A Bias For Trust Seth Godin

Two very simple truths:

a. Don't waste your time initiating relationships that aren't going to thrive and benefit both sides.
b. Productive connection requires mutual trust. You can't empathize with someone you don't trust.

If you enter an engagement filled with wariness, alert for the scam, the inauthentic and the selfish, you'll poison the relationship before it even starts.

Those you deal with won't be challenged to rise to your expectations of excitement and goodwill. Instead, they'll struggle in the face of your skepticism.

Instead of seeking and amplifying the sharp edges, consider focusing on the dignity and goodwill of the people you're working with.

Sure, there are people out there who will disappoint you. But expecting to be ripped off poisons all your interactions instead of saving you from a few dead ends.

An open mind and an open heart usually lead to precisely that in those that you are about to deal with. Perhaps we should give people a chance to live up to our trust instead of looking for the gotcha.

Just last week someone to whom I’d given some seriously great advice (which she acted on!) asked me in a Seminar after asking sceptical question after sceptical question if she had to make a choice to join B1G1 today.

I said, “Yes you do.” And then I quickly said, “Actually, what I just said to you had nothing to do with you joining B1G1. You don’t have to join B1G1 now — you can do it whenever you want. What I just gave you when I said ‘Yes, you do have to do it now’ was mentoring advice. It was advice for your entire business not advice about B1G1. Just let go. Do things now. Trust. And your business will blossom.”

Seth says it much more profoundly than I do. But we share the same conviction. Let’s say it again; ‘Perhaps we should give people a chance to live up to our trust instead of looking for the gotcha.’

Brilliant advice, Mr. Godin.