I Have a Trust Problem

A while back, I was in a meeting with a group of people who play a very important role in my life. I have very deep connections with these people and have been able to be vulnerable and authentic with them in a way I have never been with most other people. They have encouraged and coached me through learning to set and enforce my boundaries. (I’m sure that hasn’t always been easy for them as I have been learning to shift from relying on anger to get me through that uncomfortable process to enforcing them with grace.)

We were discussing the values we wanted to guide the culture of a new community we were in the process of building. I was advocating that we should spend some time defining what we collective meant by the values we were suggesting. Others felt the definitions were more self-evident. At one point during this debate, one of the members addressed me, “Ellie, I think you can trust us!”

That one simple sentence sent me into a space of emotional chaos. First, the issue I was raising actually had nothing to do with trust and I felt very unheard in that moment. Second, pointing to trust as the issue when I wasn’t feeling particularly distrustful raised doubts about whether or not I was actually going to be able to extend trust in this situation after all. (I mean if they were pushing this hard for me to just accept things as they were, what was I not seeing; what were they trying to hide from me?) So yes, when I say I was in emotional chaos, it was as if the Egyptian god, Seth, had taken over my headspace!

After the meeting, my partner suggested we sit down and explore what was behind my response. He proposed alternate ways I could conceptualize trust so that it was less emotionally triggering for me. As we talked, Vangie, my little, internal Evangelical started singing a hymn. I heard the lyrics, I had sung so many times in church and with my dad.

“When we walk with the Lord, in the light of his word, what a glory he sheds on our way. When we do his good will, he abides with us still and with those who will trust and obey. Trust and obey for there’s no other way to be happy in Jesus than to trust and obey.”

As the lyrics continued to play in my head, I realized why being told to trust was such a triggering experience. In the religious tradition I grew up in and spent most of my adult life in, trust was essentially a polite way to say, “Shut up and do what you’re told!”

I grew up hearing with stories of “trust” meaning obedience without doubt or question. There was Abraham trying to kill his son Isaac as a sacrifice to G-d. Lot’s wife was turned into a pillar of salt for not trusting G-d enough and looking back at the destruction being wrought on Sodom and Gomorrah. The virgin Mary was praised for her unquestioning trust when she allowed G-d to impregnate her. Job received twice the worldly possessions and twice the children for blindly trusting G-d when G-d and Satan essential made a bet over how much suffering Job could take without cursing G-d.

It was obviously deconstruction time! I was in desperate need of a health definition of trust!

For the past four years, I have been using what I have come to call my Truth Spot Life Guidance System (a digital tool I created for myself when I couldn’t keep it all straight in my head) to help me breakdown and challenge beliefs I hold as I learn more and grow. So I opened the Wisdom Council section and started challenging the belief that trust means doing what you are told without question.

I started my challenge of this belief by describing the belief as I understood it and then exploring the tangible objectives and desired impacts of teaching that trust involved unquestioning acceptance and/or obedience. That is a step that requires me to set aside my reactionary emotions and look at the belief with curiosity. “I wonder what behavior they were hoping to inspire when I was taught that? What psychological, emotional and spiritual impact did they want that belief to have on my life?”

Thinking back to the Sunday school lessons, sermons, and family devotion discussions, I figured they were likely trying to inspire me to acknowledge that as a mere human, there were parts to every situation that I could not see, impacts of actions I might not be able to anticipate. They wanted me to be able to acknowledge that only G-d has the ultimate power over the events in our lives and only G-d can see the full picture of the life and the world it impacts, a truth that, as they saw it, would set me free from fear. In their minds, only in acknowledging the power and wisdom of G-d, could I have peace in my life and the certainty that I was doing the right things and that my life was aligned with G-d’s teachings. Following this belief would also demonstrate my godly humility and faith.

With that awareness, it was time to move into critical thinking mode and explore the pain points of that understanding of trust and what guiding boundaries would be necessary to address those pain points.

One of the comforting aspects of the definition of trust that I grew up with is that it limited my accountability for the consequences of what I feel is blind trust rather than healthy trust. If I am “trusting” G-d or those who represent him in my life (pastors, parents, husbands, teachers, etc.), I am not responsible for the fallout. If things don’t go according to plan, the outcome was actually G-d’s will. If people were harmed by it, it was because they were outside of G-d’s will. I didn’t have to worry about their experience. If my trust was betrayed, it wasn’t the result of blind trust, it was the devil’s fault for tempting and leading the leaders astray. I had done my part in trusting; G-d would see me through.

I don’t know about you, but that was not the kind of life I was interested in living. I wanted to live with intention. I wanted to account for the results of my actions and choices and how they were impacting me and those around me. I wanted to be able to learn from my mistakes.

For that to be true, I realized trust needed to occur within healthy boundaries; that I must make sure that the actions being pursued through my agreement to trust aligned with my own values and beliefs. I also needed to make sure that those to whom I extended trust to had the ability and the track record to be able to use that trust to actual accomplish what we were setting out to accomplish.

Armed with a deeper understanding of the concept of trust — both what I had been taught in the church and how I wanted it to work in my life, I started to define trust in a way that rang true to me.

I realized that at its core, trust is a deeper version of consent. It is a specific understanding or agreement for the achievement of an intention (one or more) that I extend to another person or a group of people that is bound and limited by boundaries that help it to function in alignment with my personal beliefs and values. I needed to consider the actual capabilities and behavioral patterns of the person or group to whom I was extending my trust extended.

This form of trust isn’t a blank check agreement or an acceptance of whatever the person or group I am trusting come up with. It requires collaboration and communication. How do we establish this trust agreement so that those involved are clear on the intention, and the boundaries that help it remain in alignment with each of our Truth Spots?

Trust, I have found, is ultimately a practice of consent. And that is a concept that empowers me and allows for my continued growth!