Trust Ledger
We are nearly bankrupt on our trust
I have mentioned trust as a ledger item in some of my other stacks. To this point, I have failed to communicate just how important trust is for us.
I know I have mentioned the trust battery popularized by Tobi Lutke. The trust ledger works just as you would expect. You take actions that build or deplete trust. You want this ledger to be in the black; however, it can dip into the red if you also have an old and weathered ledger.
The history of the ledger matters. If you meet someone and go immediately into debt, that debt likely has interest that compounds at a very high rate. Imagine going to a bank, opening an account, and immediately taking out money with a loan. Your rate will be much higher than if the bank has a history with you.
If you have a long history with someone and take a hit to trust, they will be more willing to forgive.
If you have built up a lot of credit based on trust, you can likely get away with more. On the other hand, trust is also one of those fickle things where you can build up a ton of credit and lose it with one action. I don’t think I need to come up with an example.
Trust is also permeating; I don’t think anyone could comprehend such a world without it.
We know we trust the people close to us, but what about other things we may take for granted?
When you drive, you trust people will not cross lines they shouldn’t. Yes, people break these, yet you can be fairly certain most don’t.
You trust the school with your kids.
You trust that grocery stores will have the food you are looking for.
When you play or watch sports you trust the appropriate rules will be utilized.
When you buy stuff online, you trust the item will get to you. In the case it doesn’t, you trust there is someone to complain to so you can get a new item or your money back.
Banks are insured, if something happens you can get the money you have deposited.
You pay for insurance and trust that you will be protected when you need to use it.
We used to be able to trust that we go to college, get a job, and retire after a long career.
I think you can see the tide turning in my words.
When trust degrades it gets messy. I know I have mentioned the public goods game before. For a refresher, it’s a behavioral economics game to see how people react when someone violates social contracts and takes advantage of others. People often find a way to free-ride the economics of the game.
Similarly, when trust and social contracts are violated, we tend to violate more freely.
I have seen far more cars treat red lights as optional. When that happens and you don’t see them face the consequences for their trust violation, others follow.
In this clip, Simon discusses our social contract. We allowed people (he uses alphas; I don’t like that term) who would take the protection role to have more. We did this because it worked for our survival. We would have all died out if we had never discovered trust and groups.
Now, it seems we have lost the plot. We have gone so far into an individualistic, pull-up-by-your-bootstraps mentality that we have disregarded all trust, teamwork, and community.
Companies will cast you aside for their shareholders. This is actually why my invisible ledger theory started. The vast majority of companies do not take care of their own anymore. Should we talk about trust violations and return-to-office mandates?
Insurance companies are incentivized to deny claims.
The people/entities we pay more to protect us don’t.
The social contract no longer holds.
As young people in the United States, we no longer know if we will be able to stop working at any point in our lives. So we started asking ourselves, what is this all for?
The trust of the future security is gone. Now we have employers that don’t trust employees and vice versa, leading to an incredibly fragile system.
We have become so isolated and split from each other it’s dangerous.
How many of you know your neighbors and would let them hold a package for you?
The phrase “it takes a village” has never been more true, yet we are further than ever from trusting any “village”.
Trust is a self-perpetuating cycle and it matters which way it spins. More trust lends to more trust. More distrust leads to more distrust.
The government has created about as much trust debt as it has with actual money. It doesn’t matter what side you are on. They are constantly betraying the people that vote for them and THEY WORK FOR!
We forget the government is here to serve us.
All we have seen is “the other side is evil” and pitting groups against each other for some agenda that is not the one of the people.
Take the California wildfires for example. We should all be saying this is horrible, how do we support the people in need, and how do we do our best to ensure this doesn’t happen again?
Instead, it is just attacking the other group for mistakes.
As Adler says we have 3 choices.
Poor me.
That bad person.
What should we do from now on?
I am not seeing much of #3 even though it should be the only option.
It goes back to groups
I wrote about groups and identity a few stacks ago. We associate with people we can identify with and create bonds with. Right now those groups are like magnets. You get pulled into one and repel anyone outside of it.
The last book I read before writing this was “The Myth of Left and Right”. It highlighted how left and right are just groups with intersubjective realities. The beliefs of your group change over time. You tend to love what your group does and hate what the other group does even when it seems hypocritical. I have seen countless videos where they give a quote, the person disagrees with it because they think it’s the other side then agree when they find out it’s the side they belong to!
It’s time to stop this and see people as complicated beings. The book “Outraged” builds a case for how complex we are. Our moral judgments are based on harm and what harm can mean to different people is… complicated.
We all have stories.
We all have shit going on.
We all have different experiences.
We are all angry and afraid right now.
I was talking with a colleague and she said “It’s not that they hate (the thing), it’s that they don’t understand”.
We were talking about work and it pertains to life as well.
If you have that feeling of hate, figure out why. Learning more to understand a perspective will ease your hate.
Where do we go from here?
Our trust is in the red all over the board. We need to work on paying down the debt. We can’t do much about the horrendous debt businesses and governments have amassed. However, we can take small actions in our own lives to move forward.
If enough of us can take small actions, maybe we can trim down others' debts.
With that, what can we do?
Assume Positive Intent
This one is tough without focusing on your thoughts. We tend to have a self-serving bias, which means that some of our actions are due to internal factors, whereas others are due to character traits. For example, “I made that mistake because I was tired.” Others make the same mistake because they don’t focus or work hard enough.
We have to start assuming they are much more like us. They cut me off not out of malice but because they have to get home quickly to poop.
Yep, I just used poop in an essay about trust. I did say it gets messy.
Trust First
This goes along with positive intent and starts the positive trust flywheel. If you trust first it will lend itself to others trusting. It can be a pay-it-forward of trust. I am not saying trust everyone for everything for any reason. What I am saying is, to look out for opportunities and take them as often as possible.
There will always be people that do bad things and violate trust. Why do we give them so much power that we stop trusting all others?
Quit the Rage Click Bate
Anger and rage at people through the internet have crushed us. We are constantly engaging in Us vs Them rage even when it may not be true.
When online and you see something that triggers you, stop. Take a minute to figure out why that may be stirring up rage. Consider other sides. Every time someone posts something, it’s for a reaction. They frame things to get you to see them with their slant. I am doing that right now!
Take a minute and breathe. Zoom out and figure out why you are so angry or why someone wants to make you feel this way.
One of my favorite points from “Outraged” is we doom scroll social media when we are lying in bed or on the toilet. These are places where we have heightened senses of danger and vulnerability. When we go to sleep we are exposed and the other we literally have our pants down.
Therefore, it makes sense these posts have a larger impact on how we feel.
For example, here is some recent “online drama” which was a Philidelphia Eagles player reading a book on the sidelines.
Why!?! Why does this have to be a thing we make dramatic?
And no it’s not a link. I am not going to give you easy access to this clickbait.
Why can’t the commentator say “Player likes to read on sidelines to calm the mind during games”? That would promote literacy and healthy mental strategies.
Instead, we get banter about if it’s appropriate.
Something that could be positive is spun, why? Because it gets the clicks
Give your clicks to positivity.
If you want more perspectives here are wonderful podcasts about trust and community. Trust is built on community. Thanks, Adler.
We are in a dangerous and sticky situation. The total collapse of community and trust feels immanent and I hope we can course correct.
I will attempt to bring us together instead of pushing us further apart.
Until next time…
