JUNE 8, 2020
In the end, you have to choose whether or not to trust someone.
-Sophie Kinsella
If you were to be asked what is trust, what would your reply be? You may say it is a feeling of security while being with someone; it is having the confidence to let someone know some of the deepest emotions dear to ourselves. Whatever it is, there is a deeper meaning to trust and when understood, you will trust the right people at the right time…
Trust is not only a feeling, it is a mental state; a mental state we can always have access to when we know that we can safely keep our truth in the hands of others; a mental state we can always access when we are around someone who’s past experiences with us show us that transparency, honesty and belief exist in the relationship with the other person…
A mental state is nothing but the current state of your mind which is based on your environment, the way you talk to yourself, and your physiology. Any changes in your state affect your body and mind in a way that corresponds with your current state. That is why you are happy and you feel your body vibrating with excitement and happiness when you get a big task done or when you receive some great news bringing a positive change to your life. The way you feel in your body because of this is often termed as the ‘sugar rush’ or ‘adrenaline rush’.
You have the control over your mind and so you have control of your mental state. This means that if you deliberately put your body and mind in a different state from what you are in right now, the dis-correspondence between the body, mind and the state will be detected and your mental state will have no option but to switch to the one which corresponds with your body and mind, thus letting you change your state and changing your actions and feelings.
Trust is a mental state and not just a feeling because you don’t just feel trust, you experience trust and you know what it is like even when it is not with you. Trust is something that cannot be done justice by limiting it to a certain definition made up of words. Trust is way beyond words and ironically all needed to know it is, just experiencing it, not understanding a skillful play of words.
One question is left unanswered- if trust is a mental state, then can we change it using our minds and our bodies just like any other state? The answer to this is a YES! I know this might feel preposterous because we often feel that certain people are always trustworthy, while some are never. Then how does our trust change?
The answer is simple. Your trust does change. Carefully observe the following scenario. You are travelling in a bus from Delhi to Jaipur. You reach to your seat and you see that there is a stranger sitting in the seat right next to you. You don’t start a conversation, you are just silent. Then the other person greets you with a “Hello” and you politely reply back. The person next to you has a surreptitious aura to him and you seem to doubt him. You are not feeling very comfortable or relaxed and you have absolutely no reason to doubt that person, but you just can’t get over this hunch of suspicion. You can’t move your attention away from him but concentrate and observe his actions as it gives you a certain, inexplicable anxiety. Halfway through, the bus stops at Alwar and the suspicious person steps down the bus and at that stop, your sister boards the bus and sits next to you. You sigh with relief and you start explaining and letting out all that uncomfortability and anxiety and your sister says, “I am here now, don’t worry and overthink.”
Well, I feel that this kind of a scenario has happened in our lives as well in one context or the other. Trust played a major role here; let’s understand how. You didn’t know this person before so you didn’t have any past experiences to let you know if the person is trustworthy and if you can be comfortable around him. His secretive and absurd actions let you get the chance to observe him and draw a suspicious conclusion about him. As mentioned above, your environment, physiology and self-talk, direct or indirect, have corresponding effects on your mental state, whether it be happiness, trust, sorrow etc. Now, his actions are the environment and what you figure out from them and reflect on is your indirect self-talk. On the basis of this, your mental state of excitement to travel all alone does not correspond with your mind’s thinking and your outside environment. The mind’s thinking makes the body feel a certain way so that is why you feel the anxiety. Now all of this isn’t in correspondence with your state of excitement, so the state changes and becomes scared and suspicious of the person.
Now what happens when you see the person who you know and can trust i.e. your sister? You are in a state of untrustworthiness and doubt mixed with fear and anxiety all supported by your mind, body and environment. As soon as the man leaves and your sister enters, you recognise a person whom you know very well and your past experience suggests that trust is present in your relationship with that person. The mind takes this into account and forms a perception of trust, comfort and reliance. Now that the person sits next to you, your external environment becomes the one of trust and comfort as well. The mind has a direct effect on your body and your anxiety goes away. Now the state of discomfort is not corresponding with the mind, body and environment and because of that you enter the state of trust and explain everything to your sister because you know you can trust her.
This is how trust changes, it is a mere change in people around you that changes your state of trust. This is why you talk about secretive and private things with your trusted ones in a room rather than on a bench in the park.
Trust is not only about secrecy, it is about belief and understanding as well. How can you trust a person who doesn’t listen to you or understand you? Not possible, right? Also, trust is not only a feeling that your secret is secure, trust is an experience that makes you feel secure, happy and content to say the least. Don’t misuse it, because when you misuse someone else’s trust for a meagre gossip and chit chat, you have not only betrayed the other person, but you have betrayed your own dignity, patience and confidence of letting someone else believe you…
Trust is important, trust is security, trust is happiness, trust is comfort of someone else’s presence, trust is subject to change person to person, trust is an experience, and above all, trust is fragile and easy to break, but powerful enough to form long lasting relationships and unbreakable bond and belief in each other…
Don’t take someone else’s trust for granted, because when you do, you have lost the comfort and security you had in the other person too. It is upto you to decide what is more important, spilling teas for passing the time or building life-long bonds available to you in every moment of both happiness and distress…