A friend recently called to tell me she was overlooked for yet another promotion. “My boss micromanages me, and she keeps ignoring me when it’s time for a promotion.” While she likely was experiencing some level of bias, I thought through her predicament from a different lens.
“When someone doesn’t trust you, it comes down to two things: they think you’re incompetent, or they think you lack integrity. Does she think you lack integrity or does she think you aren’t very bright?” I asked directly.
She was unsure in her reply, which led me to respond: “The real issue is you may not trust yourself. The bigger problem isn’t when others don’t trust you. It’s when you don’t trust yourself.” Stick with me.
TRUST IS AT THE FOUNDATION OF EVERYTHING
Without trust, productivity collapses. People won’t be vulnerable or honest about their struggles. They avoid conflict, which means they never truly commit to solutions. This breeds a culture where no one holds anyone accountable, and everyone prioritizes their own success over team results, as is covered in the 5 Dysfunctions of a Team.
With trust? Teams lean into difficult conversations, commit with clarity, hold each other accountable, and stay laser-focused on collective goals. Trust literally changes brain chemistry and increases productivity by 50% (Zak, 2017).
There’s a foundational academic paper that breaks trust into ability, benevolence, and integrity (Mayer et al., 1995). Let’s dive in.
COMPETENCE VERSUS INTEGRITY
Competence issues are fixable. When you intend to complete a project but fail, that’s an execution gap. You can learn. You can improve. You can rebuild trust through consistent effort, strategic thinking, and progress.
The classic hero’s journey proves this: the janitor who became CEO, the immigrant who arrived with three dollars and built an empire. These stories show expertise can be developed, regardless of context. Trust based on ability can be restored through: technical expertise, proven track record, reliability in delivering results, problem-solving, and sound decision-making (Mayer et al., 1995).
Integrity issues? Devastating.
I once knew someone who used unethical business practices to climb to the top. He got the 6-figure book deal. The incredible title. When his methods were exposed in a public scandal, he lost everything overnight. The warning signs were there — he was also known for infidelity. I never made an effort to restore our professional relationship. I didn’t trust him then. I don’t trust him now.
When you repeatedly make decisions without regard for others, it becomes your operating system. What people call “karma” is the natural consequence of systematically destroying trust through lack of integrity.
Unlike competence, integrity is about character. Once someone sees you as dishonest or morally compromised, every future action gets filtered through that lens. Even if you genuinely change, the skepticism remains. The damage requires active and prolonged effort to undo.
Integrity-based trust requires: honesty and transparency, fairness in how you treat people, consistency between your values and actions, accountability for your decisions, genuine care for others’ well-being, long-term commitment to trustworthy relationships, and avoiding self-serving behavior at others’ expense (Mayer et al., 1995).
But trust and competence are broad concepts. To understand whether you — or someone else — has a trust problem, you need a more granular framework.
YOUR TRUST SCORECARD
Brené Brown created a framework that breaks down exactly what trust looks like. Think about someone you don’t trust right now. Score them on her BRAVING framework:
B - Boundaries: Did they respect what’s okay and what’s not?
R - Reliability: Did they do what they said they’d do?
A - Accountability: Did they own their mistakes?
V - Vault: Did they protect confidences, or share information that wasn’t theirs to share?
I - Integrity: Did they choose courage over comfort, or did they protect their peace over the truth?
N - Non-judgment: Could you ask them for help without feeling shame?
G - Generosity: Did they assume positive intent?
Now here’s where it gets interesting: run yourself through this framework.
What do you think so far?
DO YOU TRUST YOURSELF?
Self-trust is the first casualty of shame or betrayal. When you hurt others or fail to act with integrity, you don’t just damage external relationships — you lose trust in yourself. Arguably the most important stakeholder.
This shows up everywhere:
Someone rebuilding sobriety is essentially rebuilding self-trust
An athlete recovering from an ACL tear is learning to trust their body again (50% never return to sport)
A parent snapping at their kid and ignoring the emotional fallout is creating disconnection — not just from the child, but within themselves
Someone being afraid to drive after a car accident
Someone getting anxious at standardized testing after performing poorly
Brown talks about how, in pursuing sobriety, the biggest reward was regaining self-trust.
But self-trust doesn’t exist in a vacuum. It’s shaped by how we see ourselves — and how others see us.
