A YOGI CHA BLOG

What is trust?

One way of defining it can be “a feeling that we are secure with someone”.

That they have our best interest at heart.

We can be sure that they have our best interest at heart when we feel that we belong to them. So the essence of trust is the feeling of belonging. If we are the same, you cannot hurt me without hurting yourself.

To trust someone means to lay down our weapons and to show ourselves naked and flawed, knowing that the other will not use it to harm us.

Let’s start from a broader view. If we would trust the earth, if we would trust nature, we would feel like we belong there. We would not feel lost in the middle of the forest and scared of insects. If we would feel like nature and the other animals belonged to us, in the sense that family belongs, would we treat them like we do?

The world wouldn’t look the way it does today if trust was something we all had. We would not feel the need to separate ourselves from other people either: colour, gender, beliefs…

Einstein said that the most important question we had to ask ourselves is if we find the universe a friendly place or not. He continued by saying that if we decide it’s not a friendly place, we would use our technology and science to create safety and power over it by building walls to protect ourselves. It would be a place where technology would be so powerful that we would either isolate completely from the rest of the world or finally destroy ourselves.

So starting from the idea that trust is not something that comes natural to us, how do we feel safe with other people?

To feel that I belong to you, that belonging also need to be a safe kind.

That means : I must not have the instruction to need to be different than who I am in order to belong to you.

By that I mean, I need to be able to have YOU and to have myself TOO. At the same time.

I need to feel that you will take me on, I will belong to you, flaws and imperfections included.

This is where it becomes a little tricky for us. Because that is basically the definition of unconditional love. And most of us have never experienced that. 

We have experienced “I love you, if you …”. There were conditions and sometimes pretty heavy ones, that came along with the feeling of belonging.

Imagine something as simple as an overly anxious parent. A mother hen.

As a child you knew that to belong, you might have to let go of whatever you actually want to be that does not go with her ideas of what is good for you. So you learn that it’s not easy to have someone else and also have you later in life.

Or the overly busy dad. To get his attention, to feel that you belong, you might have to manipulate yourself and be the super cheery, always happy with whatever you are given. Or on the contrary; always be difficult so that at least you were seen.

So trust can be an issue for sure.

How much do you feel like your own body belongs to you? Or do you treat it like an object?

When you are not feeling in the mood, will you still push yourself to train or go and do things “just because”?

Because otherwise I’m not good enough..?

If you have ever experienced that feeling, it means that you might not trust yourself. As if being you isn’t good enough. Not worthy. 

So we need to start with looking in the mirror. What is the story that I tell myself? What narrative makes up the idea of who I am? 

The work starts from THOUGHT. 

It starts with questioning if the thoughts in your head are actually valid.

The thoughts will rarely disappear fully, but I can learn to not trust them.The thoughts of unworthiness that comes to be when I distrust myself: they won’t disappear, what I have to learn to see is that those thoughts don’t define me.

When it comes to other people and trust:

the idea of trust here lies in trusting someone that you cannot control. So the fear of the trust [ read THOUGHTS OF DISTRUST] comes because you cannot then control that they won’t do something that will hurt you. The way that we can “trust” someones else then is by putting less importance in their actions.

I’d say that it’s what it REALLY means when we say “be the bigger person”.

Because that expression doesn’t mean to be holier than thou or patronising. It means, don’t be so dramatic in what their actions mean. Come back to what is true and that is your space of safety, your presence.

Here is the link: I can choose to not trust the other and therefore be on my guard. I will then react to whatever they do, I might even drive them to do things or make myself sure of it at least which mean I stay in my starting blocks without actually trying my wings to see if I can fly. I stay therefore in my perception and nothing changes. If I would decide to do the opposite: to trust and fall straight out into open air (ie making yourself vulnerable), it takes courage. Sounds good, how do you get that courage?

Courage can come to you when you realise that you can never lose yourself.

That you can give in abundance because you can never give too much

That other people’s action do not define you. It defines them.