Trust Issues -
Apr. 23rd, 2007 02:46 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
kyburgAlec Baldwin Sorry For Being A Total ASSHOLE.
God, I wish I had a Reuters link for this story - and in all truth, it's useless information outside of being a good example of Behavior I Won't Tolerate. I could go all snarky on the issues this guys brings to the table in living color - the displacement of blame, the lack of boundaries for appropriate expression of anger - but why. The only thing he's sorry about is that someone else heard what an ass he was to his own kid - and he got caught doing it. Oh, I trust him. BAH.
He's just given me a nice seque into what I really want to discuss about it.
Let's talk about trust issues.
What makes you lose trust with me, and can you ever get it back?
I had to stop and think about this one a bit this morning - because while I'll rate the average Joe on the street as a 7 in terms of trust, walking in the door (on a scale of 1 to 10, 10 being myself and Jim and y'all fall behind us) - you do something to tweak my bullshit meter (and it doesn't take all that much, I'm finding), and it drops below 3 very quickly.
Does it ever come back?
I had to think for a moment if I could name one instance when it did. Because, well - the list has grown some over the past couple of years - and in such a fashion that borders on alarming. Am I getting pickier in my old age? More prickly? More experienced? Or am I just picking up where Cliff left off - he didn't trust anyone. Me, most of the time - and remembering, I should have been scared at how much he trusted me. I earned it, sure - but he forced it to the nth degree.
The rest of the world only got the game face. And never knew the difference.
For me, there are two ways to really blow it. Make me mad, or lie to me. Do the two always go together? Actually, no. Compulsive, habitual liars don't anger me much - you can't get mad at a dog for being a dog, as they say. You just don't get much more than the game face from me - and you don't get more than a burger when you're hungry and show up on my doorstep. "Make me mad" covers so much more ground, it defies description. I don't have much of an appreciation for anger for its own sake; get me truly angry, and you're not likely going to hear anything. And in all honesty, I can deal with anyone on a 'game face' basis - but I probably won't let you get too close again. I really hate getting angry, too - does that make sense? I might even hold a grudge - I'll admit it - for that reason alone. Rational? Not very.
Do I ever get over being lied to? Most of the time - no. I had to think about this one for a while, because I couldn't remember the last time I did. Not at once.
Oops and make a mistake, okay. But if I find a pattern of dishonesty that goes over decades, deals with subjects that are very intensely personal, emotionally attached - and worse, when the liar has used someone's innate trust and good nature to make it all work - not okay. REALLY not okay.
You make a habit of being late to everything - I'll just factor it in and "lie" back to you about start times. Watch for it.
But does trust ever come back, even when it's been over decades, yadda ya?
I have this younger brother. The one who dropped out of high school, moved out of the house when he was 16 - and stole every space bit of change left around, forged checks, bobbled in an out of Mom's house, lost jobs and ended up in jail about ten years ago on a felony shoplifting charge. He's 45 now, I think. He's also the one who lives with my mother and is her primary caregiver.
And I'm totally fine with it.
He's also the one who was using from age 11 - and went into recovery 10 years ago. (Drugs of choice were pot and meth.)
How long did it take me to trust him again?
When he was incarcerated, I didn't take calls from him. I did not visit him when he moved to a recovery program after release. I sent things that everyone in the program could use - but I didn't send letters, make phone calls or have much contact at all.
It took years. Without him asking once for my trust back. He knew that whether he ever got it again was up to me - not him proving a damn thing to me to earn it. On my part, I wanted to see what he was going to do.
He had to be - just BE - someone I could trust. He had to work his program, stay clean and take care of himself. Without blaming anyone else, grandstanding or meeting any kind of expectations I would put to him. What I wanted didn't matter much - he had to take care of himself first, and anything after that was gravy. I was good with that.
And he took responsibility for everything he had done - he knows what he did, he'll very clearly tell you about it and tell you just what he thinks of it. He'll also tell you what he can't do - up front. The list has gotten shorter over the years, but I have to admire him for having the self-knowledge to know what his limits are. That confidence has grown over the past few years - to the point these days, if you bop around NA very long, you'll likely run into him.
He just keeps getting better.
But it's been ten years. Mom's been compromised since the heart attack, oh - six years ago now? He really stuck the landing with the cancer surgery and recovery, I have to admit. That's a little over two years ago now.
Today, I could likely tell him anything and not worry about it.
Jim brought a number of people into my life - family, friends and since then, people he works with and friends we've both made. Jim, for all his grinching? He's the easy one. He also brought an older brother, a father and a step-mother I won't allow in the house anymore. Oh, I could do the family things, if necessary. Outside my home. Smile and nod and all that. Family 'ties' require that sort of thing - very rarely do you have as much in common with family you barely deal with than your friends, after all. Friction is something you just take on as a given.
Jim would likely let them in before I would, and I've said as much. Mess with me is one thing - mess with my eternal optimist, my White Hatted Good Guy - where he least expects it. Slid under the door, wheedled with promises of what he really wants the most - I've seen it. Lied, bald-faced, to get what they wanted out him. Hello, make me mad and lie to me in one neat, tidy package.
And I don't see the changes happening I did with brother - not even the beginnings of it. Boy, it would be nice if I did.
But even then, it would take years - and it might happen. It might not - even then.
