Trust

There have been some complications between me and a friend. I'm not going to go into exact details, but basically for a while I felt mistreated. I'm not about to claim that anyone was right or wrong here, because that would be getting personal. I will say however that I strongly felt when I confronted her recently about it that I was entirely right. Things are more complicated than that though because I sort of... I don't like to use the word "spy" (I'm not a creepy person), but perhaps that's what it was. I more or less spied by reading some of her conversations with other people on the internet. It started out as a complete accident, but when I saw some things I really didn't like, I kept reading. I didn't tell her initially when I stumbled on the text because I didn't want to risk looking foolish to her in case I was getting the wrong idea... unfortunately because I kept it to myself, I most likely look a whole lot worse than just foolish.

I discussed it with many of my other friends at the time and they all took my side. Of course their opinions are a little biased in my favor anyway, but I tried to tell the story in a very balanced way. After confronting her, I thought things were probably going to be alright between us. Today however, I started to rethink it all and I realize I did something horrible -- I jeprodized her trust in me. I don't honestly know to what extent she trusted me, but I really feel pretty bad about it now after thinking it all over again. Regardless if I had a right to read those conversations or not, I feel really foolish. She's a good girl, and I really set a bad example and a false impression of what kind of person I am. I've never lost anyone's trust that I am aware of, because I'm a very trusting person. So this really bugs me since I take enormous pride in how trusty of a person I am.

The point of me writing this isn't entirely to complain about my problems. I want to focus on the core of the problem here -- trust. Trust is the abbility to share some of your more personal thoughts and feelings with another person in an open manner. I have earned the trust of lots of people. Sometimes we might not always live up to what we promise others, or sometimes we may hurt them unintentionally, but we had the best of intentions. That's what trust is, and it's something everyone should step back and think about for a second or two. It is something to value and not something to toy with. I regret what I did now, and I only wish I would have talked to her more openly about my initial findings instead of letting it go on and intensify.

The moral of the story is if you trust someone, don't jump to conclusions -- talk about your problem first before deciding to lay blame. Just think about it.