Trust and Respect

My apologies on this one, as it's a bit more serious and less light-hearted as the other two... so if you're looking for some humor, you might want to skip this entry...

One of the primary values I maintain as a leftist is that every person in the world is deserving of respect. Every human being possesses an intrinsic value that doesn't diminish or dissipate based upon any of the terms and conditions that most of the rest of the world might utilize to write somebody off. The prime tenet is that life is a journey, and that everybody is on their own place within that journey.

What this implies is that people make mistakes, maintain ignorance, and often will do things that are less than savory, but that so long as they learn and grow from their mistakes, and consistently become better people as they develop, then they are at least moving in the right direction. Hope is alive and well in the world.

As part of my perspective of giving every person respect and recognizing their intrinsic value, I believe that every person is deserving of trust, as well. All too often, I've found that people's defense mechanisms are the very things that cause hurt and pain to so many others. It's their own lack of trust of others that so often causes them to become untrustworthy themselves.

The problem then becomes what to do when somebody proves themselves to be untrustworthy. I will be the first to admit that my policy has always caused me a bit more pain and frustration that I could likely have otherwise avoided. However, it has also allowed me to make a great deal of friendships that I otherwise would never have made. And I believe that, even in the cases of people who have hurt me, I have been able to have a positive impact upon their lives by giving them that degree of trust and respect.

The problem I'm encountering now is one of continuity. If everyone is on a certain place on their journey, there is a certain degree that people who have been untrustworthy can become more trustworthy in the future. In general, one would think that so long as you see any degree of change in an individual, then they should then be worthy of trust once more.

It's not as simple as that, however, as any of us with life experience can tell. Once you've been burned, it's difficult to simply put your hand back on the stove. Such is the case with a former friend who has been staying with us the past few days. A person who seemed extremely selfless, progressive, and understanding that turned out to be selfish, manipulative, and malicious and who we therefore cut out of our lives.

For some reason, Julie invited the person to have contact with us for a business matter, but who then started to have more social contact with us, which turned from a couple of days trip to the area into a more than week-long stay. I have to say I haven't been happy about the situation in the first place, and we're now on the day of the trip to the beach. Sara and Julie are taking the kids and the dogs, leaving me alone in the house. Except that this person is also still here, and that I have no particular desire to have this person remain in the house once Julie and Sara are gone.

Has she been riling up drama while she's here, refusing to help, or draining our resources? No. However, the history of her role has made me extremely wary of her presence, and I am having incredible difficulty maintaining my composure as the confusion of the day is continuing to progress. And on top of everything, there has not been a single private moment throughout the entire week that I have had any opportunity to bring up my concerns.

I'll be leaving for work in about an hour, and many of these issues will work themselves out in time. But my internal questions remain. How much do I trust, and where is the fine line between giving every human being their intrinsic respect and merely opening yourself up to becoming a doormat?