I was just talking with my “DBC” (daughter by choice). We were having a conversation that turned to the importance of trust in a business relationship and I realized something:
Trust and respect are both earned, but in opposite ways. Trust: it’s yours until you give me cause to take it back. With respect, it’s never there until your thoughts or actions give me reason to bestow it. One is given, the other earned. What’s hard and interesting is that it is always my judgement call. I decide to continue to trust or bestow respect.
But both can be lost. They are, in a way, fragile. A wrong look, an error in judgement, a misspoken word and the trust and respect of years can be lost forever.
Be true to yourself so, depending on the outcome of your actions or words, they are yours. If nothing else, you understand why you said what you said or did what you did and can live with the outcome.