Trust and honesty -or- Help soulmurk understand

In My Humble Opinion
1

Something I’ve been wrestling with for a long while and thought I might just throw it out to the masses to see what, if any, response I get.

I’m curious about trust. To be more specific, trust within a healthy relationship.

Without boring anyone with the sordid details of my past, I’ll sum it up by saying that most everyone I’ve ever come to care for has betrayed my trust in one way or another, leaving more than a few emotional scars. While this is surely not a unique occurrance, everyone handles it differently and in my case I’m left with the challenge of learning to come to trust anyone in any capacity.

Because of my experiences I have become an extremely private and (many would say) paranoid person. I take extra and seemingly unnecessary precautions to safeguard my home and possessions as well as my person and feelings.

My problem lies in personal relationships. They seem to follow one of two patterns, neither of them good.

I either A) become involved with someone that I know full well will only hurt me and hate myself for not being able to prevent the relationship from forming to begin with, or more rarely B) find someone that I realize is actually good for me and is worthy of trust and fall into the ironic circumstance of pushing them away by holding them too tightly for fear of losing them.

I’m not asking for a psychoanalysis, I’m more than aware of the roles my low self-esteem and confidence and fear of betrayal play in my becoming jealous because I see threat from every direction, but rather how others have come to terms with or learned to deal with similar problems.

My most recent fateful relationship has just recently ended badly and frankly I’m losing what little faith in trust that I did have. I knew well enough that the girl was trouble from the beginning, but that doesn’t make me feel any better to have been betrayed so. If anything I feel worse for, once again, allowing it to happen rather than remaining alone.

In a similar vein, I’m as honest a person as you’ll find and I believe in open communication, particularly in a relationship. At times it gets me into trouble because I’m not usually one to sugarcoat things. I would much rather be told the honest truth as it is than have my feelings spared and I treat others as I expect to be treated. That isn’t to say I’m a heartless bastard that purposefully hurts people, just that, for example, if I don’t like your cooking I won’t lie and tell you how great it is, but instead suggest using more rosemary or sage or something next time.

This honesty seems to cause more problems in relationships than it resolves, quite ironically considering I try to be as honest as possible to avoid misunderstandings and miscommunications, and I’m at a complete loss about this. I can’t just not be honest.

It seems to me that the lesson I’m supposed to be learning is that I should be less honest and more trusting, but that just doesn’t sit right with me. Aside from the fact that the two lessons seem contradictory, lying to someone and trusting them more, they just plain go against what the mean old world has taught me.

Any thoughts or suggestions? I put it to you Teeming Masses.

2

First, the good ol’ standby link (which thread it originally came from I still think should just be stickied).

Aside from that, honesty bits: Taking you at your word that you’re not heartless about it (some people don’t grasp there’s a difference between not sugarcoating things, and not using truth as a fist) it seems to me that those honesty problems are probably connected with your own observation of issues with getting involved with people you know full well are going to be bad news. I.e., Type Bad News folks tend not to receive loving honesty very well–it’s one of their defining characteristics, I think. But the non-Bad News types will start to react badly to any honesty if they perceive you’re driving them away in other ways–trust-paranoia and whatnot.

There aren’t easy answers. But simply be mindful that each new relationship is in fact new. What has happened with other relationshps, it has no part of. What person X did has no bearing on new person Y. If person Y really seems, on mindful contemplation, to share many of the same traits as person X, things are apt to go badly again–this fits in with ceasing to start things up, or continue them, with Bad News people. That’s hard–bad habits are always hard to break, and especially so when they’re bad habits that tie into matters of the heart. But like any bad habit, the way to break it is to, each time the urge to indulge in it arises, not to do it. Keep not doing it, and eventually the strength of the urge dwindles to more manageable levels–over a long enough timespan of refusing to indulge, it becomes a bad memory.

Good luck.

3

My hubby is a lot like this. It makes a lot of people think he’s an asshole, but I adore him for it! I grew up in a household that was all about head games, and not rocking the boat. For instance, if I asked my Mom if I could spend the night at a friends’ house, she’d probably say “Fine”. I never knew if she meant, “I don’t really want you to, but go ahead and do it, and I won’t speak to you for three days”, or “Fine. Go ahead”. When hubby says something is fine, or nothing is wrong, I believe him. And when something I cook needs more rosemary or sage or some such, he’ll tell me. Likewise, if something I cook is really great, he’ll tell me that, too.

Sounds to me like you’ve developed some really self-destructive habits somewhere along the line. These things, IME, usually, though not always, go back to childhood. Have you considered therapy? I had a sucky childhood, and had to do lots of work on myself before I could have a healthy relationship like I have with my husband of 15 years.