THE FOUR PERSPECTIVES THAT SHAPE YOU
You are always subject to 4 perspectives, per the Uffe Elbæk Model:
How you see yourself
How you’d like to see yourself
How others see you
How others would like to see you
The best way to determine where you think your gaps are, versus the public POV, is the Uffe Elbæk Model. Fill this yourself then have a partner or friend fill it. Where are the gaps?
WE LIVE IN A WORLD WHERE OTHERS’ PERSPECTIVE CAN CREATE OUR OWN SELF-IMAGE
I don’t have my kids online. I used to. I didn’t think it was that nefarious — I don’t profit off them and they exist. Then I realized that a narrative was taking shape for each kid. My understanding of their personality was molding a persona they’d be expected to step into, anywhere they are recognized.
I had two serious forces working against my kids via my naivety: it’s very easy to form a first impression, per the neuroscience, but very hard to form a second. Because it’s cognitively heavy for the recipient. And when you tell kids who they are, they believe you.
I was making a mold they had to step into, and live up (or down) to — depending on my impression of them.
Every good story has a hero. A villain. A muse. My kids won’t be the internet’s hero, villain, or muse.
Which brings me to a bigger problem with how we shape identity — not just for our kids, but for ourselves.
HOW WE TEACH DISCONNECTION BY ACCIDENT
A friend recently told me about her daughter having a meltdown before school, crying about being late. She started rushing her out the door, but once they got to the car and her daughter kept crying, she stopped. Nothing spectacular for any parent — we’ve all been through it. Some of us may see it every morning.
But my friend turned off the ignition. She turned around, stared her child in the eye, and kindly asked: “This isn’t about being late. What’s going on?”
What’s the most interesting insight so far?
Her daughter opened up: “You yelled at me on the way out.”
She had an opportunity to connect.
Parents hold all the power. Everything we do shapes our kids’ future sense of self. She could have said “calm down,” “you’re fine,” “stop crying” — which teaches kids their internal signals are wrong. This is the origin of adult self-distrust. The research on interoceptive awareness and parental invalidation shows that dismissing children’s emotions leads to poor emotional regulation and distrust of their own internal states in adulthood (Linehan, 1993).
When someone with less power (like a child) expresses pain and the person with more power responds with interest or empathy, the relationship strengthens and builds confidence.
When that disconnection is ignored? The person loses touch with their inner world. Disconnection from others becomes disconnection from self.
And nowhere is this disconnection more visible — or more dangerous — than in how we use technology.
BEING CHRONICALLY ONLINE
I was on TikTok and someone said something that caught my attention: being chronically online might be the marker of future failure.
Honestly, I agree.
Why? The first reason is math. More time online = less time doing. But also because most goals happen in alignment with others. Real connection requires presence. Connection is the energy between people when they feel seen, heard, and valued — when they can give and receive without judgment.
But we disconnect. We get online to avoid people, deadlines. We let hours melt into brain rot and avoid conversations with our kids and spouses.
The disconnection breeds further issues. Disconnection registers in your brain the same way physical pain does. Social neuroscience confirms that social pain and physical pain share the same neural pathways (Eisenberger & Lieberman, 2004).
There are three forms of disconnection in Brown’s book:
Social rejection - being pushed out of a relationship or group
Social exclusion - being left out or ignored
Isolation - being physically or emotionally cut off
Being chronically online often results from rejection or exclusion, but its most common danger is isolation.
Here’s the paradox: to break free from isolation, you need to be future-focused. But you can’t be future-focused while drowning in consumption.
YOU HAVE TO BE FUTURE FOCUSED
There’s a lot of hype around Taylor Swift this week. She released an album and it’s getting both praised and trashed. Nobody can deny her success, and I think it’s due to one primary factor: Taylor Swift outworks most people. Taylor Swift is dream driven; she is overly invested in the future.
She performed 149 shows across 51 cities on five continents over 21 months, with each concert running over 3 hours and 15 minutes. And recording an album mid-tour. Love her or hate her, she outworks most people. And sees the results as proof.
I’m not commenting on all the things working in Taylor’s favor, her talent or team or any of the factors that play in her favor. But she works. You can’t deny that she works and she works a lot, and that she’s future focused.
I always talk about how founders have to start out naive. And I saw this model that nailed the argument for me.
As a young founder, we were optimistic and naive about the realities of a business, but we didn’t care. We trudged through the good times and bad times, bad outweighing the good. Because we were future focused. And if we were reality driven, I’m not sure we would have gotten as far as we did.
