Are You Too Trusting? (The Goldilocks Principle)

Welcome to Shrink for the Shy Guy. This is the show for you if you are sick and tired of being held back by fear, self doubt, social anxiety, shyness, anything that's stopping you from you being you. I'm going to share the most powerful tools and resources that I've been discovering over the last 15 years on my journey to eradicate social anxiety and instill confidence first in myself and then in every single person that I meet on my journey. You're going to learn these tools and how to apply them in your life now so that you can become the most free, powerful, bold, authentic version of you. Welcome to today's episode of Shrink for the Shy Guy. Today we're going to be looking at you trusting others and exploring the question if you are too trusting or maybe you don't trust other people enough and you have a hard time trusting people. We're actually going to look at both sides of the spectrum. We're going to explore something called the Goldilocks principle, which probably is used elsewhere, I'm sure in a lot of things. Probably sounds like something would be used in like quantum physics or something, but I'm going to apply it to trust as well. And this is going to help you, especially if you're on either end of the spectrum, you've been too trusting, or it feels like you've been too trusting, it's gotten you into trouble, or you kind of have a hard time opening up and letting others in. That also is going to be part of what we're focusing on today. As always, if you're benefiting from this episode, please take a few minutes to go to the itunes or Apple podcast as it's called now Spotify, wherever you're listening to and giving it a good solid review so we can reach more people. And as always, if you want to take things further than this podcast, including a step by step guided video training course where I'm going to give you action steps and specific things you could be doing to building your confidence, your core confidence level and how you treat yourself. Fear of rejection, feeling on your own side and boldly you onto other courses such as social mastery, how to talk to people, how to know what to say next, how to deepen conversations, join into groups, create those friendships that you want. Dating confidence to be able to really connect with the people that excite you, go after the people that excite you and connect and flirt and do so by being yourself or career confidence, how to really steer your career and make the changes you want, make the growth that you want to increase your opportunities, your income, the type of work that you're doing. I mean, all of that comes back first and foremost to your confidence. Do you have the belief in yourself to take those changes that you want and make the growth that you want? So if you really want that specific guidance, definitely check out Confidence University. It's an in depth training system. And you can get it on my website. Just go to doctoraziz.com that'S-R-A Z I Z.com and on there there'll be a products section and you can check that out for Confidence University. Okay. Are you too trusting? Let me just ask you this to get us started here. Which side of the spectrum do you think you fall on? Are you too trusting or not trusting enough? And maybe right in the middle. And that's the whole idea behind Goldilocks, right? So Goldilocks, based upon the story of Goldilocks and the three bears. You probably are familiar with it, but just in case not. It's a little girl who, stumbling through the woods, comes upon a cabin or a little house out in the woods. And it's empty. No one's there, but she goes into different rooms and she goes in the kitchen and eats the porridge, she goes and takes a nap on the bed. And every room she goes into, there's three of everything, right? And so she'll try one bowl of porridge and it's too hot. One bowl of porridge and it's too cold. One. One bowl of porridge. That's just right. And that's the idea behind trust, is that there is an amount that's just right. And if we're too trusting, as in, you know, too hot, then we get into trouble. And if you're too cold, too withdrawn, too aloof, too untrusting others, you also get into a different kind of trouble. So let's break it down. And this will help you have some guidance to know what's too much, what's too little. How do you know what's just right? Let's explore that. And you can apply these to the situations in your life. So I would say, personally, I went from not trusting anybody to too trusting. And now I'm getting into the just right. Ish. So not trusting anybody, you know, you might have an idea of what that looks like. Maybe the person who is conspiratorial or like that person's gonna cheat on me. And I don't trust nobody, man. And it might show up that way, but it doesn't have to look like that. It can look a lot more subtle, especially if you're nice. You have social anxiety. It's just this clarity inside of like, you ain't getting in here, you're not going to know me. And it doesn't have to be shrouded with all this paranoia. It's just a simple clarity, pretty much an unconscious decision. I'm not going to reveal myself to others. And there might be stories around it, like, oh, if I share, they wouldn't like me. But it's just whatever the stories are, the result is others really don't know you. You don't reveal much. You hold your cards close to your chest. Maybe you're polite, maybe you're friendly, maybe you play the roles you need to, but people don't really know you. And that's how it was for me. It just didn't reveal a whole lot to that many people. Even if I was warm or friendly at times, I just didn't let people in. Why? Because I had a terrible self esteem. I didn't like me. How would I let other people get close to me? I don't even like who I was, right? It's gonna be dangerous. I'm gonna be made fun of and we mocked. I can't tolerate any sort of rejection or disapproval. And so that is the one major way that social anxiety manifests is we just don't let others in. Can you relate to that? And there's one way you might do, which is just avoiding approaching people, avoiding going after what you want, just not even trying or you, you