Trust. It’s a powerful word. For some people, it seems to come naturally. But for many of us who have come from poverty, dysfunction, abuse, and/or addiction, it may be like a foreign language to us. When we add our own addictions, as well as the consequences of them, then it may seem like climbing Mount Everest to even think that we could ever trust anyone. How can we ever trust family, trust friends, or trust ourselves?
However, when we choose recovery, we learn that there are a lot of things we can do that we never thought possible. Finding trust in ourselves and those around us is just one of the many blessings we learn when we do the work to build a new life. These are some steps we can take to find trust in our lives:
1) Surrender
The first step is to surrender. Let go of everything we thought we knew, all of the things we learned with our dysfunctional relationships, and all of the judgments we have been holding onto about ourselves. We might even physically and symbolically step away from the trauma of not trusting others, not trusting ourselves.
We can also pray or meditate and wash our minds clean of the thought processes surrounding trust. We can ask for strength to have an open mind about our future. That as we are making so many changes in our lives, we can have the power to impact our relationships, too, and that we will find people we can trust and depend upon.
2) Forgive
The next step is to forgive. We need to forgive those who have broken our trust. We need to forgive ourselves for any perceived faults for our trusting in them. Just forgive, letting go of the pain and embarrassment or whatever else we are attaching to broken trust.
Most importantly, we need to forgive ourselves for not being able to trust ourselves. Where have we made choices that made us untrustworthy, either to ourselves or others? We need to acknowledge our mistakes and then forgive ourselves for them. We can trust ourselves again because we are making new choices. And we can forgive ourselves for whatever has happened in the past.
3) Forget
It is one thing to forgive, but it is another to truly forget. Erasing the past is hard to do when we have so much pain and trauma attached to it. But if we are truly going to be able to trust again, then we need to cleanse our minds of everything and everyone that has broken our trust in the past. All of those decisions that others made that hurt us. All of the people who didn’t show up for us. All of the choices we made that damaged our own trust in our selves or others’ trust in us. We need to take a big eraser and wipe the slate clean.
Part of forgetting is also to remember to stay in the present. When we are anchored in the here and now, focused on the choices and people in front of us, we are more prepared to leave the past in the past and to be able to trust. Here. Now.
4) Take a Chance
The scariest part of finding trust is to take a chance and trust someone again. This can seem insurmountable. If it is not working, then we probably need to go back through the first three steps and see what we are hanging on to still.
The telling part will be when we notice that we are actually already trusting. We are trusting in our facility or outpatient program to help us heal. We are trusting in the people around us by confiding in them and sharing our stories. We are trusting in ourselves by staying, and by showing up and working every day in our recovery. With these skills in place, we are more prepared to take a chance on ourselves and others in our lives and trust.
5) Reward Faith
To trust in ourselves or others requires faith. We must believe that trust will be fulfilled, and we must be willing to put our trust out there, risking failure. Having lived with failed trust, that of ourselves or others, we of all people should be able to acknowledge and reward faith.
When someone keeps our trust, we can thank them for being trustworthy. Not only will it help them to feel validated for being trusted, but it will help us to remember that our trust has been rewarded, too. The same goes for when we keep our own trust, by making a good choice or fulfilling an assignment. We can acknowledge that we are worthy of trust. This will help heal and reinforce the positive choices we have worked so hard to implement in our lives.
Learning to find trust is part of healing ourselves. Regardless of our past, we can learn new ways of living, including trust in ourselves and others. If we are willing to take these steps, we can learn to trust. That empowers us to build new relationships with others and to be confident in our own choices and believe in ourselves again. To begin recovery and learn to trust, call us today at (805) 719-7954 and speak to one of our admissions experts.
