2008-01-05-Trust and Trustworthiness

Session

Opening

EREGON, (TR, Jo Ann): Welcome, children of light! It is I, Eregon, your assigned teacher, though there is another here who would speak with you today as well. Today’s topic is “Trust and Trustworthiness.” This is a word and a concept, familiar to all of you. The concept itself has existed in your awareness and your relation to the world, even before you could speak or form words. The trust that a child, an infant has that it will be cared for, is unquestioned, it is inherent; it is built into you, designed into you. Think about it: An infant is not born into abject fear and panic—who will take care of me, who will meet my needs? An infant is born trusting. Even a newborn meets the eyes of its mother in loving trust, in awe and wonder, and the maternal instinct responds.

Lesson

So it is with your spiritual selves; there is a place in you where trust is inherent. Things may be learned in life to disrupt that trust, but for the most part, these kinds of trust function as planned, as designed, as built into you. Rejoice that this is so. For what kind of a life could you have, how could you enjoy, if you did not have this one great gift? You trust that the sun will rise each day; in reality, the planet will keep spinning, the seasons will come, you will keep rotating around your sun. You trust the trees will grow, the tides will flow, the rain and snow will fall, the rivers will run to the sea. You trust that your hearts will beat; you trust that your minds will perceive, your eyes will look around, your voices be able to speak. All these things are planned, built and designed for you, to enjoy and to appreciate—and yet, it is all right, it is more than all right, that you can take them for granted.

You see, the universe is to be trusted; God’s handiwork is to be trusted. You can rely on things being, and remaining a certain way. And then again, if you take a child who has this, an infant who has this inherent trust, and you betray that trust day by day, do not meet the child’s needs, do not feed it, do not pick it up and hold it when it needs comforting, do not put it down to sleep when it’s weary, do not help it learn to walk—you will create not only a tragedy, but a human being who has a great deal of difficulty functioning in both the material and the mindal realms, and the spiritual as well. For that trust that the loving parents bestow on a child, by being trustworthy themselves, is a necessary and a vital factor in your life’s journeys. If you could not trust, you would find it very difficult to function in most any arena of your life. Family, work, education, relationships, finances—even planting a garden—so we not only say to you, “enjoy your trust,” we say, “exercise your trust,” “appreciate your trust.” Look around in your life and see where the trust is most transparent, where you function with the greatest security—this would be where your trust levels are highest. And we say and suggest to you, that you can expand the trust in the areas that function well, into areas that function less well in your lives.

Very few people grow to adulthood, without a few experiences to shake their trust in some arenas of their life functioning. This can be filled in; you can allow the trust from areas that function well to overflow into those that are lacking in trust. And as for trustworthiness, the more you are able to trust, surprise—the more others will be able to trust you, because as you trust the universe, so do you use it as a model to become trustworthy yourself.

Let us clarify that as we say, “Trust the universe,” we are not talking about some mechanical functioning—although you can trust those things, the mechanical functionings of night and day, seasons and rotations, the stars in the sky and their patterns and forms—yes, those things you can trust in a mechanical way, but there is more to it. There is the love of the Father in Heaven and his spirit in each of your souls that you can trust implicitly. You can lean on this trust, far beyond what many of you—most of you—would attempt to do. And as it is good to love and be loved, it is also good to trust and be trusted. Perhaps you see this as one of the functions of love; it functions both within and without—it is an aspect of God’s love, that you can trust and rely on spiritual guidance, on that presence that loves and guides you.

So if you were to plan or to hope, create a project embracing the goal of increasing trust and trustworthiness, where would it be wise to begin? With young children, not only in the home, but also in the daycare situations, and as they go to school, in the school systems, how can these institutions be inspired to value trust and create situations where it is nurtured and grown? There are many places in institutions in your country, in your culture, in your government, where trust of individuals is being withdrawn, in respect to larger organizations. And when the trust is withdrawn, the trustworthiness recedes as well. When people perceive they are no longer trusted, when organizations/institutions perceive that they are no longer trusted, their motivation recedes, withdraws, diminishes. Trust and trust worthiness go hand in hand.

