Episode 16: The Importance of Trust

Who Can You Really Trust?

Trust is one of the most valuable aspects of any relationship, whether it’s with family, friends, or even ourselves. But what does it really mean to trust someone? How do we decide who to trust? In this episode of Message for My Kids, the host talks to his kids about the significance of trust, building trust, and exploring some of the consequences when trust is broken.

The Meaning of Trust

Trust is about consistency, honesty, and reliability. It’s knowing that someone’s actions along with their words are true. Knowing who to trust means:

- Observing actions, not just listening to words.

- Paying attention to how people treat you.

- Recognizing your gut when it tells you to stay away from someone.

Trust yourself and your Decisions

Trust isn’t just about relying on others, it starts with trusting yourself. When you lack confidence in your own decisions, second-guessing can hold you back. Creating strong morals and values helps build self-trust, so you can be more confident in your decision making. Trust also extends beyond people, it plays a role in the decisions we make about items, brands, companies, and finances.

Choosing the Right People to Trust

Sometimes people break the trust we had them at. Although this can be painful, learning to recognize who is genuinely reliable helps us build stronger, healthier relationships. Ask yourself:

- Does this person show you actions that are trustworthy with good morals? Do they lead by a good example?

- Do their stories match up? Or are their words inconsistent?

- Have they proven to be dependable over time?

Listen to the Full Episode

Trust is an important life lesson, and this episode of Message for My Kids dives into understanding its power. Tune in to hear a more detailed explanation of this episode, and learn more about making wise decisions about who to trust and how to be a trustworthy person yourself. Follow along for meaningful conversations and valuable life lessons!

Or…Read the Transcript Below!

Welcome everybody, welcome to another episode of Message to My Kids. Today I want to talk about trust. Trust, trust, trust. Trust is everything, almost. I would say trust is right up there. It's almost like water. Trust is something that you need. You have to trust yourself. You have to trust pets. You have to trust your loved ones. You have to trust your siblings.

Trust.

And it's pretty cool because I was thinking about it the other day. When people sleep and there's somebody else in the house, the apartment, trailer, when people sleep, you're actually trusting the other person without even probably realizing it. There are some people who can't trust the other person, and they sleep with one eye open. They probably don't even trust the other person, that they say something like, "I gotta go to work in the morning," when they don't have to work in the morning. They leave. They leave the house.

Trust is something that is like water. If you can't trust somebody, you're not gonna get anywhere. You're gonna keep second-guessing. It's like your sibling. If you don't trust your sibling and your sibling is living with you, you have something that's missing or moved, you're gonna right away subconsciously blame the other person. You're gonna blame your sibling.

So how do you gain trust? How do you give trust, and how do you even get trust? I always, always, always was a firm believer of you start trust with everybody. Everybody gets trust no matter what. I mean, you don't have to exploit all your secrets, but you can trust them enough to not harm you. You can trust them enough to not steal from you. Obviously, we're not talking complete trust like you're gonna open up and be like, "Hey, these are my dark secrets." No. I'm talking about trust as in trusting others to not hurt you, trusting others that they're not gonna steal from you. Start off with the basics of trust.

I was always a firm believer. Everybody got trust. Some people out there say, "I don't trust them. I don't know them. I don't trust them," which it probably works for them. For me, it always worked the other way because if somebody was trustworthy, they would always believe in the trust and not break the trust. But, if it's somebody who respects trust, they would literally respect trust.

Trust its a feeling, but it's also actions. It's really tied into actions. If somebody would tell you a story, are you going to believe that story or second-guess that story? Sometimes you would have to second-guess that story because you don't know what they're saying is even true or not. If those are the actions, apparently you don't trust that person as much as you probably trust yourself of your eyes, what you see.

Trust goes a long ways. It's not just in relationships. If you look at the actions and you look at your actions and your behavior, and you align trust with that, you can see, it’s pretty cool cause you can see who you trust and who you don't trust. I’ve gone through many years when I was younger, I would just say stuff. I would just do stuff, but I didn't understand why I was doing stuff and not doing stuff with individuals. For instance, I had a couple of friends in high school that I did do stuff with, like hang out, and then other ones I didn't. I didn't really understand that I did not trust them. I didn’t really trust them. Now that I think about it, and I get older, I’m like okay now I see why I didn't hang out with them, because they always got in trouble, and I never wanted to get in trouble. Usually, we would always get in trouble, and I’m the one that took the blame for it because they would kind of set me up in a way.

They would ask me a question like we'll be hanging out, they would be doing something, and then they would ask me a question in the middle of doing something. Then I was throwing my suggestion like, "Okay. Yeah, let's take this, do this," and if we ever got busted taking something we weren't supposed to take, they would always say, "So-and-so said to take it." So it was kind of like I was getting set up.

