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News, Trust and Betrayal

Dealing with Betrayal

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You’ve put your trust in someone because you’re an honest, open person. The trust that you felt for this person was at such a high level that you let your guard down, possibly were more transparent than you’ve ever been… and now, you’ve been betrayed. Right now, you can even recall a time when you’ve felt so bad like you’ve been punched in the stomach, had your throat slit, been beaten and thrown into a ditch and left for dead.

Trust-Betrayal-David-M-Masters-dealing-with-breach-of-trust-healing-how-to-trust-again

 

Betrayal comes in many shapes and sizes, so it’s difficult to discern what to do next, but be aware, when you’ve been stabbed in the back (so to speak) by someone you’ve trusted and you have been betrayed, it is important to get your wits about you, make healthy choices and take appropriate action in an effort to not make things any worse than they are right now.

Friend Betrayal

I was betrayed and I was hurt Im better now stronger than ive ever beenWhen you’ve been betrayed by a friend it cuts deep, especially it was a best friend betrayal, because the closer you are to a person (as in the case of a best friend) the more vulnerable you have been. It’s likely that you’ve shared sensitive information that you entrusted to your best friend and now you’re regretting having opened up so transparently. When your best friend betrays you it’s reasonable to feel a range of emotions including sad, hurt, fear and anger.

When a friend betrays you (any kind of friend) the degree of vulnerability normally adjusts to the relationship’s level of trust accordingly. Your friend could be a co-worker who has regular access to other co-workers and friends complicating things further.

“I can’t believe my friend betrayed me.”

When friends betray you, you can feel as though you need to defend yourself, strike back, flee or withdraw from society altogether. Yet, you should refrain from doing these things, if you can, when you’ve been betrayed by friends.

Family Betrayal

There is no doubt that family betrayal will rock anyone’s world. I mean, if you can’t trust your family who can you trust? Your level of exposure to family members is exponential when compared to friends. Your family knows just about everything about you and could use this information against you.

When family betrays you, hopefully, you have a friend you can trust, or seeking out a coach or counselor to help you keep your head screwed on straight as your family makes you feel as though it’s just you against the world. You need someone in your corner, who can help you empathetically when your family betrays you.

Love and Betrayal

The one person that you have been the most exposed to is your love interest. Your boyfriend/girlfriend, fiancé, husband or wife knows you more intimately than anyone and when you’ve been betrayed by a lover, if you’ve been truly in love with this person, all your emotions will be maximized.

Little hurts worse than being betrayed by someone you’ve opened up to completely and have shared intimacy with. Your heart feels as though it’s been stabbed and left bleeding out as you ponder, “Why?”

How to Deal with Betrayal

When you’re immersed in the pain of betrayal, it’s difficult to think straight. Here’s a simple exercise that you can perform that will release the pain of being betrayed that will help you to approach the betrayal from a logical perspective:

Penny for Your Thoughts

Once you’ve been able to remove the pain, you will find yourself thinking more clearly.

You can find some peace by not thinking of yourself as a victim and realize that the person who has betrayed your trust and faith is not an evil person. In most cases the one who has betrayed you is a victim of life circumstances which has made him or her strike out at others in this way.

Betrayal leaves wounds and scars that made me strongerYou will find that it is not so much about you, as it is the pent up pain and frustration of an individual suffering from low self-esteem, self-loathing and a life of pain which causes them to act out in this manner.

Get Trust Betrayal on Amazon
Get Trust Betrayal on Amazon

If you’re an empathetic person, as you begin to realize this, you may be inclined to reach out to the person who has betrayed you in an effort to help him or her. This would be ill-advised, as it is not your job to try to fix this person, and it could be very well that this person is not salvageable. Even if he/she were, your attempts are likely to cause you more undeserved pain and loss.

You’re better off avoiding the excess drama and find ways to move on.

You can find more ways to deal with betrayal in my book: Trust Betrayal.

Friend Betrayal, News, Trust and Betrayal

Friend Betrayal

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What can you do about friend betrayal? You trusted your friend, you believed you could trust your friend, you felt confident that your friend had your back, and now you’ve discovered that your friend could not be trusted. You’ve been betrayed by your friend. You didn’t see it coming, and little feels worse. Your heart sunk and you feel like you’ve actually been stabbed in the back as this person, whom you’ve trusted has betrayed you and is twisting the knife, even now.

Friends can surprise us by doing the darndest things when they betray us. You could never have prepared for friend betrayal and they will betray you in ways you could have never even thought of.

Friends have broken trust with friends and betrayed their friends by having an affair with your partner, by sabotaging and keeping you from achieving your highest and best, rallying your other friends to turn against you, spreading rumors, gossip, dirty laundry, or telling others tales of sensitive information you shared in confidence, talking behind your back, breaking promises, assaulting your financial wellbeing, fronting you off in public humiliating you, judging you for circumstances beyond your control viewing you in a negative light, blaming you for something they (or someone else) did, aligning themselves with someone else’s false accusation(s) about you, and the list goes on and on… as the betrayal leaves wounds and scars.

How can you deal with the betrayal?

Review the betrayal but don’t ruminate over it endlessly, every time you imagine the betrayal, it creates the emotional response and damages your wellbeing. Reliving the betrayal reduces your immune system and causes emotional and physiological deterioration. Stop it.

Try to think about the betrayal from your friend’s point of view. Considering his or her life, what’s led up to this point of betrayal, what might it have felt to the betrayer? Ask yourself, is this a one-time event, or is it something you might witness again?

If you are able to look at the betrayal from a wider perspective, taking all things into consideration, could your friend have thought he or she was doing you a favor or helping you out in some way from his or her perspective? Intention may offer the opportunity to avail the benefit of the doubt, or was he or she deceptive or maliciously motivated?

Remember that your friend is more than this betrayal. There is a real person in there and the person who betrayed you may not have had any intent to do so, taking an action (or not taking action) without thinking through the consequences of his or her action or inaction. Review the good qualities your friend has and balance these against the betrayal.

Ready yourself for having a conversation with your friend about the betrayal. Find a centered and calm space within you for having this uncomfortable conversation, without accusing or blaming your friend. Simply and honestly tell the story from your perspective, let your friend know how you feel, and let your friend respond from his or her point of view.

As your friend explains his or her side of the story, try to listen without judgment, you might be surprised at how differently the situation looked from your friend’s perspective. Or, on the other hand, your friend may only be harshly defensive or defiant and unapologetic. Take the negative response under advisement as a red flag for maintaining a friendship into the future.

Fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me

If your friend has betrayed you once, you could give your friend the benefit of the doubt. If you’ve been betrayed twice by the same person, now you know that you can expect to be betrayed again.

Remember that your friend is not a bad person, but you must manage the sacred space which surrounds you. This is your responsibility to create a safe environment for you to live your life. You may have to change the relationship, proceeding with caution in the realization that your friend cannot be trusted with certain things, just understanding that your friend just is as they are, and you cannot (and you shouldn’t even try to) change him or her. Another option is to sever the relationship altogether.

Friend betrayal will certainly have an effect on the viability of your friendship over time, and it’s up to you to decide whether you can successfully manage a friendship which has suffered such a transgression, or whether you’re better off without having this person in your life at all.

Life is short. Create a life for yourself that leans toward your enjoyable, life-affirming better life, your best life, and find ways that you can live in a manner which can lead to making the world a better place with integrity and love.