Best of luck!

4

Well, as Drastic said, there are intermediate stages, between sugarcoating and hammering someone. I’ve had the same problem you describe, at various times in my life. The trick is not to sugarcoat the truth, but to learn to sweeten it. Just as you may not care for a dish that’s served with too little seasoning, the truth can be served bitterly or sweetly. It’s still the truth. Most people prefer it on the sweet side, especially in the early stages of a relationship.

You don’t have to say “This sucks! Where’s the rosemary?”. You could say “This is pretty good. I think, maybe, a little more rosemary would make it even better.” Same basic message; two completely different impressions. The first is likely to result in you wearing her wine; the latter is likely to be taken as constructive and even helpful.

As for trust, I second Drastic’s advice, again. The new person is not the one who gave you those scars. I’ve got plenty of those, myself, but you can’t blame everyone you meet for them. If you tend to fall to quickly for women, as I do, you have to either live with it or learn not to do that. Guard yourself, and shield your heart; don’t let it go leaping off the cliff at the drop of a hat. Use that truth hammer on yourself, if necessary, to keep fantasy from overriding reality. Get to know the woman well, before loweing all your shields. It’s not an easy thing to learn, if it doesn’t come naturally to you, but it can be done. I’ve also found that it’s a lesson that needs to be relearned, periodically.

If you have a history of falling for women of a certain type, who always end up hurting you, well you obviously recognize them, so stop doing it. Don’t approach them. Don’t fall for their approaches. Think about what you’re doing. Use some of that brutal honesty on yourself. It may hurt, briefly, but it doesn’t leave a scar.

These are two separate, but related, issues, and they’re both tough challenges. You’re to be commended for tackling them, but don’t kid yourself. It’s going to be tough going to deal with both, at the same time. So, cut yourself a little slack, if you don’t achieve total success, right off the bat. But, don’t let up. You can do it.

5

Thank you for your thoughtful replies. I’d like to respond to each suggestion line by line, but I realize that by doing so I’ll seem (and probably be) defensive and make you all think I’m ungrateful, which I’m not.

I’ve considered therapy in the past and have been seriously considering it again recently. It’s a big step (for me at least) to admit that I’m not strong enough to handle things on my own and that I’d need help. I’m not sure I’m at that point just yet, but I’m definitely closer than I’ve ever been. It would also most assuredly be an extensively long process because it will likely take me a very long time to find a therapist I’m comfortable with and even longer to trust them well enough to actually get to the heart of things. Of course, it’s not like things are speedily getting better now…

Since everyone touched on the honesty I’ll clarify a little. I’m not an asshole about it generally. I can be, but who isn’t at times? I don’t try to be, especially with the people that are closest to me. But, perhaps I don’t sweeten it up as much as I could. I really do try to treat everyone as I would expect to be treated. Despite my efforts to lighten it up some, I guess I should assume that most people don’t have as naturally thick skin as I do and should try lightening it up even more.

Davebear, I do have a tendency to fall too quickly. It’s another reason that I try to remain guarded, however finding the right balance of trust in a budding relationship proves beyond me. I can’t rightfully expect a girl to open up to me if I remain closed to her. You rightfully speak the obvious when you say I should just stop falling for certain women (it’s funny how painfully obvious it is to everyone else, I’ve shaken my head at friends doing similar things and here I am with all my friends probably shaking their heads at me), but not all women can be immediatly classified as the Good kind or the Bad kind. In getting to know them and finding out who and what they are it’s necessary to open myself to them and show a certain level of trust, if I expect the same in return. This is where I get into trouble and I can’t imagine I’m alone in that respect.

6

Maybe if you stopped thinking of it as a weakness to ask for help, you would feel better about it. IME, a therapist is most useful as a sounding board. My therapist has never given me answers, she’s only helped me discover the answers that are already within me.

7

soulmurk, I do understand something of where you are coming from. I have two fairly similar issues to sort out for myself, and I am really pleased to be making some headway.

Where you wrestle with the issue of truth vis-a-vis tact, I have a knee-jerk reaction with the cutting humour or sarcasm. I get a little uncomfortable, and this bitch comes out of my mouth and says the funniest things. She is terribly funny, but I don’t like her much, because I have seen the looks on people’s faces after she surfaces and goes away. I’m getting better at being nice-funny, which I have discovered sort of keeps the bitch at arms-length. Work in progress.

