Fear and Trust

I had a long meditation last night about trust.  When you accept, even in a minimal way, a friend back into your life who has hurt you so much in the past, and whom you have hurt as well, when is the point where you begin to trust?  I think many people would just rather let these ones from their past go forever, because the effort can be too hard and the chance for the same hurt, or worse, is there.  And yet what do you do if someone hwants to at least not be someone to fear, no matter if they continue to have contact with you or not?

There have only been two people in my life who really took ownership of their own part in some emotional debacle between us, and those are people who have a lifetime of some sort of real reflection.  Their ability to be honest about their part in a rift really helped me to look at my own part in it.  I tend to feel I am the only one at fault at things, and to feel right away that I do not have to take on all of the burden helps me.  Both people have proved to me over time that they are doing their best not to hurt again, and I have also tried to do this, however imperfectly I have done so.  But even so, I am always somewhat wary.  In time, perhaps I won't be.

What do you do when someone who has always been dear to you and with whom you have had the worst possible rift, begins to at least speak to you a little again, when there seems to be at least some effort at cordiality between you, so that maybe you feel you don't have to avoid every place in Santa Cruz for fear of running into them? We have all had something like this in our lives.

I believe the basis to resolve great hurt between people is to first and foremost reduce fear on both sides, and use that to build whatever bridge is to come, even if that bridge is just to be a courteous acquaintance.  Can anyone build any sort of bridge from ashes?   What if a person does not have benign intentions, but just wants to augur a knife in one more time, to be the "winner" with hurt, and to flaunt what they think is a better life now than when they were with you?  I tell myself that, in time, I will know, and am willing to expend some effort, knowing I might have to take it back again. I am willing to open the door just a bit.

I think it is possible, in time, to trust again, but some sort of emotional armor always seems necessary, at first...yet I am glad I am at least able to speak to this person again. 

I do have a conviction that, except in the worst circumstances possible, people can always reach for that original spark of caring, and that it takes courage to do so.  And a lot of people are far more courageous than they let on.