leaping feet first

I was feeling a bit introspective this evening - maybe because of some crap I have been going through for a while or maybe just because work has me totally frazzled - and I started thinking about trust. Trusting your spouse, your friends, your kids.

Trust is frightening and yet so important. Without trust, I don't think a relationship - any relationship - can really BE. I know people - men and women - who monitor their significant others like hawks, because they don't trust them. I don't understand that. What's the end there? I mean, I get having some healthy skepticism and I also truly believe that people in a committed relationship should be respectful of each other - you know, let your loved one know where you're headed and if you're going to be late. But monitoring them like young child...doesn't feel like trust to me.

I also don't think it works. I think it causes a cancer in a relationship - the person watched somehow feels like s/he is set up for failure. And the person watching is just sitting waiting for the other one to fuck up. I can't judge what others do - but that's not me. I've been watched - for no apparent reason - and it's hurtful. It feels like you will fail - maybe not by doing something horrible but simply by being. You feel like you don't merit the person's love or appreciation unless you "earn" it.

And I was once the watcher. Honestly, it makes it worse. You're living with that constant expectation of the proverbial ax falling. You never feel comfortable in the relationship you're in.

And I don't mean just love relationships - I've seen this occur in friendships and with children. it's a little different - but the issue is still there.

The problem is, trusting someone is an enormous leap of faith. This applies to a spouse/significant other - you trust them to love you for you, to be faithful, to be honest, to think of you first and others after that. You trust your friends to be honest with you, have your best interests at heart, to tell you when you're talking out of your ass, being too sensitive, or hurting them. You trust your children to learn from what you teach them, to think of the values you've set in them when you're not there to monitor them, to grow into functional and respectable adults.

All that trust - it's all RISK. So how do you trust in yourself to know when trusting is the right thing to do?

I think implicitly, most of us trust those we care about and those who we believe care about us. But it's still a huge leap of faith to put your trust in a person. And what do you do if they break your trust? Do you forgive, forget, and move on? Do you draw a line in the sand and decide to never trust them again? Do you mourn, get frustrated and angry, and then start over? How do you know in your heart - or in your bones - the right call there?

I struggle with this a lot. By nature, I am a very guarded person. I have been hurt by significant others, by friends, by collegues. I seem to be the type of person easily thrown under the bus.

This leads me to start off most of my new relationships definitely not trusting the person. This makes people assume I am snobby or standoffish or think I'm better than them. This could not be farther from the truth.

What I am is afraid. I'm afraid because once I choose to trust someone, I TRUST them. I have been accused of being too nice or caring too much - I don't think of it that way. I reserve my care, concern, and love for a chosen few - the people that feel right to me. It's an "in my bones" sort of 11th hour decision. Once I choose to care about you, I will care, I will trust, and it will be implicit. Until I decide that, I will be guarded and doubtful.

This puts me in a complicated situation if something causes that trust to be questioned. I'm there now. I'm trying to figure out what to do. I'd like to start over - but my guarded self is afraid. In fact, it's far more frightening to me to try to trust someone I already trusted - who betrayed me and let me down - than it is to trust someone I never trusted before, never knew.

Problem is - obviously I cared - and care. So I want to trust. It's the getting there that's the trick.

Speaking of - anyone got a trick for working through this? Right now, it has me anxious and nervous and not trusting myself, my gut, my intellect, my feelings. I want to leap back in feet first - it feels right. But the fear - the fear looms like a black cloud and slaps me - makes my heart race and my hands sweat.