The Anatomy of Trust

Trust is often spoken about like it’s a simple feeling or a choice we make. But trust is far more complex. It’s an intricate anatomy made of a delicate structure built on layers of honesty, boundaries, self-awareness, and vulnerability. Understanding this anatomy means looking inward first, because we can’t truly trust others if we can’t trust ourselves.

At its core, trust is belief. It is the quiet assurance that someone, or we ourselves, can stand on their own two feet. But this belief doesn’t arise from blind hope or wishful thinking. It grows from a place of brutal honesty: knowing our limitations, recognizing our boundaries, and holding ourselves accountable. Like the spine that supports the body, trust supports the relationship and keeps it upright.

Trust Begins with Self-Honesty

We often mistake trust for an external act, placing faith in others, hoping they won’t disappoint us. But trust begins internally. We can’t be honest with others if we aren’t honest with ourselves. This honesty involves confronting our own vulnerabilities and limits, rather than ignoring or dissecting them.

When we push beyond our capacity, we betray ourselves and become liabilities, not only to ourselves but to others, risking emotional and sometimes physical harm. This often masquerades as noble self-sacrifice, a desire to give and support. But beneath that is a deeper wound, the part of us that dissects our own needs to fit the image of what others expect. We carry the heavy weight of responsibility, like muscles strained and fatigued, showing up for others even when we are too depleted to show up for ourselves.

It feels like the right thing to do, but it’s a betrayal to the parts of us that long to be seen, heard, and met. These are the parts we don’t value enough, the parts we feel are “not enough.” These parts have been pushed aside for too long, crying out in pain until they resort to demanding, controlling, or manipulating as a survival mechanism. This is where self-sacrifice meets survival, the body shutting down when pushed past its breaking point.

Dissect Our Humanity

People don’t need to be saved, they need to be honoured and accepted as they are, not made to feel weak for their vulnerabilities. People don’t need saving. They need acceptance and belief in themselves. Proof that they won’t be judged for being vulnerable or made to feel weak or incapable.

When we fail to honour ourselves, we dissect our humanity. We become amputees in organ failure, disconnected from our aliveness. We get stuck in a cycle of need and survival, breathing life into others while struggling to breathe ourselves. Saving implies brokenness. It suggests that someone is incomplete or insufficient. But the reality is that trust is belief, belief in someone’s ability to stand on their own two feet. And most importantly, trusting yourself to stand tall, not to carry the entire world, but to lean into belief that lifts everyone higher, like the heartbeat that pulses life through the body.

The Weight of Carrying Too Much

Wholeness is not found in fullness or holding more. It’s found in feeling lighter, relieved from the weight we’ve carried for so long. It’s a return to aliveness, like oxygen filling lungs after being breathless.

The story we’ve been told is that love has to be earned, that we are worthy only if we are needed. This leads us to try to save the very parts of ourselves that once needed saving, reflected in others. We recognize the pain we try to avoid within ourselves and attempt to rescue it in those around us.

This journey contains both purpose and destruction. Only by meeting ourselves in reality, with clear boundaries, can we create genuine space for others. The sense of responsibility we feel for others is often a deflection of the responsibility we owe to the parts of ourselves we buried. We try to be the parents to ourselves that we never had, patching wounds with borrowed strength.

The Hard Truth About Fixing Others

We believe that if we can fix others, we can fix ourselves. But healing is not the same as fixing. Two breathless souls cannot breathe life into each other. Before we can truly hold space for others, we must first learn to breathe on our own. Without that, the flow of life and love will always be scarce, like a body deprived of oxygen.

Start with Yourself

Healing and trust begin with self-honesty and acceptance. When you honor your own needs and boundaries, you create a foundation that allows you to connect authentically with others without losing yourself in the process. Trust is the skeleton that holds relationships upright, but it must first be built within.

Trust is what happens when learn to feel safe within ourselves.