do date. I just spoke with someone recently who dates someone for a while, about a year, and then tends to break up. And he's done that many, many, many, many times. And I said, well, do you want something different? Is that working for you or do you want something else? And he's kind of like, well, you know. And he'd always find a reason. It was a bit like Jerry Seinfeld or something. He'd always find a reason as to why this person wasn't quite right. And look, I'm not saying that that's not true, but after, you know, seven or eight swings at bat, at some point you got to look at the common denominator, which is you. And so are you selecting people that you're not really that excited about or are you finding a way to keep other people at distance? So this can show up in a lot of really subtle ways. Not letting people get close by keeping things a little more superficial or not even trying in the first place. And Saying, you know, who needs to go out and interact with friends. I got all the stuff I need. I got video games, I got porn, I got cannabis. And now I have whatever version because it's moving so fast that by the time this episode is released, whatever version of AI that you can talk to, that's your bestie friend. At the time of recording this, I believe Snapchat has already put Chat GPT into, built into their platform. So you can just like chat with Chat GPT. Like, hey, Jet Chat GPT. How's it going? Well, I'm, I'm feeling blue. Oh, don't feel bad. You're right, you know, so. And it's going to advance quickly. So pretty soon it's going to, it's going to become your, your bestie. So who needs other humans? Man, you just connect with a robot. Yeah. You use porn to satisfy any sort of emotional or sexual urges and you got food and you got video games. Now I know that because I live that way for many, many, many years, minus the AI that I could talk to because that didn't exist at the time. But it's a sheltered and defended life and it's a not trusting life. Even if you don't think I'm not a trust, you know, I don't trust others. That's exactly what's happening. That's why you're withdrawn. And so that's one side of it, and that's the too cold side of it and the Goldilocks porridge situation. And it hurts, it's painful, it's isolating. It takes a toll. And instead of me listing all the ways it's going to take a toll, let me ask you, what is the toll that it's taken on you? For me, personally, I felt isolated. I felt alone. Even with friends, I was alone. Right. Because they didn't really fully know me. And aloneness and isolation takes a toll on your mood, your mental health, your physical health. So that's one side of it. Then as I learned personal development and confidence and I started to say, hey, you know what? People are actually more friendly than you think. And I stopped. I realized the power of vulnerability. Wow. I could share who I am and people actually like me more and all these really exciting eye opening experiences. But the pendulum swung a little too far where I was like, yeah, people are great and there's so many opportunities in life. You just got to say yes. Don't say no to things. Say yes. It became like a yes man. You want to go on this trip? Yes. Do you want to go, you know, take this, you know, go to this new, explore this new opportunity in your learning or your career? Yes. You want to date them? Sorry, banging the microphone. I'm getting so excited with my yeses. Do you want to date this person? Yes. You know, and generally that was awesome. It led to a ton of growth and then there started to be a few problems and there were a couple of me getting into relationships that maybe or friendships that weren't great, people that weren't necessarily the most caring or considerate or valuing other person, some narcissistic, know, interactions, people that were, that were really self absorbed or going to be mainly seeing other people as means to their own end. But the too trusting peaked for me when it came to investing and making one major mistake, which was investing with a private person who was going to take me and a bunch of other people's money, invest it into the crazy world of crypto. Crypto world, right. Cryptocurrency. And it was going to make us great returns. And I'd had my own foray of investing myself. In fact that was my first foray into investing back in 2017 in the crypto world, right? Because it was like bitcoin's booming. Like, oh yeah. And I jumped in like right at the end of the peak of the bubble of the bull market and proceeded to lose a bunch of money, like and then, you know, concluded, I don't know what I'm doing, you know, I can't do this. And that's a, that's a problem right there. If you conclude that you're not capable at something and you're never going to learn it, you're going to be reliant on others in a way that's very different than, look, I understand we all can't be masters of everything, but there's a base level of personal responsibility needed, I think in the key areas of life so that you can select appropriately the help that you need. Right. So look, I'm not going to, I'm not a lawyer. So if I need some legal documents drafted, I'm going to get a lawyer to do that. I'm not a plumber. So if I've got to fix some pipes in my, you know, from my sink or whatever, I'm going to get a plumber to do that. So we do need other people. However, when it comes to your health, your physical health, if you don't take any responsibility and you say, ah, I wouldn't have a problem, the doctor's gonna fix me you're gonna set yourself up for a lot more suffering in life when it comes to your finances. I don't wanna worry about that. I'm just gonna do whatever my 401k manager tells me to do. I don't know. Okay, well, you know, I know one of my relatives had a bunch of money in a 401k that his company was investing. He was totally hands off, didn't know the first thing about what the hell was going on. And all of a sudden they said, you know what? All your money's gone. He said, what are you talking about? I was putting into a 401k, I was doing, I was supposed to do. Well, it turns out their 401k manager decided to put all most of the money in the energy sector and specifically in a company