59. Trust After Betrayal: Is There Hope?

When someone you love betrays you, trust doesn’t just break; it shatters. Rebuilding it can feel impossible, especially when you're also battling the loss of self-trust. But healing is possible, and in this episode, we’re going to explore how.

In this conversation, I look at trust from the inside out: what it really means, why it matters, and how to rebuild it both with others and within yourself. If you're questioning everything right now, especially your own judgement, this episode offers hope, clarity and a roadmap forward.

Key Takeaways:

• Why trust is more about your ability to trust than someone else’s ability to be trustworthy

• The evolutionary and emotional role trust plays in relationships

• How to rebuild self-trust using a step-by-step internal process

• Why broken trust in a group or relationship often mirrors broken trust within

• How to move from blind belief to informed, self-aware trust after cheating

💬 Reflection questions:

What does trust look like for you now? Have you struggled to trust again, or to trust yourself, since the betrayal?

Connect with Luke:

• Website: www.lifecoachluke.com

• Instagram: @mylifecoachluke

• Email: luke@lifecoachluke.com

Join the After the Affair community at www.facebook.com/groups/aftertheaffaircommunity

Episode Transcript:

The After The Affair podcast with me Luke Shillings is here to help you process, decide and move forward on purpose following infidelity. Together we'll explore what's required to rebuild trust not only in yourself but also with others. Whether you stay or leave I can help and no matter what your story there will be something here for you.

Let's go. Hello and welcome to the After The Affair podcast with myself Luke Shillings. You're listening to episode number 59.

Now for those of you who have been following me since the start you will know that I have already done an episode on trust but of course trust is a complicated topic and after infidelity it plays such a significant role after we have been betrayed. So rebuilding it, understanding it, having confidence in how to find and move forward after that trust has been broken is absolutely essential so it's well worth another episode on the topic and of course I'm going to look at it from a slightly different angle today. So there's a few questions that I want to have answered by the end of this episode.

What is trust? Let's get a clear definition. Why is it important? Why is it so difficult? Why do we find it so hard to trust people and why is it that when trust has been broken it's so hard to rebuild it and why does it feel so we feel so vulnerable so fragile after it has been broken? And of course I really want to be able to also offer you some tips and ideas for how to build it both with yourself and with others. If you listen to the intro of this podcast it is literally one of the things that I promise you so let's get into that in more detail.

But before we do that if you're wondering about the state of trust in your relationship after experiencing infidelity it's a question that haunts many and in understanding it can be a first step towards recovery. That's why I've developed the relationship trust quiz designed to give you a clearer picture of where trust stands in your relationship. Whether you're feeling lost at sea or navigating the choppy waters of reconciliation this quiz can offer you an insight and direction.

In just a few minutes you'll discover your trust type and get a trust score which is pivotal in understanding how to heal and grow from betrayal you've experienced. It's a powerful tool that I've crafted from both personal insight and professional expertise. By completing this quiz you're not just getting results you're also going to get a customised report on how to take steps forward in any of the areas that you're struggling with trust in your relationship and the best part it's absolutely free.

Simply visit lifecoachloop.com forward slash trust score or one word lifecoachloop.com forward slash trust score or click the link in the episode description and take the first step towards a deeper understanding of trust in your relationship. Okay so let's start with a definition. Now I believe I did offer a definition or at least a simple definition in episode 9 how to rebuild trust but I'd like to go a little bit further this time and also explore that element of why it's important.

So trust. Trust is one person's belief that something or someone will behave in the way that we had anticipated. It is having confidence in the reliability, the integrity or honesty of a person, thing or even a situation and it involves a willingness to be vulnerable and to rely on that person or thing to act in a way that is consistent with our expectations and of course our values.

Trust is built over time through repeated positive experiences and of course consistent behaviour. It is an essential part of healthy relationships and can provide a sense of safety and security. Trust can be very difficult to establish and sometimes even harder to maintain but it is a fundamental aspect of human interaction and essential for all of our relationships and for our well-being.

Did you know that trust is believed to be an evolutionary adaptation that helps us to cooperate with others and achieve mutual benefits? This means that trust has been an essential component of human survival and social organisation for thousands and thousands of years. Research has shown that trust is strongly correlated with economic development as well. Societies with higher levels of trust tend to have stronger economies, lower levels of corruption and better quality of life for their citizens.

Trust is not very rational. People often trust others based on factors such as similarity, attractiveness, familiarity, social status and things like that rather than the objective evidence of trustworthiness itself. You are far more likely to trust someone who has the same beliefs as you for example or shares the same interest.

