Trust Issues...

Most of you have heard of or experienced the "trust fall" where one person falls backwards, trusting another person or persons to catch them. We did a few different exercises to demonstrate trust this past weekend at our youth retreat.

It got me thinking about trust--Who we trust? Why we trust? What does it take to earn our trust? Am I trustworthy?

On the surface, most of us would say that it's better to trust an honest person or one that always does the right thing: but is that really the case?

What if somebody does something that is wrong--anything from spreading gossip to taking something that doesn't belong to them? Do they really trust an honest person or somebody that always does the right thing to keep their misdeed a secret? Wouldn't they be more likely to trust somebody that has the same values (or lack of them) as they have?

I suppose there are many different levels of trust as well as different areas of trust. I may trust a coworker to have my back in a difficult session of air traffic control, but not really trust them in other areas of life. A person might trust another person to be honest about fixing their car but not feel like they would leave them to care for their children. Things like these are based on experiences and knowledge of situations as well as people.

So how does somebody earn your trust?
By keeping their mouth shut?
Or by telling the truth?
By doing what's right?
Or by doing what you need them to do?

Is an honest person really the kind of person that you want to trust?
Or would you rather trust a person that has pretty much the same level of dishonesty as you have?

Is there honor among thieves? Do we count on the bad deeds of others to keep them silent about our own bad deeds?

Are these really the kinds of things that we want to base our "trust" of others upon and are those really the kinds of people that we want to trust?

Hmmm...

Just thinking.

John <><