Friendly relationship between man and woman although will have many words here and there but the most commonly used words in English are “I trust you and I love you.” I don’t know for sure but think these words can cause huge pressure on the relationship.
Although it can be in any relationship but in particular a relationship between a man and a woman there will be a time when the ‘trust’ becomes an important issue. It becomes even a major issue if money is also involved. Many people find this issue to be a very difficult one. For many people as soon as the time to part with money comes they become more suspicious. It happens even when they are to pay for their own commitments and from which they have saved a lot of time, money and energy. To them relationship suddenly becomes a difficult one.Some people believe that it is okay to lie about some issues to a person that you call your friend. Their argument would be that it was necessary to do so and even feel proud that they did that and still have a very healthy relationship.
Anthony (name changed) migrated to Canada and is being asked by his friend (Jennifer) for help in her family’s migration to Canada. Jennifer found out that the consultants in the market would charge her over US$5000 to do the same job which she wants Anthony to get done for free. This is a friendship and especially between a man and a woman. Has Anthony placed himself in an extremely vulnerable position agreeing to help Jennifer in this matter? Anthony wanted to be upfront and informed Jennifer that he will do so for her but she should know that there are some expenses that will be incurred on the way and he expect that those will be paid by her. Also that Anthony will help her do all what is necessary but she should be aware that Anthony is not an expert, even though he has successfully helped many people including his own brother, things may not work out successfully. Also that if her application is rejected for any reason that she might have to hire a lawyer that will cost her much more money because it becomes a legal issue. At the same time he assured and let Jennifer know that he will help her the same way as he did in the case of his own brother who got the immigration for Canada and spent a little less than US$1500.
She agrees and ‘on trust’ Anthony starts the process for and on her behalf. It takes over 10 months and hundreds of hours of Anthony’s time to find, consult and collect information on Jennifer’s behalf. He wrote and received Jennifer’s emails in this regards for all these months. He collects all the information from Jennifer and her family to prepare the paperwork. Jennifer too in return kept sending all the information required to do her job. Anthony has already spent close to C$1000.00 in out of pocket expenses by the time all information is completed and applications are filled in. He is able to get the things done and is hoping that Jennifer will not even spend the kind of money his brother spent because so many things he did by himself and charged her nothing for those.
Anthony by this time has done all what he could for his friend and has paid all the out-of-pocket expenses too. A lot of thoughts kept coming into his mind about this kind of a relationship. He found out that people want you to be helpful and trustworthy. People expect you to help them in achieving their goals. These are the goals from which they would benefit. They ask for your help; making you to believe that they trust you. People want you to help them in saving their money – because they found out already, it costs them huge if they go on their own. They want to use your expertise and experience. They want you to be their personal consultant without cost. They will choose the subject on which they want your help and on which they don’t. You just help them on the subjects that they choose to ask you about.
He found out one more thing that there are ‘men’ people and there are ‘women’ people. They all have their own way of asking for help. He feels that his experience with the ‘women people’ is that somehow they have a feeling that asking help from a ‘man’ is a privilege that is being granted to the ‘man’ who is given an opportunity to be ‘women’s’ help provider. It is the ‘man’ who will have to provide ‘trustworthy certificate’ even when he is helping for free.
He says, “I trust people because I trust myself. Not that my trust is not broken by anybody, but because, I think it is important to trust people. You got to trust people on almost all things. Some people you are able to trust more than the others. You trust your mother the most. By trusting others you learn how to trust yourself.”
He found out that woman friend is always on guard about the descriptions of past and present relationships, they will always be listening and talking with their ‘head’ and would want the man in relationship to believe that it is their ‘heart’ which do the same. They tend to protect themselves even more under stress. Some people are unable to handle stress and begin to tell fat lies. This does not make them untrustworthy but in reality they are unable to control stress in this relationship. Well, not necessarily that all will lie when under stress. It only means that the people who do so just don’t know any other healthier way to handle the relationship when in stress.
And then Anthony has another feeling…”few people are the kinds who now have developed this as a habit. Once they find out that it works to their advantage; they always begin to add some lies to the actual truth. By doing this they achieve someone’s attention, sympathy and commitment towards them.
Robert (name changed) and Anthony were friends from West Africa. They became friends because Robert’s elder brother Raju was Anthony’s good friend. Robert was coming to Africa for business visits and both soon became good friends. Not known to Anthony Robert would soon end this promising friendship because he did not fully gave himself in and because he could not keep the relationship in an honest way. Robert will soon take one of the trusted employees and hire him without letting Anthony know about it. And when Anthony’s wife Anna (name changed) confronts Robert about this broken trust, he begins to tell lies. Anthony calls it the cycle of broken trust and his lies a life style of a person. How could have Robert saved this relationship? What would be the best way to develop a pattern that will lead to long lasting healthy relationship? A relationship in which there is no greed, selfishness or bad faith? Could it have been possible if Robert would treat himself in a better way? Can Robert do it by loving himself and liking himself? May be by doing so he becomes more confident about himself and begin to love him with proud. May be this will give him a reason to be proud of and trust himself as someone special. And once he begins to treat himself with respect; when he begin to feel good about himself; when he begin to feel honest and open minded; perhaps it will be a new beginning and a positive move towards finding out your own ability to detect dishonesty within you.
It is a known fact that people who take good care of themselves will not so much need others to help them. May be Anthony too will have to change his way of taking care of himself. Taking others simply at their face value will have to be stopped. Anthony will have to take his time to make judgments about other people; he will have to stop and think ‘why am I taking this quick decision?’ He will have to change a little bit too when many people has shown a consistent pattern of untrustworthiness over time.
In a relationship between a man and a woman there is an old guard issue. Not all but most woman will be on guard just because the other person is a man. They would be on guard feeling this man may get in this relationship because he wants to have sex with me. Well, it happens too. Many men do get in this type of relationship only for sex but then it can not be true for all men. But then there are women too who gets into this kind of a relationship only for sex – so we cannot create a pattern out of such relationships. It is true that many people have invested a lot of their time, energy and even money in such relationships and have been betrayed.
It is not easy to say if these people who caused pain and suffering by betraying others should get the same in return; however the people who got betrayed for sure their heart will ach for a long time to come and they will begin to fear the relationships.
It is a difficult question to answer as to what the person who broke the trust would get in return. But the person who suffered will surely be holding some degree of grudge inside. It is a possibility that even if this person does not follow the footsteps of the person who has broken his heart there will always be chances that he may not easily accept anybody else into a new relationship for a long time.