In addition to my one-to-one coaching clients I also deliver workshops on trust and healthy boundaries and one of the questions that I ask in the workshop, often 30 to 45 minutes in, is how much do you trust me? On a scale of 1 to 10, 0 being you wouldn't trust me with a barge pole and 10 being you trust me with your life. I often ask this to a group of 20 or 30 people and the results that I get vary significantly. Anything from 2 to 8 on average and occasionally I even get a 9 or a 10 but the point is everybody sat there witnessing this have seen and heard the same words from my mouth.

I've been talking to them for the previous half an hour or so. They've all seen me move around the stage or the platform or wherever it is at the time. They've all witnessed the same thing yet the variation in scores is always by at least 5. So surely if how trustworthy I am is dependent on me then I would have got the same score? No? Well isn't it interesting how everybody's witnessed the same thing yet given me such a variation in scores.

Well what does that tell you? Well it perhaps says that there's actually a much larger component to trust than we sometimes realise really comes from within and not from the person that we are judging or the person that we have decided is or isn't trustworthy. It's far more about our own judgement, our own quality of thinking when it comes to that person. Of course there are other things at play as well.

For example you know repeated positive experiences and consistency over time all obviously do come into this complex topic that is trust but far more of trust is about your ability to trust than it is the other person's ability to be trustworthy and that's definitely something worth considering when we're thinking about our one-to-one romantic relationships. But it's also very true in our work relationships with our colleagues and peers and and also with that of our children which I mean right now I'm actually experiencing some challenging times with my eldest. She is pushing the boundaries of honesty and trust probably a little bit far but of course she's young and she's testing and she's trying to figure stuff out so I could be very blunt and restrictive in terms of how I or me and her mother discipline her as a result of that or we can be a bit more open and relaxed and recognise actually it's as much about our ability to trust that she will make the right decision as it is for her to be considered trustworthy.

This is a complicated dynamic and should never be looked at just from that one closed perspective. Now in many situations we do blindly trust. We blindly trust in certain professionals such as doctors and other medical professionals.

We sometimes automatically distrust other people such as lawyers or maybe that sleazy car salesman. Trust can also be contagious. When people see others behaving in a trustworthy way they are far more likely to behave in a trustworthy way themselves.

This means that building trust in one area of life can have positive effects in many other areas. It also helps to explain why those who have experienced untrustworthy behaviour from those around them are much more likely to be untrusting themselves. Trust as we've already mentioned can be very fragile and easily broken and once trust is broken it can be difficult to rebuild.

Of course trust is not always reciprocal. People may trust someone who does not trust them back or vice versa and trust obviously is complicated. Now with all of these obstacles in the way of being able to build and maintain trust you might want to ask the question well what are the benefits of not trusting? I mean it's a fair question.

Maybe it's self-preservation. Maybe it helps you minimise risks, keeps you safe. It could possibly even increase your independence by relying less on others which could arguably foster self-reliance and independence.

It might even be able to help you set stronger boundaries by withholding trust. It can help you set and maintain those personal boundaries and ensuring that your maybe your mental and emotional well-being is prioritised. Of course there are always going to be examples where actually withholding trust or choosing not to trust is the best option for you in that particular moment and that does need to be taken into consideration.

But in terms of being able to build and maintain healthy and fulfilling relationships trust is absolutely essential. Now of course trust in another person is actually just based primarily on your thoughts about that person because even if that person does do all of the things that make them more trustworthy i.e. they keep doing repetitive positive actions or behaviours it's still your subjective judgement, your subjective experience as to how trustworthy you think that person is. It's still you making that judgement.

Therefore the quality of sentences in your mind about that person are essential to helping you experience a trusting relationship. That's worth considering. There's another interesting element when it comes to trust with others that we often don't think about and this can often be seen in the workplace.

So I'd like you to imagine a company that has 10 employees and they have a bonus scheme at this company. At the beginning of each day the employees are paid £10 each and they're given a choice. They get to keep their £10 or they get to reinvest it into the company so that the company can buy more materials and more goods and make more profit.

But if they do invest that their money into the company the company makes the promise that whatever money is in that pot will be multiplied by five at the end of the day and then distributed evenly amongst all of the employees. So you have 10 employees each getting paid £10. Let's say for example they all put the money in the pot.

That's £100 in the pot. That gets multiplied by five which creates £500 and at the end of the day it's divided by ten each person comes out with £50 each. Win-win.

However a few days go by and we have one particular employee, let's call him Bob, and he recognises a flaw in the system. He realises that if he doesn't bother putting his £10 in and he keeps it, everybody else continues to put their money in bearing in mind that no individual employee knows whether another person has invested or not. Everybody else puts their money in so there's now £90 in the pot instead of the hundred.

