The Lavender Light

Trust

July 23, 2008 on 7:02 am | In Growth Ramblings | No Comments

I had an experience recently that spoke to me and I just have to share it.  The lesson here is invaluable.

The Reunion

My wife’s family gets together every year for a family vacation in Lake Tahoe.  There is lots of food, lots of fun and I look forward to it every year.  This year, I was delayed in getting to the family reunion due to business and I caught up with them on Saturday night, they all arrived on Friday.

My 3 years old son, Ryan, is always the hit of the party no matter where he goes.  He’s just an incredible child. Of course my opinion is biased.  However, he is mildly spirited and has a strong will.  He is swayed only be distraction, it seems, and we’ve learned how to adapt to that.  My brother in law, however, hasn’t.  He sees Ryan twice a year at best, he is a  Professor of Psychology in England and comes home for the reunion and the holidays.  He doesn’t have any children of his own.

Trust

My brother in law was playing with my son and they had a bucket of ice out of the freezer.  He let Ryan alone with it briefly and told Ryan not to spill the ice all over the floor.  Well, being a 3 year old, he promptly spilled all over the floor all the while looking his uncle directly in the eye and giving him that all too familiar sneer that we’ve grown to know and love.  His uncle became very upset, angry even, saying that he had trusted Ryan to not do what he did and he knowingly did it anyway.

Let me repeat that for it’s full effect:  “I trusted him not to spill the bucket of ice and he knowingly did it anyway. He knew what he was doing was wrong yet he did it anyway.  He betrayed my trust.”

(Long pause for an enormous deep breath)

Later, I asked him what he meant by that Ryan had betrayed his trust.  He repeated what he had said earlier and then added that nothing would change his feeling on the matter.  The first mistake is trusting a 3 year old.

So I asked, “is it accurate to say that you trusted Ryan to do what you expected him to do?”  He said, “yes, I did and he didn’t do it.” “So you expected that he would do what you wanted him to do?” I repeated.  He said, “yes, I did.”

“The basis of your trust in him is, in this case, that he do what you wanted him to do, correct?” I asked.  He said, “yes, I guess it was.”

Trusting

I don’t know about you but my basis of trust with everyone on the planet is that they would make the choices that are right for them, not right for me.  I trust them to do and expect them to do what is right for them.  I trust only myself to do what is right for me.  Because of this distinction, I trust everyone, even those I’ve never met.  I don’t mistrust.  I don’t even see, with this distinction, how mistrust is possible in everyday situations.

With a 3 year old, this distinction is even more important than with an adult.

Generally, I think we put too much emphasis on trusting others.  We are all different people and interpret situations and events differently.  How can we ever trust that someone else will act in accordance with our values, wants or desires in total?  With this mindset, its like we want to be disappointed!

Ok, so do you like disappointment?

When we have the expectation that someone will act in accordance with our wants, we are setting ourselves up for a let down.  Begin to recognize that our trust is best placed with ourselves, our own expectations guiding our own actions, not with the expectation that others will act as we would like them to.

This distinction allows us to have control over our emotions.  We begin to expect less from others because we have freed them, in our own minds, to act in their own best interest.  We are let down less by others or, rather, let down less by our own expectations of others, and have healthier relationships.

You will be continually let you down if you have the expectation that others will do what you perceive to be the right thing to do.  When you expect others to do what you feel is best for you, you’re projecting yourself onto other people.  The truth is that no one will act in accordance with your expectations all the time, nor should they.

Free yourself from expecting others to behave as you’d like them to and trust yourself to behave in a manner that is right for you.

Oh, my brother in law did end up getting the gist of this.  He’s an aware guy and a pretty darn good uncle too.