The front page of Sunday's Oregonian told the story of a seventy-something woman who had been bilked out of her life savings by two swindlers posing as friends. The county was preparing to auction off her house, leaving her homeless. They were not sure if they would seek extradition for the fugitive swindlers, who had probably spent the money. Such is the cost of trusting, sometimes.

I frequently cross paths with this issue of trust. Project managers ponder how to second guess their team members so they can make sure they are hearing the truth. Team members silently reciprocate, each playing their cards close to their vest, careful not to disclose too much. Project sponsors bait traps to catch the "real" story, suspicious no matter what's captured. I swear that the cost of such mistrust far exceeds the feared cost of trusting too much.

I apologize for missing a few rants these past weeks. I have been traveling - two Mastering Projects Workshops, Two Follow-up Sessions, and a Problem Solving Leadership Workshop sandwiched in between. I've been watching, observing the territory while teaching and facilitating, and I conclude that we are suffering from an epidemic of apprehension. Withholding our trust does not create "better safe than sorry," it makes ourselves the most sorry kind of safe.

Trust is not earned or earnable, but freely given or it is not trust at all. We cannot insure freedom without enslaving ourselves and we cannot apprehend trust without compromising the involved relationships completely. Among my most memorable recent memories is the picture of a workshop participant explaining how he'd like his project to work. He believes it would work best if he could communicate coequally with the project sponsor, calling them as he sees them, rather than giving her the information he thinks she wants. His project is suffocating under the unspoken, not because trust has been violated but because apprehension has elbowed trust aside.

"So," I ask, "Will you try to tell her the truth?"

"No," he responds with a nervous laugh, "It's too risky. What if she lies? What if she says one thing and does another? What should I do then?"

This apprehension is a belief about the future. It is most certainly not a provable condition. It is also most certainly a provably sub optimal choice, since other perhaps equally unprovable assertions might yield more pleasing results. This one keeps us safe and suffering rather than risking and at worst only possibly suffering. Curious safety.

What's at risk here? The belief that the sponsor is not trustworthy is most prominently at risk. The blame for the situation, so securely in the lap of the untrustworthy, is also at risk. Most prominently, the project is at risk, teetering on the edge of both an unsupportable and an untestable belief. Doesn't this seem the sole of absurdity?

There was no front page story in the Sunday Oregonian explaining how some fortunate citizen was lavishly rewarded for trusting his fellows. There never will be. It's easy, based upon what we consider newsworthy, to conclude that there are many more crooks than there actually are in the world. It's way too easy to destroy the quality of our experience by attempting to insure the quality of our experience. If we are going to be alive, we're much better off engaged than we are standing at a pseudo-safe, stiff-armed distance.

I conclude after the last month of observation that the cost of mistrust is the greatest burden encumbering projects today. The real question is not "what if they lie?" but "what if I tell the truth?" If I told you the truth, you would know something real about me and you might take advantage of me. But, my catastrophizing imagination omits, maybe you won't take advantage of me. The great paradox of trust is that we fear this salvation when it is the only thing really capable of making us safe.

My trust is sometimes wounded. I have recovered in the past. The self inflicted wounds of apprehension are more insidious. They heal begrudgingly, scaring without ever really drawing blood, crippling without cracking bone. I think we are better provisioned then we imagine. We can afford to trust even when our trust is not reciprocated. We can snap back if attacked. We might never make the front page of the Oregonian but our projects and our lives will work better if we can trade more apprehension for trust and more safety for the enriching risks of relationship.