Where you wrestle with trust, I do too. I chose a series of destructive guys, and I am TIRED of them. Cannot believe I let myself down so badly, so often. That self-disgust kept me single and celibate for well over a year, until recently, when I realized I’m not mad at me anymore. I was introduced to someone whose attitude to truth is like yours: Tell is like it is, and suck it up. He is a complete refreshment to me, no guessing where I stand with him, no beating around the bush. And we both have our reasons for keeping the “getting-to-know-you” stage light and easy, both have baggage to negotiate. I don’t have to trust him with the weight of my world any time soon, but I am getting the chance to “learn him” before I have to decide. (Refer back to point #1 in Drastic’s link.)

My words to you, then, are to maybe take some time away from relationships, until you get the major one with yourself worked out. You will find that, once you start trusting your own judgement, it is easier to trust someone else. And keep on coming back to us. We like ya. We would like you to like ya, too.:wink:

8

*Since everyone touched on the honesty I’ll clarify a little. I’m not an asshole about it generally. I can be, but who isn’t at times? I don’t try to be, especially with the people that are closest to me. But, perhaps I don’t sweeten it up as much as I could. I really do try to treat everyone as I would expect to be treated. Despite my efforts to lighten it up some, I guess I should assume that most people don’t have as naturally thick skin as I do and should try lightening it up even more. *

This thread could use a healthy dose of cynicism…

soulmurk, I think that you should assume that most people are shallow twits who want to be lied to and told exactly what they want to hear, in a flattering manner no less, rather than being told the truth bluntly. While this is not universally true, it’s true much more of the time than the other side of the coin: that people are basically secure in their self-images and can take honest criticism as it is intended - as an attempt to be completely open and truthful.

Given that you accept this state of affairs, and that you don’t want to be bluntly honest any more, you have two choices:

A) Become a weasel-tongued flatterer who lies his ass off and always tells people want they want to hear, no matter how stupid and wrong it is. (As a consequence, you will become VERY popular. Especially among very shallow people who need constant reassurance that they’re beautiful, intelligent, the best of the breed, etc…)

B) If you don’t have anything nice to say, don’t say anything. (As a consequence, people will whine about how “quiet” and “anti-social” you are. Because, after all, being quiet and not talking much is such a terrible, horrible, downright evil way to be. If you don’t natter mindlessly at all times, you are a BAD PERSON.)
Personally, I never even considered A, and I got tired of B and long time ago. So what I did was started looking for people who had a similiar attitude that I did: That’s it’s a privledge to have friends who respect you enough to be honest with you all the time, and that you return the respect by doing the same for them. It took me about five years to find these people, and there are basically only three of them, though most of the people I know “get it” to some degree or another. It’s not an easy thing, but it’s had an amazing number of rewards. Remember that there are a lot of stupid people in the world, and you have absolutely no obligation to hang out with any of them.
As for your relationship problems, I can’t really help you there as I’m still going through the same kind of thing myself. The best advice I ever got was something that a friend of mine parroted back at me. We were talking about this guy she liked and she was like, “But I know he’s bad for me.” And right there, I was like - “You know, you have good instincts, you just need to learn to listen to them.” And about a week later, as the laws of irony dictate, I was talking to her about a relationship of mine that was in the failure stages, and I was like, “You know, I knew she was bad for me, and even with that foreknowledge, I went ahead and tried it anyway. And now it’s all bad, and it’s going to end in flaming wreckage.” And she said, with a wicked grin, “Well, you have good instincts, you just need to learn to listen to them.” I’m not saying don’t date people if they have one or two little things that don’t seem quite right. Nobody’s perfect. I’m just saying, if you can straight up totally tell beforehand that this is one of those women who’s really bad for you, maybe you should tell her so, explain the reasons why, and refuse to date her. If she’s really screwed up, this will probably make her want to date you even more. Screwed up chicks are funny that way.

As for a possible strategy for hanging onto the good relationships, you say you drive people away by holding them too tightly. It may help to remind yourself always that that other people are basically beyond your control. They have no obligation to you, and you have none to them. If they hang out with you, date you, whatever, they do it by their own free choice. You can’t make them do anything, and you can’t change them. You can influence them a little bit, maybe give them a push in the direction of something they already want, but you can’t make them do what you want if they don’t want to do it anyway already. Also remember that while you (and only you) know what’s right for you, other people’s lives are different than yours, and your truths, attitudes, or opinions may not work for them. Try and respect their right to live their lives the way they want to, even if you disagree. And assume that they will do the same.

