"The most expensive thing in the world is trust. It can take years to earn & just a matter of seconds to lose."

Trust is the firm belief in the reliability, trust, ability, or strength of someone or something. With that being said, trust is a very difficult topic to comprehend and is one of the most challenging concepts to embrace in your lifetime. Many of us have a difficult time with trust because we have all been hurt in one way or another. Whether you were hurt by a friend, a family member, or a boyfriend or girlfriend, someone in your life has betrayed you in a way where all trust was broken between the two of you. Lying or deceiving someone is one of the largest breaches of trust to ever exist and violates a spoken or unspoken rule that we will be treated honestly and with full respect. Many betrayals in trust, when not treated or addressed, can cause scars and wounds that may last months or even a lifetime.

How can trust be repaired and rebuilt once broken?

The first step towards repairing and rebuilding trust in any relationship is by embracing the nature and the extent of the pain you feel. If you constantly dismiss your hurt and continue to push it aside because you don't want to think back on those upsetting memories, then more than likely the wound will continue to intensify and the trust will continue to need to be repaired. Not only do you have to be willing to open up your heart and embrace the pain, but the other person involved needs to acknowledge the hurt you are feeling and take responsibility for the pain they have caused you. If the other person doesn't show a sense of remorse or acknowledge that you're hurting because of this betrayal, then the relationship may never be repaired because the person hurting may think that the other person "just doesn't understand" and will give up trying to repair the trust that they had.

Sometimes repairing and rebuilding trust between two people requires a promise that you won't hurt each other again. If you chose to promise this, make sure the promise is heartfelt and you both truly mean what you say, otherwise, the promise will carry little weight and most likely will not be kept. Usually, a promise is built on the hope that the other person understands they made a mistake and that they promise to control themselves and resist from making that same mistake again. Promises, when kept and followed, can deepen a relationship and help rebuild the trust that was once damaged.

Living a life where betrayal is unavoidable

No matter who you decide to surround yourself with in life or what decisions you decide to make, unfortunately, betrayal is unavoidable and is bound to happen multiple times throughout your lifetime. We all have insecurities or traits that make us who we are, whether that be our sensitivity, anger, selfishness, jealousy, fear, or our need to feel important, loved, or even beautiful. Trying to suppress these qualities is detrimental to not only ourselves but to our relationships as well, so the best thing to do is to embrace them and get to know the other person's qualities too. It is important to make a conscious effort to explore and discuss every aspect of your qualities, even those you may not be too proud of, with the other person so that it doesn't mysteriously come out later on in the relationship. Yes, everyone makes mistakes, especially when it comes to their certain qualities, but you have to learn to embrace the other person and trust them. Trust is built on the understanding and the honesty of who you both are and you have to realize that everyone is learning how to embrace themselves throughout their lifetime. Sometimes you both will make mistakes, but those mistakes lead to how you end up learning and moving on to bigger and better things later on in your life.

Embrace and express how you feel

When it comes to this topic, expressing how you feel is the only way you are going to be able to move past the hurt you are experiencing. Learning that over time you can take another step in a relationship even after being betrayed and hurt is important and is a key part of life. You have to be able to trust yourself and express your hurts and your feelings to the other person involved. You have to be able to state that "I understand there may be times where you end up hurting me and I may end up hurting you. We may even breach our trust and our promises towards each other. With that being said, I know that no matter what we can address these hurts and eventually turn them around in order to strengthen our relationship."

Just remember that no friendship, family member, or relationship is worth losing if you truly care about that other person, so it's important to know how to embrace and move past these betrayals when the time comes.