Many find it easy to trust things in which they already believe and hold dear, and they will be blind to inequities, to inconsistencies and hypocrisies, in those organizations in which they do fully trust. This is a factor of trust, in fact, that it overlooks the small inconsistencies. And sometimes the loyalty becomes so great, that even glaring inconsistencies, moving into the range of hypocrisies, are overlooked as well. How can this be balanced? How can those who are loyal and trusting, call upon their institutions to remain in high integrity, if they do not see the flaws? It is indeed a function of loyalty and trust, that when trustworthiness is faltering, teetering and questionable, it is a function of those who support these organizations, to call them back into their trustworthiness. If their loyalty is so great that they refuse to see the flaws, the inconsistencies, then they cannot be of a great use to their organization to which they are loyal.

Some people believe that trust is either total or nonexistent; we suggest that this is not so, that trust can be partial, relegated, conditional, even probationary. These aspects can exist even to those organizations, for instance churches or political parties, to which one is entirely loyal. It is still possible to call into question the actions or intentions of the few who might head this group at this moment in time. And we wish to state we are not speaking about any particular, exemplary institution, but asking you to apply these ideas and observations to all of the groups within which you function and exercise loyalty and trust. We ask you to recognize that total trust, complete unquestioning trust, feels good, is comfortable, but that it may not be the wisest course and the best thing to do, for the functioning of your group, whatever group that may be.

We ask you to see that your human institutions and organizations cannot be perfect. They must continue to grow their perfection and toward perfection, and nothing, no organization will grow if everyone believes it is perfect as it is. You must, as you go along, create higher ideals, new goals, new dimensions of service, higher levels of organizational equity and responsibility and idealism. No progress is ever made from a point of perceived perfection, and this is a truth. So we say to you, it is a responsibility to the organizations in which you function, to bring before them, ideals of a higher nature, so their progress can be made, so that growth can continue, so that ideals will come more fully into the organizations of human beings.

Would you be happy to pass on to your grandchildren, the world that you grew up in, before you were an adult, or do you want to give them something better, something more, something more beautiful? We hope that you want to provide something more beautiful, for those who exist in the future of your planet, your country, your government, and your town. Institutions do not grow through complacency. You do not need great quantities of conflict or huge controversies, in order to create progress. Once you have a group functioning, the trusts and the concept of growth and progressiveness, ideals of a higher nature will spring forth and be welcomed.

As an infant would be crippled in its ability to grow trust and love by being abandoned and abused at a very young age, so can the same thing be true of institutions and the people within them. If you perceive that an institution is corrupt, how much do you want to participate in it, if you are truly altruistic? Yet, within the very same institution may be individuals who have been involved with it for decades and no longer see it for what it truly is or what it has become. There are many places where the seeds of mistrust have been sown, and the ability to function is therefore threatened—at least the ability to function holistically and honorably—for if the only people who are willing to participate are those with low to no idealism, selfishness, greed and power as their goals, what is to become of such an organization? Even those who wish to withdraw from these organizations are asked to participate, for only by the participation of the trusting and trustworthy idealists, will organizations continue to grow towards perfection. So we ask you, do not withdraw in your discouragement and disillusionment.

We ask you to participate, even as a dissenting voice. Hold fast to your ideals, for the organizations in which you function. Call your fellows on their lack of idealism and trustworthiness. Even if this is uncomfortable, it is far less uncomfortable than functioning under a despotic organization, be it community, business or government. So we ask you to recognize and appreciate all the things that you can trust in the universe and its functioning, and the functioning of your world. Trust that if these natural things, so called, work with such great consistency that the God who designed them has also designed into each and every human being, a desire to function with such great trustworthiness and regularity. And many times, simply calling for it, calling to it from your heart to another individual’s heart, will bring it out and allow it to grow and blossom.

