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    %RISK TRUST LOVE SECURITY VULNERABILITY DEFENSE 901114

It  is  risky  to trust people who do not  know  the  real
nature of love through personal experience.

It  is  risky to trust people who approach life  and  each
other  person  in a manipulative manner in which they  are
looking for points of vulnerability to take advantage of.

It  is  risky  to  trust people  who  are  always  on  the
defensive,  never trusting anyone because they  themselves
are always on the offensive in conflicts which to them are
perpetual,  and cannot be resolved to the mutual advantage
of the people who are afflicted by them.

It is risky to trust people who have not accepted the gift
of  security from others who love them,  because authentic
love has never been offered or because they do not want to
accept love on true love's truly non-manipulative terms.

It  is  risky  to trust people who  treat  dishonesty  and
misleading behavior as tools,  to be used in  manipulating
other  people  in technical efforts to achieve  unilateral
goals, in keeping with unilateral ideals and values.

It  is risky to try to avoid trusting anybody,  for in the
absence of trust personal and communal integrity will  not
survive.

The  fear  of having trust betrayed,  kills those who  let
that fear lead them to try to avoid trusting anybody.

We do well to be judicious in whom we trust. We need to be
careful in choosing whom to trust.  Yet to refuse to trust
anybody,  is to alienate ourselves from everybody,  and so
to die.

How then are to we recognize whom we can trust? By looking
for  signs  of  honesty,   authenticity,   non-calculating
spontaneity,    relaxation,   serenity,   receptivity  and
generosity,  humility,  thankfulness,  appreciation,   and
profound simplicity.  It is safer to trust people who give
these  signs  in coherent patterns,  than it is to try  to
avoid trusting anybody.

It  is dangerous to alienate people whom we cannot  safely
trust.   The  more  that they  are  alienated,   the  more
dangerous they become to themselves and to others.  We can
love  people  whom  we cannot safely trust.  We  need  not
regard them as honest,  when they are dishonest.  We  need
not regard them as authentic,  when they are pretending to
be  other  than what they really are.  We need not  regard
them as competent, when they are incompetent.  We need not
believe the lies they tell. And, we need not alienate them
by our manner of relating to them.

We  need not support people in their ways,  when we cannot
trust  them  in their dishonest ways.  We can be for  them
becoming  trust-worthy,  by not supporting their dishonest
ways  of being manipulators who are trying to milk  us  of
our  resources and energy.  We need not let them milk  us,
for letting them milk us encourages them to continue to be
dishonest manipulators. We can be honest with them, and by
being  graciously honest we can confront their  collusions
and addictive patterns of perception, feeling, thought and
behavior.  Such honest confrontations need not be violent,
confrontational,   offensive or intentionally threatening.
The  manner of the confrontations can be guided by  honest
love, rather than by manipulative intent.

                                                                                                                               
                         (c) 2005 by Paul A. Smith in      
                    (On Being Yourself, Whole and Healthy)  
                                                                                                                               
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