when we don’t trust, we get just plain weird. and do weird things.

by this i mean–

I. i don’t trust you to accept me as i am, so i overextend myself to live up to what i perceive are your expectations and definitions of “awesome.”

II. i don’t trust you to tell me the truth, so i don’t really listen to what you have to say and hear only what i want to hear through the careful, timid filter of my fragile heart.

III. i don’t trust myself to be honest with you so i make up little white lies just to cover up the parts of me that aren’t perfect–but that nobody is really looking at anyway, but now that i’ve made a white lie, i have to act a little bit less like me and a little bit more like a lie even though nobody is actually keeping track of if i’m being me or not cuz…well, no one really knows me because i haven’t been honest.

IV. i don’t trust you to love me even when i make mistakes, so i act really clingy and make you feel guilty for not coming to every single event that i plan, for not responding to every single email text tweet tumblr status update blog mixed-media-message you tube video glance and phone call i send your way, for not acting exactly the way i want you to act, and i make extraneous demands of you just to see if you’ll give in because the only way i can tell for sure if you love me or like me is if you let me emotionally control you and hold you hostage with my insecurities.

V. i don’t trust that i’ll love you when you disappoint me, so i prevent myself from seeing the greatness and wonderfulness inside of you because it’ll hurt and piss me off too much when you don’t act like the great and wonder that you are, or when you choose someone and something other than the dreams i dream.

VI. i don’t trust that you’ll not disappoint me. so you always do.

VII. i don’t trust you to not leave me, so i give you the cold shoulder because you never call me and i always have to call you.

VIII. i don’t trust you to stay, so i leave.

IX. i don’t trust, so i don’t say a word to you when you’re wrong or when you’re hurting me or when you’re just being dumb, and i make excuses like, “wisdom is telling me to keep quiet,” all the while forgetting that speaking truth in love is beautiful.

X. i don’t trust that you’ll recover from mistakes and bad choices so i create obstacle courses, speak hasty words, slap overbearing demands on you, make you carry false crosses, wear myself out trying to persuade you to do things my way all to prevent you from perhaps becoming stronger, greater, smarter, wiser and fuller than i was after i had made those same mistakes long ago.

XI. i don’t trust that you see and believe the best in me so everything you say to me is either criticism or judgement–even sincere compliments and acknowledgments are either sarcastic jokes or not what you really think so i can never receive and thank you for the encouraging words you say about me

being weird cuz we can’t trust can also feel like this–

I. i don’t feel safe telling you my heartaches because either
a. i think you won’t understand and i NEED you to understand so i feel valid
b. i think you can’t handle the burden when secretly i really want you to handle this burden for/with me so i don’t feel so lonely
c. i’ve seen you be so careless with your own heart

II. i blab to you all my heartaches plus a lot of other made-up ailments because
a. i’m forcing you to be my confidante even if you don’t want to
b. i’m angry and want attention because the lack of full trusting relationships makes my heart sick
c. i’m careless with my heart

III. i don’t think i can tell you what i honestly think about your (fill in the blank) because you’ll either
a. get hurt and not talk to me and put up a wall
b. get angry and then say something awful and untrue to me, and now i’m hurt and there’s a double-wall
c. get offended and bitter and say terrible things about me behind my back
d. slap me, hit me, abandon me, kick me, curse me
e. think less of me
f. lose faith in me
g. get hopeless
h. think that what i think is the end-all, be-all truth and it starts to unhappily dictate and control your life when all i did was share an opinion, a perspective, a thought, a piece of my heart that ended up being poison instead of an opening to a realer kind of place for you and me

IV. i won’t stay in the same boat of mistrust with you, but will go climb into my own boat of mistrust instead of climbing us both out of your boat and go scuba diving

when we don’t trust, it becomes all about
“I” and “Me” and “Can’t” and “Won’t”
and “why can’t you” and “why won’t you”

we get weird. just plain weird.
so un-like our free selves, so un-like freedom where

I. we can say exactly what we think and it won’t screw us up because
a. what we say is beautiful and
b. even if it’s not beautiful, it doesn’t matter cuz we see all the fresh sweet juicy goodness in each other’s hearts and trust that it’ll start flowing out our mouths real soon, and we can wait
c. we love each other more than what we may or may not say
d. we have forgotten how to be critics and skeptics

II. you can be free to explore the wildest things and be the silliest craziest you, and maybe i’ll join you, maybe i won’t, but neither will hold you or me back because
a. fear isn’t an ingredient in our lives anymore
b. we know we won’t die of shame, embarrassment, failure, or death because, well, He put an end to dying
c. we’re happy
d. i like you and you like me
e. we enjoy life

when we trust, we are honest and real.

so when i hurt, i say “i am hurt”
instead of making up excuses like, “well, it’s just a spirit of rejection” or “i’m under attack” because i’d much rather spiritualize (or detach from) our poor choices and real hearts that bleed instead of facing the fact that–sometimes, we suck.

so when we suck, we can say,
“man. we sucked then, didn’t we?”
“fsho. i’m sorry about that. it won’t happen again.”
“yea. me too. hey, and if we start sucking again, i’ll slap us both, yea?”
“fsho.”
and then we get over it and get rid of the sucking cuz that disappearing .1% of not-awesomeness is not so big compared to the growing 99.9% awesomeness inside us.

so when we’re ecstatic and in love, we say
“dude. i’m in love and really really really happy right now.”
“serious? wow, that’s cool. i’m freaking excited for you.”
“thanks. dude, i’m in love with you too.”
“for real? word. thanks.”
and it’s not awkward or weird to just sit in each other’s company without any other expectation than enjoying the presence of each other.

so when we need, we say
“hey. i’m pretty hungry and broke. can you feed me?”
“fsho. what you feel like?”
“steak.”
“sounds good. who else is hungry?”
“probably that guy over there. he kinda looks homeless.”
“yea. let’s see if he wants to go too.”
“fsho.”

when we are amazing, we say
“dude, you were amazing just then, that thing you did–genius.”
“oh word, thanks man. yea that was good.”
“fsho.”
“hey, you were pretty rockin too the other day when you said that thing. much better than when you did that other thing.”
“oh yea? thanks. yea that was cool.”
“fsho.”

when we trust
face-to-face conversations and/or truthful-in-love confrontations (in which we look into each other’s eyes for more than a quick second) aren’t rare like some kind of endangered species, but are a frequency that becomes a wave that becomes a tsunami that becomes a climate change that becomes an environment that becomes the culture straight from that place inside us and around us, that kingdom golden beautiful reality

trust is
where we can weep without apology and without pity when a friend dies even though we know we’ll speak him back to life in just a few days because we understand that we are not only Spirit, but Soul and Body too, and it’s just like that, simple:

a Spirit-Soul-Body
loving
another Spirit-Soul-Body

us loving us