How to Earn Trust: The Most Valuable Currency

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Teach with Trust

For the past few articles, I have been writing about teaching with trust. I have discussed a few things:

Yet I haven’t tied it to the most crucial point. You earn trust by believing in something because it allows people to know where you stand.

Faithful Fatherhood

Your faith makes you a known quantity, and your ability to stick with that faith earns trust. I hope I have demonstrated how vital trust is to your kids when you teach them. There are too many sources of information available to them. All news is fake news today. The only way to rise above the noise is to own your faith. Declare and stick with a stance, a lens, through which you process the world. Can your lens improve and grow? Of course, but it needs to make logical sense.

All news is fake news today. The only way to rise above is to own your faith. #faith #trust Click To Tweet

Building trust from your faith lays a durable foundation that becomes more dependable over time. Your children can question it, check it out, and learn from it. They may disagree with it later, but they can at least see and understand where you are coming from. Dependability is an underrated skill and quality among my generation, but children never underrate it. Children listen to those they know they can trust.

How to change faith into trust

Remember, when I say faith, I don’t mean some particular religion. While I might be Christian, I know many professing Christians who have stronger faith in hard work or a sports team. I imagine it is similar to other cultural religions such as Atheism, Buddhism, Islam, or Judaism. The point is to know what you believe. Then stick with it and grow it.

Your faith makes you consistent. Consistency over time builds trust. Let me give you two examples.

Two examples

Seth Godin writes a blog post every day. Some days they are little more than a paragraph. Some days he digs in deep. Regardless, Seth shows up every day. What this demonstrates is that Seth will continue to show up because Seth believes in showing up. He continually communicates that to be a successful marketer, you have to show up consistently. He lives this practice in his blog posts. We know what Seth believes in, and that means we can trust him. It also had led to his success. The point is to know what you believe. Then stick with it and grow it.

The point is to know what you believe. Then stick with it and grow it. Click To Tweet

Or consider Donald Trump. His word is trusted over people smarter, more talented, and more honest than he is. How else can you explain the rise of notorious liar Donald Trump other than faith? He has always believed in his ability to overcome himself and anyone else against him. His belief in himself speaks to a portion of the American public that believes in themselves. They, too, should be able to rise and overcome by their abilities. Trump believes in American Individual Exceptionalism, and more than that, he believes in Donald Trump. So, his followers who also believe in American Individual Exceptionalism have shifted that same belief on to Donald Trump. Trump trades in trust.

Trust as Currency

So what does trust buy you? Well, in the case of Trump, it was the White House. In the case of Seth Godin, he has become the most trusted marketing authority. For you and me? It depends on your faith and what you are building.

When we teach, trust hammers the lesson home because trust involves our students in a deeper manner because there are deeper relationships. Benjamin Franklin once said, “Tell me and I forget. Teach me and I remember. Involve me and I learn.” Trust involves our students and brings them into deeper learning.

"Tell me and I forget. Teach me and I remember. Involve me and I learn." Benjamin Franklin Click To Tweet

For me, I leverage your trust to involve you in your faith and fatherhood. I believe better father-child relationships will fix something of what ails us as a society. Where does that belief come from for me? I believe in my Father, which leads me to believe in Christianity and the relationship between God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit.

What this buys me is fulfillment. Every dad who learns to love his kids better is a win.

What does trust buy you? Business success? Your marriage? A relationship with your child?

Trust buys the most coveted things in life. The currency of trust comes from your faith. I suggest you figure out what yours is, and use it to start building trust with the people that matter most to you.

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