Why Emotional Trust is Harder to Gain (and More Important) than Physical Trust

The idea of trust brings up strong reactions and opinions in many people. We all have ideas about trust; what it means, how important it is, how it can be gained, how it can be lost. Most of these ideas have grown out of our childhood and familial experiences, and then been molded and sprinkled with the seasonings of relationships along our journey.

If your earliest experience of trust with a primary caretaker was one of them not being there when you needed them, of them pulling away their love and support when you showed your truest self and not who they “wanted” or “expected” you to be, of not having clear boundaries, or of them not respecting your autonomy, then you might experience yourself in relationships struggling with your idea of healthy separateness, or struggling with expressing your point of view, wants, or needs in a healthy way. Because you were shown that expressing individuality, a personal need or a desire was not appreciated or validated you learned to conform to however best you might receive love. You began to believe you had to act or speak a certain way to receive love, and that others should do the same to get your love (and trust) in return. Most of this is unconscious, we walk around repeating patterns from childhood because that’s what feels normal. But what feels normal isn’t…