelings, but to get rid of which is sometimes very difficult.

It is important to remember that the pain will pass over time and it will be easier for the psyche to reboot, start "living" again and trust. The main thing is to believe and know that it is important and possible to trust. Only this faith should be with open eyes. Those. to see, feel and understand who you can trust and who you shouldn't.

To work with a partner:

1. If one of the partners tries to satisfy his long-standing hunger in a non-ecological way (self-esteem, power, control, etc.), for the other, the world collapses, an earthquake with the destruction of ideas about relationships. From now on, there will never be such a relationship as before. Now you will know much more about your partner than before. And the old look at him will no longer be. It is important to be with this thought.
2. When something happens in a relationship that undermines trust, it is important to determine the personal positions of partners, their philosophies, life strategies in the matter of trust. You need to analyze your earliest attitudes, decisions that determine how we deal with others and how we deal with us. The manifestation of these attitudes in their paired relationships is a reflection and projection of their subjective view of the world into the real world.
3. Everyone has their own way of work, awareness of what happened and recovery. Life after trauma for some time is an uprising from the ashes and self-rehabilitation. Do not rush to make decisions about believe-disbelieve, forgive or not, continue the relationship, or disagree. It is important not to arrange "lynching" and seek help. Therefore, paired psychotherapy may be appropriate in parallel with personal psychotherapy.
4. We influence each other. If one in the family is "sick" - he will certainly infect the second. Therefore, the only correct, from the point of view of perspective, decision is to jointly form healthy moral and ethical values and build interaction on their basis. Yes, childhood means a lot, and yet, as adults, it is here and now that we can change, choose and define our values and principles.
5. Ideal and ideal do not exist. We are people, which means that we make mistakes, we search, we try … It's good when we make the right conclusions and decisions. "From goodness - they do not seek goodness." Often people are insincere precisely because they are afraid of being rejected, rejected as they are. Childhood experience says that you have to seem like someone, to seem better, so that you are accepted, not abandoned, loved. But it’s hard to be not yourself all the time. Psychological hunger, needs, desires, push to actions aimed at satisfying what is lacking. In adulthood, this is often achieved at the expense of a partner, relationship.
6. At the same time, trust is impossible without intimacy. Intimacy is impossible when you feel physical or emotional insecurity from your partner. Therefore, even the most traumatized trust and relationships can be restored with mutual desire, mutual responsibility. Each of us has needs that are met only in relationships. They are important to hear, understand and strive to mutually satisfy. The hardest part of this is to be honest and open towards yourself and your partner.
7. Trust will not arise by itself. This is the solution first. Then a mutual trust contract with a partner and … the formation of a new experience and a new skill of close open communication. This needs to be learned, it is a process and it takes time. Trust Development Formula: Trust = openness * time. It is important here not to play the games of "victim and villain", to keep boundaries, not to turn into attacks and accusations, to express your feelings and thoughts in a constructive way, in the way of "I-messages".
8. The decision to trust does not mean blindly ignore the falsity or insincerity of a partner. And it signifies taking on the responsibility of the courage to be sincere and open with a partner, to share experiences, fears, doubts, to clarify fantasies. And the time factor will help to form and strengthen this skill and the style of healthy, sincere and harmonious relationships in a couple.

I wish all of us Trust, Love and true closeness in relationships with the most dear people!)