Is He or She Trustworthy?
How to know if you can trust someone or, not? Is he or she trustworthy?
If you pay attention you can usually tell if someone is worthy of your trust early on. People are generally fairly transparent unless they have a form of psychopathy or are a highly trained government spy.
Early on, people give us clear signals which could alert us to whether they can be trusted, or not, though in most cases we overlook the warning signs because we desire to seek out and believe the best in people, especially those we may have the potential of developing a relationship with.
First off, you feel comfortable about the idea of trusting them. Now this may be a false positive, but it is rarely a false negative. If your first impression of a person is that they appear to be trustworthy, more often than not you will be right. On the other hand, if your first impression of someone is that they cannot be trusted, you’re probably right.
Observing how a person acts and reacts will help to give you more supportive information as to whether someone can be trusted, or not, such as do they appear to trust others, or are they more suspicious of others. There’s a pretty good chance, if they are unable to trust others, it is probably because they know they themselves cannot be trusted. If you can’t trust yourself, how can you trust someone else? An early indicator might be impulsivity. If they can’t trust themselves, their ability to control their own actions, then there’s a good chance your faith or trust in them may be misguided. People who are worthy of your trust are usually able to demonstrate an adequate level of self-control.
Trustworthy people are more compassionate and willing to compromise for the greater good, while someone who is unwilling to compromise might not be able to be trusted to do the right thing. These observations can be noted on the smallest scale and extrapolated out to the more important things of life. For instance, if you have an impromptu meeting after work with co-workers about a particular project and you invite the new hire along, if he or she declines the invitation because he or she is tired, you can reasonably expect that this person will opt out of more important obligations if they are not feeling up to it. Which in itself is not a bad thing, but what if you’re depending on this person to follow through on something of great importance? You will look back on this early warning sign, slap your forehead and say, “I knew it.”
If you can’t trust someone with the smaller details, then you probably can’t trust them with the big ones. If someone is not telling the truth about how long they took for a coffee break, or lie about where they went on their lunch break, even though these may seem inconsequential, they are early warning signs of someone who is comfortable with not telling the truth. Even though they might be white lies or they might have purposefully withheld particular details which may not be cause for alarm, these can be indications that trouble may be brewing down the line when the stakes are much higher. If someone can be trusted with small, inconsequential details, then there’s a good chance they can be trusted with more important details.
Making excuses, justifying their missteps, or blaming others could be early indications that someone can’t be trusted, for trustworthy individuals are far more likely to take full responsibility for their actions. You know what to expect from someone who can be trusted. If they say they are going to do something, they do it. If they give you a head’s up that they might not be able to perform to an expected level, and they do not, they were honest and forthright, giving you fair warning. While untrustworthy individuals are more likely to make promises knowing they are unlikely (if not unable) to keep them, then make excuses or blame someone or something else for their inability to follow through with their commitment(s).
The only real way to know if you can trust someone, or not, is to trust them with something small at first. Then sit back and see what happens. If they prove that they can be trusted with this, then you can move on to other, more important issues. Sometimes trusting someone allows them to raise their own personal bar of integrity, answering the call with trustworthiness. Giving them the opportunity to show themselves as trustworthy might actually make them worthier of your trust in him or her.