Building Trust - Starting With Yourself

The most important person you can trust is yourself! Do you trust your self? Do you trust other people? Do you start with the belief that people can be trusted - or with the belief that people aren't to be trusted?

These are questions we ask people as part of our work. Usually the answers are - "Yes, I trust myself", and "Yes, I believe people can be trusted." Predictable answers - most of us really believe that we have a high level of trust in ourselves and in our fellow man. After all, every day we hit the highways we trust our fellow travelers to drive safely. When we dine at a restauant, we trust the food preparation was done safely. We trust our bank to handle our money according to our instructions. We trust the teachers of our children to be competent and diligent in developing the young minds entrusted to them. That kind of institutional trust is essential to our being able to function on a day to day basis in our society. Only when some event creates mistrust - an accident, food poisoning, embezzlement, a failed course, do we question this kind of trust.

But there is a far more important form of trust -

It's the kind of trust that results in success or failure in our lives. It starts with how trustful we are of ourselves. It starts with keeping the promises or commitments or resolutions we make to ourselves. If we have a problem with keeping promises to ourselves, we will transfer that lack of trust to our beliefs in other people. Put simply, if we can't trust ourselves, we won't be able to trust others. Why? Because every one of us assumes that others act and think and feel the way we act and think and feel. It's a bad assumption - but a human one.

So how do we develop trust in others? First, we start by developing trust in ourselves. We start by keeping the promises we make to ourselves. Many people set themselves up for failure by making too many or too agressive promises to themselves. Take New Year's resolutions as an example. Realize that every unkept promise we make to ourselves corrodes our feelings of trust in ourselves - and how can we possibly trust others if we don't trust ourselves?

Second, we gain trust in others by starting with a clean slate - training ourselves to remember that other people are different than we are - and to not assume our behavior is the same as their's.

It's impossible to gain leverage in life through other people if you lack trust in others. It's impossible to reach your goals - assuming your goals are lofty ones, without the help and trust in others. How do you get that trust? You start by developing trust in yourself. Start today - now - don't wait!

Written by Andy Cox, President

Cox Consulting Group LLC, 4049 E Vista Drive, Phoenix, AZ 85032 Ph: 602-795-4100; Fax: 602-795-4800; E Mail: andycox@coxconsultgroup.com. Website; www.coxconsultgroup.com

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