Do you pick up hitchhikers? Do you read the small print?
Trust underpins almost everything in life, says retired clinical psychologist and author Chris Skellett.
He talks to Jesse Mulligan about what trust means in the Covid-19 era.
Photo: Unsplash / Zdeněk Macháček
Trust has three components, Skellett says –
1. Trusting yourself to make good decisions
2. Trusting others to act in our collective best interests
3. Trusting the world (including the virtual world and the government) to be predictable and safe
In lockdown, we now have to simultaneously trust ourselves to act safely, trust other people to do the same and at the same time 'assume' mistrust (aka risk of contracting Covid-19).
New Zealand's culture of trust is what other countries envy about us, he says.
"As a culture, we are a trusting people generally and we can generally trust Aussies, too.
"People trust Kiwis because we're open and we've got the suite of personality attributes that make us trustworthy."
New Zealand's current leader is doing an excellent job of modelling trust, Skellett says.
"Jacinda Ardern is an open communicator, no real hidden agendas, and she's telegraphing ahead what she's going to do and the basis on which she's making her decisions."
If Jacinda is the "doyenne of trust", Director-General of Health Ashley Bloomfield is the "poster boy", he says.
"He's a safe pair of hands, he's the kind of guy who will keep minutes of meeting accurately, he's unrelentingly courteous… he's not exactly charismatic but he's there, you can trust him to keep the beat, you can trust him to lead us through this crisis calmly."
Trust is a wonderful thing we should cherish it when we have it, Skellett says.
"Trust is the glue that binds us, it's like oxygen. You don't notice it's there when it's not there you're suddenly gasping for it, you can't survive without it."
Chris Skellett is the author of When Trust Goes Missing: A Clinical Guide. You can find his Trust Questionnaire here.
