Trust

Tackling this one is hard for me: both in writing and my personal life. How do I repair trust in the wake of hurt? I’m still working on this.

When fighting, intimate knowledge comes out. I fight, I hurt. I try to hurt others in the same way I feel wounded. I inflict damage with my anger. Our trust in each other unravels as I breach what’s shared between us. Sometimes I’m faced with honesty I don’t want to acknowledge. I twist the truth.

Truth is a harsh master. It can feel good, or it can leave lash marks. Truth can be soothing and uplifting when it’s something I want to hear, hurtful when I don’t. I struggle with truth. I’m not very good at it. I struggle giving it to others, I struggle being truthful with myself.

I have my own issues with trust, many wounds I hide and protect. My most difficult ones are the ones I’m not aware of, the subconscious ones. They sit invisible, but very evident to those close to me. Our intimacy sheds light upon them. That focus doesn’t always feel good. It’s hard to see my ugly underbelly exposed for what it is. I pull back and raise my defenses. The only way for me to stop hurting is to see myself for who I am. Air my wounds out. Expose them so they can heal. It’s not easy. I feel hurt.

Honesty is a cornerstone of trust. Honesty is what I look for in a friend when I ask their opinion. I know who I can ask for positive sunshine and who will give me honest truth. I want to trust my friends, my family. I want them to be open and honest. But trust diminishes when someone I love, family or friend, hurts me. I feel soreness in it’s loss, replaced with the hurt that broke it. In that aftermath, how do I rebuild it?

I believe it takes will, then effort. I have to want to rebuild trust and then make the effort to do it. That effort starts with openness. It involves honesty. It may start with a peace offering – a concession I make. Putting myself in the other person’s shoes – their point of view – helps me comprehend how they feel. I can understand what I did to hurt them. I need to volunteer my fault in what I did to injure the other. Then make the effort to bring about change in myself.

When making a change, it’s important to make progress – people don’t change overnight, but improvement is progress. Some progress may need to occur immediately, depending on how severely I’ve hurt my friend. Time and repetition in my improvement, honesty and owing my mistakes help. Determination and persistence on transforming myself initiates a real change.

I struggle with this. Change is one of my most difficult obstacles to overcome. I am a creature of habit, but change is possible. It takes tenacity for me to move forward. It takes time and patience for trust to return.

Trust is never earned overnight. It takes serious effort to repair the damage, to heal, but it can be done. I continue to learn and struggle through this. It’s not an easy battle, but it’s one worth fighting and not giving up.