That gets multiplied by five at the end of the day which is £450 and then gets distributed evenly through all ten employees so they all get £45 each. However Bob still has his £10 so he now has £55. Okay so at this point the other employees start to realise well hang on we only got £45 today.

That means there's somebody who's not invested. There's somebody who's not being part of the team. This then creates an air of doubt amongst all the employees and one by one over the following days fewer and fewer employees invest their money in the pot.

But eventually it gets to a point when nobody puts the money in the pot because they are dubious because they don't trust any of the other employees. But of course what happens then is that nobody puts the money in the pot and they just finish their day with £10 so they are no better off at all. Now although Bob clearly is an untrustworthy person.

He was trying to take advantage for his own gain and everybody else's loss. However had the remaining employees still continued to put their money in they'd have still been far better off because even at nine people in they would have still got £45 compared to their ten so that's still £35 more. In fact it would have actually had to have got below three people investing for anybody to have actually lost money.

At that point three people investing it would have been £150 in the pot which means they'd all get £15 back which is still five pounds up on the start of the day. But because that lack of trust started to seep in and then everybody that trust basically broke down amongst the entire company then nobody trusts and nobody gains. So what can we do in this situation? However before I answer that I just want to talk a little bit about self-trust.

We've just spoken about group trust and now I want to talk about self-trust. So self-trust is the belief in your own ability to make sound decisions, to take responsibility for your actions and to really navigate all of the challenges that you are faced with in life with confidence and resilience. It's an important element of your self-esteem, how you estimate yourself.

Self-trust is developed through a process of self-reflection, self awareness and self-validation. If we take the time to reflect on our values, goals and our priorities and then act in accordance with those values we are building trust in ourselves. And as we make decisions, take risks and face challenges we're just building that track record of success and resilience that further reinforces our self-trust.

Self-trust is important because it allows us to make decisions and take action with confidence even in the face of uncertainty or adversity which is exactly what we're facing when we're going through betrayal. Which brings up an interesting question. Should you trust yourself? Yes or no? Because when it comes to thinking about trusting yourself well there's some things to consider.

You could always potentially be wrong. You see you cannot know what you do not know and this therefore always leaves that door of uncertainty slightly ajar. But that's kind of the point.

Sometimes I think we go through life with an expectation that we should be 100% certain about everything and this is actually one of the reasons that people find betrayal so painful particularly if they're married. When our partners stand opposite us and say their vows what we are doing is believing that what they are saying is the truth. But that's it.

We're believing and a belief like faith means that we cannot know because believing means that you have chosen the truth. Whereas knowing means you are certain about that truth. Believing always leaves room for doubt.

However I think we often tell ourselves that we know for certain when we don't. We just have faith in that person. We just believe in that person.

But believing is actually not that dissimilar to blind trust. Whereas knowing is trusting but with awareness. Now if anything I've just said has caused you some internal friction or you have just found very uncomfortable to get on board with then I understand and it's okay.

Well first you don't have to believe anything I say but I would recommend that you pay attention to that discomfort and ask the question or why is that there? Why am I feeling that resistance? I know that the majority of the people who listen to this podcast are aged between 35 and 55-ish. It does expand beyond that of course but I would say that the majority are within that sort of age range. So for everybody listening I ask you to in your mind go back 20 years from where you are now and ask yourself are all your beliefs, are all your ideas, your opinions the way that you thought, are they the same now as they were then? I would imagine I know certainly for myself that I have evolved and changed and grown and learnt enormously in that time frame.

So what was true for me 20 years ago might no longer be true for me now. And if that can be said for you and I then that can be said for others as well. Again just another element to consider when we're dealing with the words and actions of other people.

Speaking of others let's return to our hypothetical company. What could the employees do when they recognised that the amount they were getting paid at the end of each day was dropping? Well perhaps one of the employees, let's call her Alice, could suggest holding a team meeting to discuss the recent trend of declining investments. A neutral and non-accusational tone should be used to avoid defensiveness.

Then we could lead that into open discussion. Of course Alice could start by sharing her observations without singling anybody out. She can mention how in the beginning the collective trust helped everybody earn more but a lack of trust would eventually lead to nobody investing and everybody losing out.

To help try and incentivise the rebuilding of trust well you could establish a trust building period. For example Alice could propose a trust building period where for the next few days everybody commits to investing. They can all pledge their commitment in the meeting.

We could show immediate results. So for example after the trust building period the team can then meet again to discuss the outcomes and if everyone kept their commitment they'd see the immediate benefits reinforcing the importance of trust. At that point you could re-evaluate the system.