We were dream driven.
I truly believe as a founder you have to be naively optimistic — until you reach the point of the journey where the naive optimism converts into poor judgment, at which point the same optimism can kill you. This alone needs an essay.
All in all, being future focused does not align with being chronically online. Or any form of consumption. Being future focused hinges on doing, not consuming.
But here’s the twist: you can also be too disconnected.
BEING CHRONICALLY OFFLINE
A friend looked at my phone recently. “397 unread texts?!”
“And 364 unread WhatsApps,” I continued, “and who knows how many emails or notifications because I turn those off.”
We’ve all heard ramblings around the dark side of being online — 24/7 work access leading to workaholism, and other more generic points.
But the less examined angle, wholly from my perspective, is the never-ending layer of expectations we put on ourselves by thinking it’s reasonable to be a message away from any person at any time.
We know that responding to texts and answering emails leads to a disruption in focus, so I don’t prioritize them. It’s not due to a dislike of anyone, rather a mental capacity issue. I’m comfortable with having hundreds of unread messages and apologizing to a friend when I realize I hadn’t seen their birthday message til months later.
But these expectations, more often, lead to a sense of guilt. I am a good person, doing something wrong. Leading to us perpetuating disconnection because you’re worried the person on the other side thinks ill of you. Leading to...more disconnection.
I’m not here to tell you to ghost everyone. I do my best to scan messages and reply when it’s time sensitive or from someone in my inner circle. But the expectation that we can be available — always — for anyone who has the 10-digits-to-our-attention at all hours of the day is profoundly unrealistic.
This section may seem counterintuitive to my upcoming section on loneliness. Because I strongly believe connection must be fostered, and I have a rock-solid circle of friends/family that I’m grateful for every day. Most of these articles are informed by a stimulating conversation with someone I trust and hold in high regard.
It’s mostly to say that boundaries have never been more needed.
Because when we fail to set boundaries — when we’re either too online or too disconnected — we end up in the same place: profoundly alone.
THE LONELINESS EPIDEMIC
When Surgeon General Vivek Murthy referred to loneliness as an epidemic amidst a global pandemic, I saw eyes roll.
But he was onto something.
Long before him, social neuroscientist John Cacioppo described loneliness as a biological warning system — like hunger or thirst.
Hunger signals you need food
Pain signals tissue damage
Thirst signals you need water
Loneliness signals you need connection
Denying loneliness makes as much sense as denying hunger.
Research shows loneliness increases your risk of early death by 45% (Holt-Lunstad et al., 2010). Compare that to:
Air pollution: 5% increased risk
Obesity: 20% increased risk
Excessive drinking: 30% increased risk
Loneliness isn’t about how many people you know. It’s about how meaningful those connections are.
And here’s what makes loneliness especially insidious: we often try to fix it by forgiving ourselves instead of changing our behavior.
SELF-TRUST IS NOT SELF-FORGIVENESS
Self-forgiveness without restitution is just self-trust destruction with extra steps. The power move isn’t forgiving yourself — it’s rebuilding through action. Research on moral licensing shows self-forgiveness often leads to repeated violations (Merritt et al., 2010).
The path forward isn’t avoiding shame. It’s feeling it fully. And re-orienting towards who you want to be, actionably.
THE BOTTOM LINE
You can rebuild trust lost through incompetence. Commit consistently. Learn. Improve. Prove your capability over time.
But trust lost through lack of integrity? That’s a different beast. It requires fundamental character change — and even then, skepticism lingers.
The most insidious problem isn’t others not trusting you. It’s when you can’t trust yourself. That’s when disconnection becomes isolation, isolation breeds loneliness, and loneliness literally kills you.
Stop covering up. Be ok being unsure, but trying. Trust yourself enough to be honest about your failures, own your mistakes, and build genuine connections.
Because the alternative isn’t just being untrustworthy — it’s being alone with a version of yourself you can’t even trust.
YOU MADE IT TO THE END! Check this out — I made you cliff notes. Do you like the cliff notes? Leave a like, a comment, a restack. Or send to a friend. It makes my day and helps people find me. Also, I recorded my own audio for the first time this week! You can listen in app or on the desktop reader.
This article is superb🧡 ...going to implement some hopefully
this was so good…going to carry this with me going into the weekend 💖