I am a HUGE fan of Dr. Brene Brown. My clients will tell you that I reference her work frequently when discussing courage, fear, vulnerability, and “let’s rumble” topics. Another topic that repeatedly comes up is TRUST. How do we define trust? How do we build trust with others? And to me, the most important question, how do I build or sustain trust with myself?
Charles Feltman defines trust as “Choosing to make something important to you vulnerable to the actions of someone else.” To summarize, whatever we chose to make vulnerable to another, we do so because we believe that the other person’s actions will support it or, at the very least, not hurt it. Overall, trust is a two way street.
To break it all down, Dr. Brown came up with the acronym BRAVING to better explain and help us understand what we look for in order to trust someone. I’ve broken down BRAVING below:
Boundaries-I trust you if you are clear about your boundaries and you hold them, and you are clear about my boundaries and you respect them.
Reliability-I trust you if you do what you say what you are going to do more than once/over and over again. Also, you are clear on your limitations. If you are not able to make a lunch date, do not say: “I’ll call you and we’ll meet for lunch.” Can you relate? Yep, me too...
Accountability-I trust you if when you make a mistake, you are willing to own it, apologize for it, and make amends. Likewise, when I make a mistake, I can own it, apologize for it, and make amends.
Vault-I trust you if what I share with you, you will hold in confidence, and what you share with me, I will hold in confidence. Also, you don’t share other’s confidences...you do not share what is not yours to share. You respect my story and you respect other people’s story.
Integrity-I trust you when you act from a place of courage over comfort, choosing what is right over what is fun/fast/easy. You practice your values, not just profess your values.
Non-judgement-I trust you if I can be messy, ask for help, and fall apart without being judged by you, and you can be messy, ask for help, and fall apart without being judged by me. Important note: If you personally cannot ask for help or think less of yourself for needing help, you will think less of the other person for needing help…real trust doesn’t exist if trust is not reciprocated with non-judgement.
Generosity-I trust you if you can assume the most generous thing about my words/intentions/behaviors and check in with me. Example: If I forget something or miss something important, you will think the “best intent” of me and check in with what happened.
Trust is complex and everyone struggles with it. Thus, understanding trust gives us specific language to talk about it and say “here is my struggle” and ask for what we need. And as I stated before, one of the biggest casualties with heartbreak, disappointment, and failure in our struggles is the loss of self trust. When something hard happens in our life do we trust ourselves to stick with our boundaries, offer some self compassion when we make a mistake.
I’d invite you think about this: if you find yourself struggling with trust, examine first how you treat yourself. If you can’t count on yourself, you can’t ask others to give you what you don’t have. Maya Angelou stated: “I don’t trust those who say ‘I love you’ who don’t love themselves.” Ultimately, you will know you are worthy of receiving trust when you trust yourself above everyone else.
- Log in to post comments