Friday
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People are complicated.
I trust people to the degrees that I know them. It’s not an on/off sort of thing. It’s much more like a sound board with dozens of levels. The areas I’ve seen them in action? Have numbers attached. The ones I haven’t? Don’t. So Jane & Joe’s “boards” may look like this
Joe’s = 9 0 0 0 -4 2 4 4 9 0 5 2 1 1 7 0 6 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 6 0 0 -8
Jane = 0 0 0 0 0 6 0 0 0 0 2 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 9
Clearly, I know Joe a lot better than I know Jane. He has a lot more areas of established trust. But you see that -8 & +9 as the last number? Let’s say that’s how much I trust them with my kid. Joe? No way in hell. I not only don’t trust them, but mistrust them. Jane? Absolutely. Which would make total sense if Joe is a colleague -and I hate their parenting style- so don’t want him within a mile of my kid, meanwhile Jane is my kid’s preschool teacher, and I loooooooove having her in my kid’s life. Looking at the 9 & 0 That are the first numbers? That may be how much I trust them with my life. Joe may have my back day in and day out and I trust him in that regard completely. No better man to have at your side when shit goes sideways. Jane? Never been in a position to find out what she would do.
Those numbers are also/always flexible. Some of the lower numbers may be maxed out, I’ve seen them in action and don’t trust them as far as I could throw them, but I don’t mistrust them either. Some may be “new”. There’s the beginning of trust, and it may well rise to the top given time. Or not. And some of them might have been 7/8/9s -long established & very solid- and something happened to cause a massive breech/drop in trust. Either instantly (like being cheated on), or gradually eroding over time.
One of the things I have to work on with PTSD is focusing on the person themselves. It’s very easy for me to simply subtract 3 points across the board. Instead of starting at a neutral zero, starting in -3 mistrust, as well as not trusting people to the level they’ve actually proven themselves to be at. Or to decide that since I can’t trust Joe with my kid? EVERYONE gets assigned a -9. Even though they’ve never done anything to warrant any mistrust, much less that degree of it. IE my judgment? Is f*cked. It might seem protectiv, but it’s not.
Trying to apply the same rules to everybody, across the board, means I don’t see anybody for who they really are. And that’s dangerous.
Snort. I don’t.
I trust people to the degrees that I know them. It’s not an on/off sort of thing. It’s much more like a sound board with dozens of levels. The areas I’ve seen them in action? Have numbers attached. The ones I haven’t? Don’t. So Jane & Joe’s “boards” may look like this
Joe’s = 9 0 0 0 -4 2 4 4 9 0 5 2 1 1 7 0 6 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 6 0 0 -8
Jane = 0 0 0 0 0 6 0 0 0 0 2 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 9
Clearly, I know Joe a lot better than I know Jane. He has a lot more areas of established trust. But you see that -8 & +9 as the last number? Let’s say that’s how much I trust them with my kid. Joe? No way in hell. I not only don’t trust them, but mistrust them. Jane? Absolutely. Which would make total sense if Joe is a colleague -and I hate their parenting style- so don’t want him within a mile of my kid, meanwhile Jane is my kid’s preschool teacher, and I loooooooove having her in my kid’s life. Looking at the 9 & 0 That are the first numbers? That may be how much I trust them with my life. Joe may have my back day in and day out and I trust him in that regard completely. No better man to have at your side when shit goes sideways. Jane? Never been in a position to find out what she would do.
Those numbers are also/always flexible. Some of the lower numbers may be maxed out, I’ve seen them in action and don’t trust them as far as I could throw them, but I don’t mistrust them either. Some may be “new”. There’s the beginning of trust, and it may well rise to the top given time. Or not. And some of them might have been 7/8/9s -long established & very solid- and something happened to cause a massive breech/drop in trust. Either instantly (like being cheated on), or gradually eroding over time.
One of the things I have to work on with PTSD is focusing on the person themselves. It’s very easy for me to simply subtract 3 points across the board. Instead of starting at a neutral zero, starting in -3 mistrust, as well as not trusting people to the level they’ve actually proven themselves to be at. Or to decide that since I can’t trust Joe with my kid? EVERYONE gets assigned a -9. Even though they’ve never done anything to warrant any mistrust, much less that degree of it. IE my judgment? Is f*cked. It might seem protectiv, but it’s not.
Trying to apply the same rules to everybody, across the board, means I don’t see anybody for who they really are. And that’s dangerous.
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