47: Trying to build trust in your marriage doesn't work

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Episode Transcription

Welcome back to the Road to Life Podcast with Meredith and Craig. Hello, Meredith. Hello, Craig. What are we talking about today, Meredith?

We're talking about trust. We're talking about building trust. A lot of people seem to be wanting to focus on trust and focus on building trust and people want more trust in their relationship. Which is admirable. Totally get that.

Yep. For sure. However, focusing on trust is not the answer. Focusing on trust is not going to work. And what I mean by that is trust is a byproduct. It's the outcome that you get when you Create a happy, healthy, thriving marriage. When you show up every day and consistently show up. When you do the things to be present, be there in your marriage, to be fully engaged in your marriage.

Trust is the outcome that comes out of that. It's not something that you can focus on and build in a silo. You can't isolate trust and build trust. Like here's my phone. Go through it. Yeah. That, that doesn't build trust. No, it actually breeds mistrust. Here's where I am at all times here. Track my phone. Like there are circumstances where maybe that is necessary if there's been a huge issue in the marriage, but, but talking day to day building trust to your point, it's a by product. It's when you show up every day as the best version of you, and show up as the spouse that you want to have in the marriage.

That's when you start building trust with the other person. The other person sees, your spouse starts to see, huh? They're showing up every day. They're consistently there for me. They're consistently making me feel seen, heard, valued, respected. They're validating my feelings. They're not dismissing me.

They're showing up and loving me the way that I like to be loved or I need to be loved. They're showing me appreciation. I feel appreciated. I feel I feel like when we're in a conversation that you're in it with me, like we've got actual quality, dedicated time. I feel like a partner. We feel like partners in this marriage.

Like we're a team going through life, kicking ass and taking names together as a team. That's how you start building trust. It's not, one activity of here, like check my phone, go through my texts. Like that isn't it. There isn't a secret sauce, secret formula for building trust in a marriage, especially if it's been damaged through infidelity or whatever.

It's just, it takes time and consistency. It's showing up every day and doing the things and showing your spouse that you are a different person than the person who cheated. If there wasn't infidelity in the marriage, the same rules apply. It's still about showing up, being there being engaged, an active participant in this marriage so that when we spend time together, you're there too.

You're not scrolling your phone. You're not writing emails in your head. You're not making to do lists. You're actually in the moment in the marriage with your spouse.

It's also letting them in, being vulnerable, sharing what's going on with you. That's going to build a lot of trust. It's also going to have you incredibly connected and build a lot of intimacy. Trust is a byproduct of that. If you can share what you're afraid of, what's keeping you up at night, the problems you're experiencing, the goals you have, the dreams you have, the things you're working toward.

If you can let your spouse in regularly so that they know what's going on with you, that builds an incredible amount of trust as a byproduct of actually building a lot of intimacy and connection with your spouse.

Another thing that provides a lot of trust as a byproduct is apologizing. Apologizing.

Taking accountability, taking 100 percent accountability in your marriage oftentimes means apologizing here and there. So if you're sincere with your apologies and you're generous with your apologies, that actually builds a lot of trust in your marriage. You're not apologizing so that you can build trust.

You're apologizing because you're accountable for what you've done and that's the kind of person that you are. But that also builds a lot of trust with your spouse. As a byproduct. They actually got a whole episode on apologizing and how to do a sincere apology. So we'll link that episode in the show notes so that, you know, if you want to know what makes a really good apology, we've got you.

And we talk about this all the time, but checking in. It's so simple, but it's so effective. Check in, just ask some questions at the end of the day. What was the best part of the day? What was the worst part of the day? Is there anywhere where I can support you going forward? is there anything that you're struggling with that you need my help with?

Yeah. Cause when you ask a specific question, you're going to get a thoughtful answer. Yeah. When you ask a generic question, you get a generic, how was your day today? Fine. How was yours? Mine was good too. Yeah. As opposed to asking something really specific that gets you a thoughtful, what was the best part of your day today?

