If you’ve read a number of the posts in this Blog, you’ve gathered that relationships… love of people is my passion. I’m asked, “Where did you learn all this stuff?” In truth I am “home schooled.” Three hundred books in my office attest to the fact this is so. Lots of studying with mentors. All this deals with interpersonal growth, the magical love… other emotions too for sure that make us who we are.Love of another… your higher power. Mine the Lord. It’s all about the quality of the relationships we create.

My vision for my twenty year… 3 million mile on Delta second career has been Growing business by Growing people. Today I’m life coaching… helping people grow. What I’ve been called to do.Relationships guide us, feed our lives and … well… are really all we have in the end. God’s greatest gifts. You want to know who someone is? Look at the books they read and the friends they have.

Trust is the currency of relationships. Trust and vulnerability are kissin’ cousins. Open yourself to another and trust will sprout. But trusting is easy to describe and yes… one of the greatest challenges we face… every day. Past slights, a hurt, a dismissal or any rejection really… can block our capacity to trust, love. Faith helps. But embracing another person fully is hard work… complex. Especially when we feel it may not be returned.

Some I work with… a chosen few actually, have learned the art of creating high trust / low maintenance relationships. When trust abounds. Not much effort is needed to maintain. The reverse? Low trust / high maintenance. Well. Got it?At its pinnacle trusting another wholly, completely yields emotional bliss. When this is returned? Intimacy… true intimacy is the gift… for both.So, this brings me to the crystal vase. I’ve counseled some incredible people. Trusting themselves … loving them self first is always “Gate One.” You cannot love another until you love you first. But trust is like creating a crystal vase… mold, shape, build. Navigating the path to getting close to another is hard. Again so complex.

Like creating a vase. When you get there though … Wow! The beautiful bond of trust arrives. Like a crystal vase. It can take years to create it. And it can be dashed in a second. A lie, an affair, a betrayal. A loss of temper. Ego. So many ways that crystal vase of trust can be dropped… an agonizing experience . Dropped. Gone. Usually devastating. It’s always a long journey getting it back. Recreating the vase? Expect slings, arrows. Emotional flogging. Standing in the way. Drop the vase of trust? Suffering arrives.Most of us will have but a few relationships in our lifetime that we fully, emotionally release to. Just a few. But when we do…the love that arrives is precious. Intimate. Give one capacity to reach out and love others.

Wondrous. But hard, unique. And so worth creating… like a crystal vase. Cherish it. It will always have a fragility about it. So just don’t drop it.My thanks to my dear friend Gary for giving me a nudge to write this one.