How do you know if you should trust someone?

People break and the ones you think you know do things you never thought they would.

By Nedroj Walker

Friendship is a beautiful thing. I have asked for trust and trust has been asked of me. There is someone whom I gave all I had and she is broken now and can give nothing back. She is a lesson, but not that I shouldn't trust again. For I have asked another for a great favor, and he has given it to me. He trusts me more then my family who had refused my request.

In hard times people naturally lose some willingness to endanger their personal world for the sake of those outside. Help that risks little or nothing is easy. The true test of the heart comes when the risk is true and deep.

Romantic relationships swirl with emotions. Commitment is a risk. Opening your heart to another and having it cut out is a fear that cripples.

The woman that I helped is a friend only. The help was mostly monetary. I fear that guilt and failure has dug itself deep into her soul. I sense that she is broken. I think back to that first decision to help her. I wavered back and forth. On the one hand I was correct to think I shouldn't have. At the time I recognized many of her failings. But I needed to help her. I wanted to be a part of something I could dream about. This wasn't a scheme. This was an ideal and I felt it would be something I could talk about if nothing else.

Then much later I gave big help, several times more money. I gave almost all I had. It was real. I was still thinking of her flaws but I couldn't let go of my first investment. Besides she had a charm that I felt would bring her success, especially with me around to check up on her business. But the environment is not a gift. It just is, and it doesn't need to respond the way I want it to.

I was cut out of the loop. She arranged a sort off payment plan and now has had her checks bounce twice. Her eviction proceedings begin today, and I'm living off my credit card.

My fiancee trusts me. I felt horrible giving her this update, but I am not yet broken so I have to tell her. She trusts me, but she is afraid. If I don't find work soon. We won't be able to be together and I will break myself. What I will be afterwards is something too dangerous to trust.

So the moral is, trust is part of a healthy heart but the mind should recognize the circumstances which may cause someone to break and be ready to face what you wouldn't have believed.