What does it mean to trust if we separate trust from the object? Trust can’t be about the object alone. Because the object will for sure eventually fail and not meet expectations. Even our own bodies fail us. I think trust has to also be about the subject who is doing the trusting
I conceptualize the act of trusting as a movement away from anxiety. Maybe it’s like faith. Or maybe it’s about trusting myself to cope with whatever may come.
I always find it confusing when someone tells me that they trust me. I wonder…for what. You trust me to what?
I notice in myself, that the issues for which trust is the biggest deal for me—as the subject of the trust sentence—are the issues for which I have personal childhood anxiety. Trust is about me in acceptance, overcoming that anxiety as much as it is about the human object of that trust.
I suspect that trust is a partner emotion— Trust : Anxious
Just as— Brave : Scared
I can only feel brave when I feel scared. Brave partners with scared to help it. Trust : Anxiety :: Brave : Scared
A helper emotion to help me manage the difficult emotion.
Another possibility for trust is we experience trust when there is a lack of certainty. I have found a lot of comfort in “I don’t know.” There’s so much space and opportunity there. Opportunity to ask and learn and grow.
Maybe then the opposite of trusting would be attempting to control.
Perhaps trust is an active belief in the unknown and acceptance of not knowing, with minimum anxiety. That sort of trust is without attachment or expectation. Maybe with this sort of active trust, there is less disappointment because I realize ahead of time that I don’t know and I am not attempting to control it. I am open to unexpected possibilities.
I trust you.
As in…I allow space in my mind for you to do you. I make no attempt to control or confine you. I don’t know exactly what you will do, and I’m okay with that. In fact, maybe, I’m eager and curious to see what you will do.