A few years back a psychologist helped me come to a conclusion on love – it has to be earned. No one gets a default feeling of love just because they are related to you, know you or were nice to you once in passing.

I loved the idea of my mother – a woman who cared for me, loved me, made sure my needs were met. I didn’t really have that, but was stuck on an idea of obligation of loving her because she birthed me. Truthfully, she only loved me when she needed something – attention, pity, affection or my social security number when her credit wore through.

Loving someone who doesn’t love you back, is using or manipulating you… not really a winning game. The same is true of trust and respect.

I like to give people the benefit of the doubt in the beginning – I’ll trust you unless you give me a reason not to. Tell me you’re going to be somewhere at a certain time and I believe you. Tell me you’ll work on a project, call me, change or whatever – I’m gullible enough to think you’re telling me the truth.

It’s the part of me that’s an optimist (it’s a very small part, most of me is a realist who thinks that people are designed to fail one another and that they like it), this idea that people are fundamentally good and want to help one another. I’ve always wanted to believe in the good in people, even though it’s seems to be the exception to the norm.

There are acceptable excuses for lying – surprise birthday parties or gifts, if you’ll hurt someone’s feeling (ex. “Honey, do these pants make me look fat?” – that could be self preservation as well) or if telling the truth would cause harm to others. I think that’s about it.

What really gets on my nerves is when someone says one thing one day but a completely different thing the next. When you try to bring up the old thing they look at you like you’ve gone nuts and it’s never happened (I guess it’s reasonable that I’ve gone nuts, not something I’ve considered on the matter… I’ll consider it). Changing your tune when the evidence is there in front of you just to get something accomplished – this should not be how it’s done.

Yesterday “this is because of this” but tomorrow “this is because of that”… maybe I just need to surround myself with better liars who can keep track of which story to tell.

Or manipulating a person to get what you want – that usually involves lying and deception as well.

I’ve always found it best to be upfront about those things. If you want a particular result and I can help you get there – tell me. Don’t fuck around with my trust, belief and respect in you… just say it. I don’t do subtle well either… just spit it out. I’m a goal oriented, hard working person who gets a certain satisfaction out of doing the job… why would you fuck with that?

So you trust and respect someone – in life or business and they start to lie or manipulate you… why wouldn’t you stop believing in their dreams, goals and the very words that come out of their mouth?

If that person is a part of your own goals, say a linchpin in the plans you’ve made for yourself and they start lying… well then you need to consider your future and look at what you’ve started to build and if it’s worth continuing or not.

It’s hard to think I invested so much in a future that isn’t solid.