Let's Talk About Trust

Trust is a big issue for most of all of us. Parents want to be able to trust their kids. Spouses want to be able to trust each other. Bosses want to trust their employees to do their work and employees want to trust their bosses for a paycheck. Business partners want to trust each other, and folks entering into a contract want each side to live up to their written word. Trust is big, and yet the number of people most of us trust, really trust; can be counted on one hand. I'm not saying we distrust everyone, but most of us simply do not trust very many folks with the opportunity to be distrusted, except our elected officials. We listen to them campaign, we talk about their empty promises, and yet we vote for them. Why, do we do collectively, what we'd never do individually? This fact of just accepted distrust of politicians got me thinking. Let's be honest, we all have people in our lives that we don't trust, and it's not because they've done something big and devious, although some do. No. Trust is more a matter of counting on the little things. We trust people that remember to do what they say they'll do. We trust people that bring the change back from an errand. We trust people that answer their phone. We trust people that don't make excuses, and we don't trust people who consistently do not do those things we count on. Trust isn't about the big events in life, it's a collection of several things that might seem quite trivial. I know, I would more quickly re-trust someone that was on the spot and told a "whopper," rather than someone that repeatedly changed the rules of engagement telling me I misunderstood. I would more readily trust someone that wrote a bad check, owned up to it, and covered it, as someone that repeatedly looked for opportunities to disgrace another. Perhaps my requirements of trust are different than those of another, but I have this great idea. Since most of us can agree that politicians can't be trusted, wouldn't it be great if say, three times of being caught not keeping your word or misleading people, landed that person squarely in Washington DC. A sort of shock treatment for the untrustworthy. Scared truthful! Can you imagine the average teller of white lies or someone with just a generic and random disregard of promise keeping were sent to try to survive amongst the real liars! A sort of "Lord of the Flies" version of truth therapy. As a matter of fact, rather than elections, we could have "true" public servants that are doing their time and paying their debt to society for lying. The great thing to this theory is, there would absolutely be term limits and they'd have to come back and "truly" face their people. Then, rather than prideful pensions, sock puppet theatre, and "cliff hanging" shenanigans, anyone that had been to Washington to serve would hang their head, as they should. When someone asked about Uncle So-and-So or Cousin Such-and-such, there would just be the whispered response that they were out of town . . . on the east coast . . . or, tending to some business. We'd have euphemisms for it, but finally politics would be known for what it truly is.
Buy the truth, and sell it not; also wisdom, and instruction, and understanding. a Proverb of Holy Scripture