Many people function on a low level, simply because they believe that is the accepted standard. Standards must be raised for progress to be made. You cannot continually lower the bar and increase the quality of life at the same time. We hope and trust that our short lesson today has inspired you, and we have left time for questions and discussions.

Dialogue

Student: I have a question. My impression is this: When we are with an organization or individual or a family, or whatever… a connection of some sort, if somebody displays their untrustworthiness and there has to be trust to rebuild the trust, but it has been shone that there is not a basis for trust, how do you break that cycle? It’s going in and saying okay, well I’ve learned that I can’t trust here, and operating under that, which from a mental standpoint would make sense, actually and energetically builds that cycle of untrustworthiness. How do you break that?

EREGON: If you are speaking of individuals in a one-to-one relationship, discussion, openness, and if both parties are willing, an agreement more or less like a vow, to be made as to future actions. If you cannot have a heart-to-heart open discussion with this person, as to the effect of their behavior on the disruption of trust and the basis of relationship, then the opportunity for rebuilding trust is virtually non-existent. If you can come to an agreement that is more or less like a contract between the two of you, where if trust were violated, it would be very clearly delineated, then the opportunity to grow, to regroup, to rebuild, is present, and therefore the relationship is of value, has value and is likely to continue with the opportunity for growth. Is this a sufficient answer for you? (Yes, thank you.)

[Jo Ann: I’m hearing something about, “If you are talking about organizations like a state, or where you are talking about having to rebuild laws, that just simply adding more laws won’t do it, there has to be a different kind of process for group functioning.] (Long pause.)

EREGON: If there are no more questions, there are others here who would communicate with the group. We would request that you all open your hearts and minds for a moment or two, and be willing to share what might be coming through for each of you.

Pam: My personal guides are coming through. She is responding on the question of just a moment ago, about how to rebuild trust, when trust has been disrupted and what they are saying to me is that we must not the believe the evidence of our senses. The evidence of our senses may show that certain individuals or organizations are untrustworthy or dishonest or out to do us harm in some way, but at the deepest core level of their hearts and souls, all are trustworthy, all are created of that essence of God. When we start to believe the evidence of our human senses, our physical senses, we start to shut down the evidence of our deeper senses, which actually show us the truth, and the truth is, just go deeper. Just go deeper. All of the acting out we go by, the acting out of fear, all reacting out of anger, the need to control, it to move toward the blame, and as people react out of that, that’s not their divine nature, it’s their human nature, their animal nature. Just keep diving underneath that, underneath that, underneath that, expanding that divine nature through our attention on that. (Thank you, I think I understand.)

UNIDENTIFIED, (TR, Lynn): When someone isn’t trustworthy, you teach by example, and you say little everyday things like, “I promised to do this, so I need to follow through with it,” and you lead by example of what trustworthiness is like.

Jo Ann: Do any others have insights to share with the group? Very well then, we will close on this lesson, and there is another here who wishes to address you.

Closing

MICHAEL, (TR, Jo Ann): It is I, Christ Michael. I love you, my children. I love to fellowship with you. In the season of Christmastime, Christians around the world celebrated my birth and life here, and at the same time, I celebrated your love for one another. In my continuing love for you, as you came in and greeted each other today, did you realize that as you hugged each other, you were hugging God, you were hugging me? Whatsoever you do to anyone else, you are doing it also to me. And on this subject of trust, trustworthiness and love, it is correct that the God centered part of each person, is entirely trustworthy. How could it be otherwise? My love for all of you, my love for each of you, is boundless, endless. You cannot deplete it; on that you can rely, that I am constant, ever present, always with you, always the source of peace and love—in that you can trust. When you place your trust in this reservoir, you will find it boundless. I love you, my children. As you begin your New Year, new goals, new projects, please remember that I am always with you. Good day my children and go in grace. (Thank you.)