Because the history is there - and if they were capable of it once, they could be capable of it again. The bar has been set.
This warrants further pondering.
God, I wish I had a Reuters link for this story - and in all truth, it's useless information outside of being a good example of Behavior I Won't Tolerate. I could go all snarky on the issues this guys brings to the table in living color - the displacement of blame, the lack of boundaries for appropriate expression of anger - but why. The only thing he's sorry about is that someone else heard what an ass he was to his own kid - and he got caught doing it. Oh, I trust him. BAH.
He's just given me a nice seque into what I really want to discuss about it.
Let's talk about trust issues.
What makes you lose trust with me, and can you ever get it back?
I had to stop and think about this one a bit this morning - because while I'll rate the average Joe on the street as a 7 in terms of trust, walking in the door (on a scale of 1 to 10, 10 being myself and Jim and y'all fall behind us) - you do something to tweak my bullshit meter (and it doesn't take all that much, I'm finding), and it drops below 3 very quickly.
Does it ever come back?
I had to think for a moment if I could name one instance when it did. Because, well - the list has grown some over the past couple of years - and in such a fashion that borders on alarming. Am I getting pickier in my old age? More prickly? More experienced? Or am I just picking up where Cliff left off - he didn't trust anyone. Me, most of the time - and remembering, I should have been scared at how much he trusted me. I earned it, sure - but he forced it to the nth degree.
The rest of the world only got the game face. And never knew the difference.
For me, there are two ways to really blow it. Make me mad, or lie to me. Do the two always go together? Actually, no. Compulsive, habitual liars don't anger me much - you can't get mad at a dog for being a dog, as they say. You just don't get much more than the game face from me - and you don't get more than a burger when you're hungry and show up on my doorstep. "Make me mad" covers so much more ground, it defies description. I don't have much of an appreciation for anger for its own sake; get me truly angry, and you're not likely going to hear anything. And in all honesty, I can deal with anyone on a 'game face' basis - but I probably won't let you get too close again. I really hate getting angry, too - does that make sense? I might even hold a grudge - I'll admit it - for that reason alone. Rational? Not very.
Do I ever get over being lied to? Most of the time - no. I had to think about this one for a while, because I couldn't remember the last time I did. Not at once.
Oops and make a mistake, okay. But if I find a pattern of dishonesty that goes over decades, deals with subjects that are very intensely personal, emotionally attached - and worse, when the liar has used someone's innate trust and good nature to make it all work - not okay. REALLY not okay.
You make a habit of being late to everything - I'll just factor it in and "lie" back to you about start times. Watch for it.
But does trust ever come back, even when it's been over decades, yadda ya?
I have this younger brother. The one who dropped out of high school, moved out of the house when he was 16 - and stole every space bit of change left around, forged checks, bobbled in an out of Mom's house, lost jobs and ended up in jail about ten years ago on a felony shoplifting charge. He's 45 now, I think. He's also the one who lives with my mother and is her primary caregiver.
And I'm totally fine with it.
He's also the one who was using from age 11 - and went into recovery 10 years ago. (Drugs of choice were pot and meth.)
How long did it take me to trust him again?
When he was incarcerated, I didn't take calls from him. I did not visit him when he moved to a recovery program after release. I sent things that everyone in the program could use - but I didn't send letters, make phone calls or have much contact at all.
It took years. Without him asking once for my trust back. He knew that whether he ever got it again was up to me - not him proving a damn thing to me to earn it. On my part, I wanted to see what he was going to do.
He had to be - just BE - someone I could trust. He had to work his program, stay clean and take care of himself. Without blaming anyone else, grandstanding or meeting any kind of expectations I would put to him. What I wanted didn't matter much - he had to take care of himself first, and anything after that was gravy. I was good with that.
And he took responsibility for everything he had done - he knows what he did, he'll very clearly tell you about it and tell you just what he thinks of it. He'll also tell you what he can't do - up front. The list has gotten shorter over the years, but I have to admire him for having the self-knowledge to know what his limits are. That confidence has grown over the past few years - to the point these days, if you bop around NA very long, you'll likely run into him.
He just keeps getting better.
But it's been ten years. Mom's been compromised since the heart attack, oh - six years ago now? He really stuck the landing with the cancer surgery and recovery, I have to admit. That's a little over two years ago now.
Today, I could likely tell him anything and not worry about it.
Jim brought a number of people into my life - family, friends and since then, people he works with and friends we've both made. Jim, for all his grinching? He's the easy one. He also brought an older brother, a father and a step-mother I won't allow in the house anymore. Oh, I could do the family things, if necessary. Outside my home. Smile and nod and all that. Family 'ties' require that sort of thing - very rarely do you have as much in common with family you barely deal with than your friends, after all. Friction is something you just take on as a given.
Jim would likely let them in before I would, and I've said as much. Mess with me is one thing - mess with my eternal optimist, my White Hatted Good Guy - where he least expects it. Slid under the door, wheedled with promises of what he really wants the most - I've seen it. Lied, bald-faced, to get what they wanted out him. Hello, make me mad and lie to me in one neat, tidy package.
And I don't see the changes happening I did with brother - not even the beginnings of it. Boy, it would be nice if I did.
But even then, it would take years - and it might happen. It might not - even then.
Because the history is there - and if they were capable of it once, they could be capable of it again. The bar has been set.
This warrants further pondering.