The team can consider adding measures to the system to promote trust. For example a minimum threshold of total investment that must be met for multiplication to occur. This could create a kind of all-or-nothing incentive promoting full participation.

You could consider having a neutral third party like a HR or a manager have them oversee the process. They can ensure full transparency without compromising individual anonymity. Of course these things always help best when it's just a gradual introduction.

So if the trust is completely broken the company can consider restarting the programme but introducing it gradually. For instance start with a lower multiplier and increase it as the trust is re-established. Finally it's always worth reflecting on these things so after a set period the team can then meet again to reflect on the outcomes, discuss any persistent issues and brainstorm solutions.

This reinforces the idea that trust is a continuous journey not a one-time act. Now this whole process correlates surprisingly well to trust in yourself. We've just spoken about how to potentially rebuild trust in a group setting but more importantly is how you build trust on your own in your own mind.

Because after betrayal it's not just a case of being betrayed by the other person. We've kind of been betrayed by ourselves too because we judged that person to be trustworthy and if we're to accept that at least a good proportion of trust comes from our ability to be trusting then we need to take that on the chin and acknowledge that we might have some room for improvement. This can be tough so it's an important part of the journey how to rebuild trust with yourself.

So given the method that we just used to help the team of people overcome the betrayal of Bob in this case, with Alice and her more logical rational approach we're going to do the same but internally. So the first step is introspection. This is the team meeting.

It's the scheduling the regular self-reflection sessions. These can be daily journaling sessions, thought downloads like you've heard me talk about before, meditative moments or just simply quiet times that you set aside to check in with yourself. Analyse why you might have lost trust in your own judgement or decisions.

One of the things that you can do at this stage is actually just ask yourself of examples of when you have been able to trust yourself and also examples of when you've not been able to trust yourself and just explore those. The next part is to acknowledge the past mistakes. This is kind of the open discussion part of the process.

Accepting and owning your past mistakes is the first step to moving forward. Recognising where you went wrong doesn't mean dwelling on it but understanding and actually forgiving yourself. Then you get to set clear goals.

This is like sharing the collective goal. Decide what you want to achieve in terms of self-trust. Is it being more decisive, trusting your intuition or maybe ensuring you don't ignore red flags in relationships.

Make these goals clear and tangible. The next part is to take small steps. This is establishing a trust-building period.

If you've lost trust in your ability to make decisions, start by making small ones and celebrating them. Each positive step will reinforce your self-trust. You can then acknowledge those achievements.

This is showing the immediate results like we did with the group. When you make progress, acknowledge it. This can be as simple as recognising a day when you fully trusted your intuition or made a difficult decision.

You can then create systems of check and balance. Basically re-evaluating the system. For self-trust this might mean always taking a moment to pause and reflect before making a decision.

Consulting with trusted individuals or always checking in with your core values before proceeding. Seek therapy or coaching. This would be the external moderation, the HR for example.

Just like the third-party oversight, a therapist or coach can provide an external perspective, helping you navigate complex emotions and decisions. Reset when needed. This is like the gradual reintroduction.

If you find yourself faltering, it's okay to reset and take a step back, reassess your goals and start again. Remember, building self-trust is a journey, not a destination. And finally, regularly evaluate and reflect.

Again, like we saw with the group, they ended with reflection. Set aside times, maybe monthly or quarterly, where you evaluate your progress in rebuilding self-trust and adjust your strategies as needed based on your reflections. Rebuilding self-trust, especially after a significant event like infidelity, requires patience, perseverance and consistency.

It's about reconnecting with yourself, understanding your core values and ensuring your actions align with them. With time and deliberate effort, trust can be restored, paving the way for growth and healing. And remember, everything that we've just spoken about, even if you rewind and listen to this back again, you make the notes.

Everything we've spoken about applies to how you would build trust with a partner as well. It's the same steps, it's the same process, we're just applying it in a different setting. Now, I feel like I could talk about this for hours and there are so many intricate elements to trust that I could explore, but for the sake of the length of this episode, I am going to call it a day at this point.

I hope that you found what I've shared today useful and you can take some parts from it to hopefully implement into your rebuilding of trust in your relationships. Obviously, if you have any questions or there's something that you're uncertain of or don't understand, then please reach out. You can always contact me directly, Luke at LifeCoachLuke.com and remember, don't forget there's the trust score quiz you can also take by visiting LifeCoachLuke.com forward slash trust score.

That's LifeCoachLuke.com forward slash trust score. I look forward to speaking to you all again next week.