So I didn't trust those individuals anymore, stopped hanging out with them. I never understood at the time why. I just knew it, like a gut feeling, not to hang out with them. Now that I know why I didn't hang out with them, it's trust. Trust, trust, trust. It's all in to trust.

Sometimes we don't even trust our best judgment. I think with the judgment of what to do and what not to do, you have to really trust in your gut. So if you can take a message away and you're having issues in your life, and there's your siblings or something you want to help, but you can't trust them, then you have to balance it. You have to balance it enough to where you know what's already gonna happen, but yet you can be there for them in different types of ways.

Can trust be rebuilt? Yes, trust can be rebuilt. But, I know that there's always that little seed behind your head, no matter what. If you get burnt by the stove, will your hand heal? Yes, it will heal. But every time you cook or touch the stove, you're going to second-guess yourself and be like, "Should I touch it? Should I not?"

So if you're having troubles with issues that you don't know why, it's more than likely trust. I mean, it can even be like your job, your coworkers. If you're having issues with coworkers, more than likely it's trust.

Trust is not just with relationships. It can go..buying a device. If you're buying a device and it has a name brand versus not name brand, are you gonna trust that name brand over the one that doesn't work? Or maybe, maybe you want to buy an electronic or a device or something just to use for that day. So you don't care about the name brand. That also goes into trust, because you obviously trust the name brand to last forever, but you don't want that. You want it for one day.

So trust is everything, and you can base off trust off people's actions, from what they said they're gonna do, from what their stories are.

And this past weekend, the reason why I'm bringing up trust right now is because this past weekend, there was some issues with some of you. You would say a story, but then after asked a couple of questions, the story didn't match the actions. So I, as a father, have to kind of step back, and it hurts.

It hurts because I wasn't ready for not to trust a child as much as I possibly think I should trust. I know you guys are my kids, and I do trust you. I go to bed comfortable. But, if I go in the cupboard and there’s candy packages, the snack cupboard, I go in there, and there’s candies and chips that are moved, and it's like, "Okay. We had more chocolate pretzels in here. Like I know for sure the container was not a quarter full, it was three-quarters full because it was just purchased two days ago."

Then I start thinking, "Okay, who?" And it comes automatically onto one child who more than likely went in the snack cupboard and ate some snacks. And it comes into trust. It comes all in trust.

Trust is everything, and that's why I'm bringing it up. Because this weekend, there's been some complications with trust.

I hope that sometime you'll understand what you're doing and you can base off your actions on being a trustworthy person, not just towards me, but towards your career, towards yourself, towards college.

Trust is a highly moral attribute and a value as well.

When I was younger, I'm gonna tell you a story. When I was younger, it was kind of confusing. When I was younger, there were some things that me and my siblings would do that we weren't supposed to do. We were young, and there was Christmas presents underneath the tree. And one of my siblings went, opened up the package, and they were peeking and looking and all that stuff.

So what happened was, nobody got busted. We put the tape back. Your grandma and grandpa they ended up coming home. We put all the presents exactly the way they were supposed to be, way we found them.

So I had trusted my sibling because I did not want my sibling upset, but I trusted them. I really trusted them not to get in trouble. So when time passed, I would do stuff like that in front of them. And then it would be turned around and said that I'm not to be trusted because of my actions like that.

At the time, I thought my siblings were correct. I thought they were right. But I never understood that, me being the youngest, them being the oldest, I had my trust into the wrong values. I had my trust in the wrong morals because I should have spoken out. I should have said something. I should have held my siblings accountable.

And it's something that will grow with you. Just because they're doing it, you have to base it off of trust. You have to trust yourself. So I was looked at like I was the bad person. I was looked at like I was a bad person because I ended up doing the same thing, and I thought it was normal to do, like our sibling secret.

So be careful with that because I know that your siblings are siblings. And sometimes you create, not a reputation, but you create morals and your values into a different way. You just create them where you don't want them. Create your morals and create your values to an area where you do not want them.

So trust, it goes from all the way from the left all the way to the right, different universe, different spectrums. Trust is everything. And all that, it is, it is everything. Without trust, you don't have anything. Without trust, it makes things harder.

Without trust, without trusting yourself, your decisions that you make are going to be ten times worse. Believe in yourself. Do the right thing, especially with your morals and with your values. Be a value in trust. So I know it's hard because sometimes you do things in trust.

So I know it's hard because sometimes you do things thinking it's right, but it's not. And trust comes. Trust comes almost above everything. Without trust there's no love. Can't love somebody without trust. Pets? You gotta trust the pets. Can't go to bed while they're gonna chew up everything.

So it's something for you guys to think about. I love you kids. I miss you kids. You're at school. And there's another message for my kids.