On a similiar note, Manda Jo posted a decent list of rules for relationships a while back:

http://www.kaosol.net/~mackys/irreg/content/2003-04/Tips.html

The last piece of meaningless and useless advice I have for you is to “know thyself.” Know what you’re like and know how other people react to it. Understand the consequences of your actions before you take them. And by this I do not mean that you should become a little goody two-shoes. Quite the opposite. It can be a great deal of fun to go into a situation with a person you hate and never want to see again, and with malice aforethought, verbally tear into them so hard that they practically walk out limping. But it’s very important that you knew beforehand that you wanted things to turn out that way, not that they turned out that way by accident or coincidence. Oh yes, and if you intentionally offend someone (and boy are there a few people out there who sometimes deserve it), be prepared for other people to call you an asshole. Hell, occasionally they may even be correct.
-Ben

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I had no idea Manda Jo’s post was republished in Teemings! My bad - shoulda clicked on all the links in the thread before posting.
-Ben

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I’ve tried 3 times to start a post and I guess what it all my typing boils down to is that I’ve got a lot to chew over.

I appreciate everyone’s advice and I thank you all for taking the time to offer it. I’m going to look into seeing a therapist and I’m going to try and take some time for myself.

Unless anyone else out there is gaining from this thread I guess it’ll just die a quick death.

Thanks again.

11

soulmurk, what sort of trust issues are you talking about? trust is a word that it so overused that it prety soon becomes meaningless.

One thing I am concerned about–though I do’nt know if it is the case in your situation–is when people use trust to mean “perfect understanding” or “selfless devotion”. I hear people say things like “I thought I could trust him/her, but then he/she just walked away when I was depressed”, or “then he/she wanted me to get a better job” or even “then he/she dumped me.” These are not trust issues. Trust involves 1. breaking a specific promise (i.e. “I won’t sleep with anyone else”, not “I’ll be good to you” or “I’ll go to the grocery store after work”) 2. exposing a confidence, or 3. lying. If these are not what these girls are doing, what’s going on is not a trust issue.

Furthermore, while trust is, of course, important in a relationship, but it can’t be everything. In my experience, a relationship is healthier if both people are independent enough that they are not totally vunerable to a breach of trust: for example, if my husband cheated on me, I would be devestated, but I know I would get over it–though it would take a few years and much pain. Being so concerned with trust so early in each relationship suggests to me that you need to focus on being really content in yourself. When you are, you don’t need to trust a girl right from the beginning–the fact that you know you could walk away if you decided you needed to gives you the luxury to get to know her slowly and give trust only after you have seen her in a variety of situations–and it gives her that same luxury, as well.

As far as honesty goes–I love a straightforward, honest person. I’m a straightforward, honest person. However, we both need to remember that the other way–the polite way–is no better or worse a social system, just different. It’s like bowing vs. shaking hands vs. air kisses. Now, you don’t have to change your customs just because other people are using a different formula, but it’s polite to recognize when someone else has a different system and try and be sensitive to their system. You want to spend the rest of your life with someone like you–and we do exisit–but when in Rome, do as the Romans do–if you are in a social situation where everyone understands the unstated rules of being kind first and honest second, you are not being any better, wiser, or more profound than them when you insist on ignoring their customs to demonstrate your own.

Furthermore, if you want to be honest about the bad shit, you have to take the time to mention the good shit. People can swallow a lot if insults if they come in a 2:1 ratio to compliments. There exisits a type of asshole who can be bothered to be brutally honest about what he doesn’t like, but can’t take the time to mention the shit he does like. Take pains not to be this type of asshole. Always try and be awsare of how many nice things you are saying. And if you don’t like twice as many things as you dislike, why are you there at all?

12

By trust I mean simple trust. Honesty, loyalty, and a commitment to follow through with promises.

I don’t expect selfless devotion or perfect understanding. I do believe that perfect understanding can be reached through open and honest communication, but I don’t expect it. Anymore at least. The trustworthiness I expect is of the honest sort.

If I enter a loving relationship with someone (I do so hate to give boyfriend/girlfriend labels), I expect the other person to be honest. Not openly honest about every skeleton in their closet necessarily, but honest about their commitment to me and the relationship and trustworthy when we are independant of one another. I expect my trust to not be abused, misused, or used against me.

I don’t think that these are unique or impossible things to ask of someone, and I do try my best to live up to the standards with which I hold others. I understand that not every one is capable of complete honesty and I’ve learned to accept that, but lying is unacceptable and, to me, an irreparable breach of trust.

It’s not that I put such a heavy emphasis on it so early in a relationship but that I’m always so continually worried about being hurt that perhaps it does rear its head a little early. It’s part of my defensive posturing and guarded nature and that seems to be where I need to find more social balance.

I feel like I’m defending myself here and I know that that is a sure sign of denial, so I’ll stop talking now and think on it all further.