Then I have to stop and think about what that actually was. It was recording a podcast with you. Okay. Obviously. Totally. No, but it's, it's just going a level deeper than the surface level: how was your day? What's for dinner? Right. Oh, I hate that question. Let's just talk about it for another day. Cause when you do that, when you check in with me and ask me those questions, it, it, It makes me feel like you care, that you're actually want to be a part of my day.

And that, again, the reason you do that is because you care and you want to be a part of my day. That's why it's showing that. But because I'm feeling that, that also builds trust. I trust you because you're showing up for me. So checking in is a way of showing up consistently day in and day out for your spouse.

100%. Another one. You're a team. Show up as a team. That means helping out. Pitching in. Doing some of the things around the house that need to be done. It's not putting it all on one person. It comes back to taking accountability. Yeah. When you take 100 percent accountability for your marriage, for the life that we're leading here, and you see something that needs to be done, someone who takes 100 percent accountability It just does the thing instead of waiting for the spouse to do the thing because usually they do that garbage is gonna sit there I I've took it out last time that garbage is gonna sit there for a week Stinking rotting garbage waiting for someone and then and then the other person's thinking I took it out They didn't in the last little while I'm gonna wait and then you're both waiting on each other It becomes a game and Nobody wins.

People probably think we've got stinking garbage in our kitchen at all times because that's our go to example for some reason but we both actually take out the garbage quite a bit. You probably the most actually because you've got the most tuned in I get a little hint of any sort of whiff of garbage, it rocks my world.

The garbage is half full and it's gone. It's gotta go.

And then I think a sneaky underrated way that you build trust is through fun. Totally. Yes. Through fun is, is building connection through adventure, exploration, fun, play, like get out and do things together. And. Enjoy the, enjoy the world together. And when you do that, you can't help but have happy, good feelings with each other, you build a connection, you build trust with each other, you show up for each other.

When you go out for a walk, play tennis or pickleball, pickleball, or go to a pub and have a beer and whatever together, whatever your thing is. You're building connection. You're building trust with one another. We've said it before, but fun is sort of the underrated foundation of your relationship.

It's the foundation upon which trust is built. Connection is built. Intimacy is built. Communication. All of those things come from fun.

So all of these things, while Trust is not the point of doing them. Trust is the by product. Trust is the outcome that comes when you put all these together. You're building trust by doing all of these things. There isn't like a thing, a to do that's going to build trust. Like a trust thing.

It's consistent daily action of all the other things in your marriage builds the trust. Like there's no secret bullet, I guess is what I'm trying to say for trust. There's no magic pill for trust. It's just showing up consistently.

So if you're struggling with or have been struggling with trust in your marriage, think of it as consistent daily action. Plus time is going to get trust. So it's showing up and doing the little things in your marriage that you would do that you would want to be doing anyway.

That's how you build trust. Because trust cannot be built by itself. It can't be built in a vacuum. It's connected to everything else. So if you think, I'm just going to share my location with you. I'm just going to let you go through my phone. All of those things that you think build trust in a vacuum that are strictly for trust. They, they don't, they're not doing much, but if you showed up every day, and you listened to your spouse, you checked in, you validated their feelings, you checked in with them and see how their day was and see how you could support them.

Mm-Hmm. . And then you followed through and did support them. Mm-Hmm. with whatever it was they needed. And you let them in to what's going on with you. Yeah. And you apologized 'cause you take a hundred percent accountability in your marriage. Right. You do the things, you act like a teammate. All of those things build trust.

We know that this episode was helpful for you. And we'd be honored if you'd share this episode with a friend who might also benefit from this episode. Plus we've got a great Facebook group called marriage reconnection for empty nesters. Where we share strategies and tactics to help you transform your marriage.

We do live trainings in there. Plus you get to join other couples working on their marriages to for accountability support. Celebration. We love to see you in there. You can join [email protected] forward slash groups forward slash Meredith and Craig. Can't wait to see you there.

And on that note, we will see you next week. Bye for now.