BUILDING TRUST FOR A HAPPY BRAIN!

This is one of my favorite passages in “Habits of a Happy Brain: Retrain Your Brain to Boost Your Serotonin, Dopamine, Oxytocin, & Endorphin Levels” by Loretta Graziano Breuning.

 

— Direct human trust always comes with the risk of disappointed expectations and feelings of betrayal. Those bad feelings built circuits that fire when you think about trusting again. Your neurochemical alarm bells ring and your brain presumes there’s a good reason. But if you give up on direct interpersonal trust, your brain feels that something is missing. And it is: Oxytocin is missing. 

Start with small steps that don’t trip your alarm. Every time you feel good about an animal, a crowd, or a digital relationship, tell yourself “I am creating this good feeling.” It may sound silly or self-centered, but knowing that you are creating it gives it a chance to grow. There will always be reasons for distrust to grow, so a source of balance is precious.

Notice your trusting feelings from any source for forty-five days, and you will build a foundation that can ignite more.

Maybe there’s someone you want to trust, but you can’t bridge the divide. It’s good to know you can build trust with a long series of very small interactions. Individuals or groups with an unfortunate history cannot always wipe the slate clean all at once. Intermediate steps build trust gradually. The stepping stones can be placed so close together that neither party risks a big betrayal. Each step need only create positive expectations about the next step rather than resolve the whole problem. Each small experience of trust stimulates the good feeling of oxytocin, which connects neurons that help trigger more.

Divorce lawyers use this strategy to help a couple reach agreement. You might try it with that person who is “ruining your life.” Initiate a very small interaction, and if that proceeds without disaster, do it again. The goal is not to trust blindly and get disappointed. The goal is to build positive expectations.

Coexisting without trust is bad, but getting burned again is worse. So instead of taking a leap of faith with that crazy neighbor or the coworker who stabbed you in the back, you can find steps that are comfortable. For forty-five days, craft reciprocal exchanges that build stepping stones toward trust with difficult people. You can’t predict the results since you can’t control others. But you will expand your sense of control over the trust bonds in your life. This is hard work, and it may not feel good in the short run. But in the long run, it builds confidence that you can do something about those thorns in your side.

You might start by just making eye contact with that person who’s making your life difficult. The next day, you could comment on the weather, and add a smile the day after that. It could take a week to build up to a shared chuckle about traffic, and even that may stir up bad feelings that are curiously strong. But you will continue making neutral contact—neither venting anger nor rushing to please. In forty-five days, you will have built a new shared foundation. You may always need to limit your trust in this person, but you will be able to relax in his presence the way gazelles relax in a world full of lions.

Oxytocin works both ways. When other people trust you, it feels good whether or not you trust them. You can enjoy more oxytocin by creating opportunities for people to trust you.

— Natural selection rewarded those who fanned out from familiar turf. In the animal world, young males are often ousted from their natal groups, or they leave on their own initiative because they’re excluded from mating opportunities. They experience huge cortisol stress when they leave their trust networks for parts unknown, according to excretory samples taken in the wild. This stress intensifies when a new troop rejects them. But the seekers don’t give up. They keep trying to build trust bonds, because it feels great when they succeed.

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