Trust

Human beings are social animals. We are reliant on a lot of different members of our community to ensure our existence. However, as a society, the divide between two neighbors has never been higher in the history of humankind, than it is now. Today, let’s take a look at this interesting facet of life and how we can actually be more trusting, and instill the same in others.

Self-trust is the first secret of success.

Ralph Waldo Emerson

(I don’t know how many times I will recycle the same opening, but here it goes)

We’ll start today by taking a trip down memory lane. Remember a time when life was not hyper dependent on technology? When we wanted to meet someone or speak to someone, the only two options were to either physically visit them or call them on the phone.

And remember landlines? The rush of hearing the ring, rushing to pick up the phone and saying hello? Having to sit in one place for the 10 minutes we needed to complete the conversation about last night’s cricket match? We felt so close, despite being so far apart, because we could hear our loved ones talk to us.

It felt very easy at the time, just having to press a bunch of numbers and being able to connect with people on the other side of the country or the world if you had a lot of money to spare.

Since then, years have gone by, times have changed, and for the better, at least technologically. It has never been easier than it is today to be connected with people who are nowhere physically close to you.

The (un)holy trinity of cell phones, the internet and social media has made it possible to communicate with anyone at any hour of the day. We can send messages, “reels”, posts and whatever else we see on the internet to anyone with whom we want to share this content.

I’m sure that the intent for these innovative solutions was for human interactions to be more seamless, frequent and thereby resulting in strengthened relationships.

And on the face of it, the outcomes of embedding these amazing platforms should include an increased sense of belongingness and a general improvement in the sense of happiness in relationships, right? But is that actually the case? Let’s find out.

The Wildfire of Mistrust

Let’s take a look at some statistics:

• According to recent studies, 1 billion people access Instagram on a monthly basis. (That’s billion with a “B”). For context, the global population as of this writing is 8 billion.
• The average number of followers of an Instagram user is 150. The average number of account a user follows is about the same also.
• Based on numerous studies, and I am taking the lowest and highest limits I saw on these, the average number of friends a person has lies between three and nine (which mind you is only 2%-6% of the average Instagram following numbers).
• Now this might be just me covering all the bases, if we remove let’s say a 100 accounts (of famous personalities, organizations, what have you) out of an average users followers and following list, the resulting number is still 6%-18% of the following.
• Additionally, people who send 2 hours or more on social media everyday are twice as likely to suffer from social isolation as someone who spends less than 2 hours.

I haven’t crunched these numbers myself, and these are results from just one platform. But the result looks very sad to me. We are connected with so many people, all thanks to this gift of technology, but we are only close to an average of 10% of our so called connections.

There are a few reasons that one decides not to increase the depth of the connection with someone else: which include past trauma, lack of awareness, lack of time and so on. But one of the most common (direct or indirect) reasons relationships end or don’t even begin is lack of trust.

In one of my recent 3 AM reflection sessions (because I don’t generally function like normal human beings), I came to realize one of the biggest possibilities that we might end up having a general distrust for people.

We can only trust someone else completely, if we can trust ourselves completely.

Let’s think about a real life example. Let’s say you have moved to a new city. Naturally, you’ll need to make some connections. Let’s say you meet a group of people who share the values you do and someone makes a plan to go out for dinner or drinks.

Now like it or not, there will be a general degree of mistrust, because humans are hardwired to try and find any threats. You’re in a new place, everyone you know is new, and there is no sense of familiarity at all. But the only reason some of us would actually act upon such an offer would be if you had complete faith that no matter what happens, I have the ability to be safe if shit goes south.

This fact translates the easiest to the relationships in our lives. I have myself struggled with this issue of not being able to trust anyone else because I always felt that if I get too close and something happens, I wasn’t sure I would be able to deal with it. And I have made some really, really stupid decisions because of this fear of mine.

Well, as soon as I gained awareness of this fact about myself, I figured this would be a worthwhile piece of information to share. So, if you stuck around this far, thank you for your time. If you enjoyed this, share this with one friend of yours whom you think will benefit from reading this. Thanks for reading, and I will see you in the next one.