Being betrayed is a terrible experience; one that can leave some rather ugly scars for years, if not forever.
Those scars get particularly painful if you keep getting betrayed over and over again, every time you allow others to get close to you.
It’s something that often happens to kind, trusting individuals who see the world as it should be, rather than as it is.
If you find that you’ve had your trust betrayed a few too many times, then now is the time to stop doing the behaviors listed below.
1. Wearing your heart on your sleeve.
In an era where a lot of people are incredibly guarded about what they actually think and feel, being someone who wears their heart on their sleeve is both brave and refreshing.
But unfortunately, being that open leaves you completely vulnerable to nefarious types who will see you as an easy target and treat you as such.
You may like to be an open book and share personal details as soon as you meet people, but this is dangerous.
Someone who knows so many details of your personal life is someone who could easily use those details to manipulate you.
Or worse, depending on what you’ve shared, they could blackmail you or even steal your identity.
2. Assuming that the people you meet are as ethical as you are.
People who are extremely ethical, with a strong sense of justice and integrity, often make the mistake of believing that those they encounter are just as noble as they are.
As a result, they may not take the right steps to protect themselves from being used or otherwise mistreated.
For example, a person who takes agreements very seriously may brush off the idea of a written contract with a new client, trusting in them to treat them fairly.
Then, when that client mistreats them or refuses to pay them, they won’t understand what went wrong.
They end up perpetually getting hurt and used because they cannot imagine how someone could take advantage of another in that fashion.
3. Being too friendly or giving when you first meet someone.
Genuine relationships take time to develop. As such, if a new relationship seems to be developing quickly (whether platonic or intimate), that’s a big red flag warning you to slow things all the way down.
You may be a very welcoming, loving individual who wants to shower others with kindness and affection, but those with nefarious intent will always take advantage of this openness.
Hold off on things like opening your home to someone you just met or hopping into bed with them too quickly.
The face they’ve shown you is just one layer, and is often a mask portraying the aspects of themselves that they feel will help to lower your guard so they can get close.
By taking your time and getting to know them more slowly, that mask is more likely to slip, so you can see them for who they really are.
This is incredibly important for protecting you against predation, as well as saving you from potentially life-altering circumstances you don’t truly want.
4. Lending things to others.
You may feel that it’s a kind, generous thing to do to lend someone money or let them borrow personal items, but how often have they done so and never paid you back?
How many precious items have you lost because you let someone borrow them and they either lost them or cut off contact with you permanently?
Try to avoid lending money to others, even if you think they are trustworthy. The same goes for something as simple as a beloved CD, a book, or a secret.
I lost some of my favorite books after I loaned them to my last partner’s cousin, with her assurances that I’d get them back in just a few weeks.
It’s been nearly a decade, and she moved 3,000 miles away, so I don’t think those are going to be returned any time soon.
5. Pretending that having your boundaries crossed is “no big deal.”
Many trusting, kind-hearted people desperately dislike confrontation. If you fall into this category, then you’ve likely avoided giving people consequences for crossing your boundaries and mistreating you.
Maybe you don’t want to be the “bad guy” here or risk potential rejection by letting people know that their behavior towards you is unacceptable.
Or you convince yourself that what they did was no big deal, because they didn’t really mean it, they were just joking, and so on.
But by taking this approach, you’re betraying yourself by showing others that you’ll just take whatever mistreatment they throw your way. After all, why would they respect your boundaries if you refuse to uphold and defend them?
6. Believing that others share your open-mindedness.
People who are incredibly open-minded and non-judgmental will often share their views and ideas with pretty much everyone they interact with, even if those ideas are a little off the beaten track.
While this may lead to some great connections with like-minded individuals (which is a best-case scenario), discussing these with the wrong person may result in you taking a vacation in a soft room while being dosed with antipsychotic medication.
Even if dire circumstances don’t ensue, you may end up being ostracized, mocked, and not taken seriously because you’re a “nutjob.”
I once had a partner who tried talking to his family about his experiences with ESP (that’s extrasensory perception), and they ended up treating him like an unstable child from then on in, even though everything he had experienced had been fully valid to him.
In short, it’s more likely that people will betray you because they’ll consider you feeble-minded.
7. Placing stock in fairy tales.
One of the worst betrayals I ever experienced was with someone who “future faked” me, and I know countless other people who have been similarly let down by those they had the audacity to trust.
For example, an individual might make countless promises for the future, envision a life with you with all the details that would involve, but there always seems to be some excuse for why they don’t pan out.
While it’s fun to daydream with someone about all the things you can do together, place neither trust nor faith in these dreams until they’ve established a pattern of proof.
For example, if the two of you talk about building a huge garden and raising animals together, don’t believe that it’s a sure thing until you have signed paperwork together to buy that piece of land. Assume everything is a fairytale until proven otherwise with solid action and receipts.
8. Convincing yourself that you haven’t been deeply hurt.
Many people end up repeating patterns of behavior that hurt them because they never gave themselves the time and grace to acknowledge and work through the hurt that they experienced.
Rather than admitting the pain and shame that the betrayal caused, they decided to just “get over it” and move on to the next fun, lighthearted thing as quickly as possible.
Actions like these don’t heal wounds: they just place bandages on top, leaving the deep damage to fester beneath.
If you don’t allow yourself to feel the hurt and take stock of everything that contributed to the damage, you run the very real risk of repeating that same mistake in the future.
Let yourself feel all those awful emotions and get help with them if you need to. Once the hurt has truly healed up enough for you to move forward with confidence, then and only then should you do so.
Final thoughts
It’s very noble and gracious to assume the best of people rather than the worst, and to fall for their potential rather than the reality of what they are in that moment. But doing so opens you up to intense hurt, betrayal, and disappointment.
Choose to see things as they are rather than what they could be, guard your heart, and verify everything before putting faith and trust in the people you meet.
You’re not a bad person for doing so, and nor is being guarded anything to be ashamed of. You’re simply protecting yourself from further harm.