that you may or may not have heard of called Enron. And for those of you around at the time, Enron. I was young, I didn't really follow investing at that time, but I knew, I heard about Enron, right? It was a big news. It was like this company, like, was just all the rage when it came to energy. And like, we're going to, you know, develop all these different forms of energy and it's going to be cost effective and we're going to be so rich. And then all this money started going into it and it turned out it was a big scam. And they were cooking the books and they were not profitable ever. And they were doing crazy manipulations in their books to make it look like they were. And then, you know, eventually the rug got pulled, as it always does in those kind of scams. And then he lost all his money. Right. So your physical health, your financial well being, some basic abilities to take care of your own surroundings, the environment that you're in. And then of course, the people you put your trust in and relationships and like, we have to be willing to take a level of responsibility. So at that time I wasn't, you know, it's like, oh, I failed at investing. I don't know what I'm doing. And, and I wasn't playing at the level five commitment of I'm gonna do whatever it takes to figure this out. And instead I was like, I'm gonna give my money to this guy and he's gonna do great for me. And so I did my own best assessment at the time, but it wasn't very good, honestly. Cause I was too trusting. And so sure enough, turns out that this guy did not invest people's money. He took everybody's money. I mean, people, I don't know how much he got, maybe like 30, 40 million out of a big group of people, 500 or 1,000 investors, something like that. People put a lot of money into this. And that was a good slap to the face wake up call for me. I said, okay. Not only a, let me take full, total responsibility for investing, which I have since then. And it's actually become a part time passion or hobby. I find it absolutely fascinating to understand or try to understand, not just, you know, the crypto world is what I got started in, but broader markets and macroeconomics. And it's fascinating to learn all these different terms and things that used to intimidate me like the yield curve. And now I'm like, okay, I know what that means, right? So it's a, it's a, for me, I love learning. So growth in that area is very satisfying. But I also needed to upgrade something else, which is who you put your trust in, you know? And so now when I look back at some of those decisions, it was like, what was I, what was I doing? And trusting too much and niceness are intertwined. They're, they're salt and pepper. They're two peas in a pod. They're going to go together, right? So when you're too nice, you default towards trusting. And even when you feel a sense of, huh, I don't know about that, you don't say it because you don't want to offend the person, you want to upset the person. So you're like, oh, yeah, okay, it seems like a good plan, okay, upset anybody here. Or maybe you'll say something and then they'll give you an answer and you're like, okay, that's cool, it's cool, it's cool, right? Instead of leaning in, pushing on a little more, saying, hold on a second, I don't understand that, or why are you doing it that way? Or I don't really agree with that or whatever it is, right? So if you're too nice, you're going to be too trusting automatically. Even if you don't feel trust, you're gonna act trusting because you're afraid of the confrontation. But niceness aside, you might just be too much looking to the good in others, seeing the possible potential in others. This is a case in relationships where I see trusting too much occurring. And look, let me just caveat with this with not everybody's a con artist, right? Like this guy I invested money with. Not everybody's bad. And it's like, well, if you're too trusting, you're gonna get know. Taken advantage of in these very sociopathic ways or criminal ways. No, that can happen, but often what happens is when you're too trusting, you're just not selecting the right people. They're not necessarily horrible people. They're just not the right people for you. Right? So the example of the plumber or whatever, you know, you. You're like, oh, you know something about that person. They don't get back to you on the phone that quickly, or they don't give you a clear quote, or there's something a little bit off and you're just like, you know, no, I'm gonna go with someone else. Right. And that doesn't mean that they're a horrible human and they're a con artist or something. It just means, like, that's not right for me. I don't trust that. And that's where you got to start listening to that little voice inside that's like, yeah, or I don't know about this. And so let's go to romantic relationships. And then I'll talk more about that little voice inside and how to use it as guidance. So romantic relationships, I see this all the time with clients. I certainly did this, where you start connecting with someone and it feels good, you're excited about them. And then there's something that maybe, if not a red flag, maybe a yellow light, which, depending on how you drive, I grew up in California. So a yellow light means speed up. That's right. A yellow light means speed up. It means determine how long the light has been yellow, how far you are away from the intersection, and what the speed limit is, because the higher the speed limit at those times, the longer the lights will stay yellow. And can you make it mostly through the intersection so it turns red right as your car is going underneath the stoplight? That's what a yellow light means for Californians. But a yellow light in the relationship might mean, hey, you need to slow down. But sometimes people like, speed up, right? They pull the Californian move on that there's something that's a little off and. Or something very clearly like, I don't like this about this person. And instead of saying, you know, this might not be the right person for me, I just don't trust that this is going to go well, or I don't trust what they're saying, or they're saying things that seem a little bit. They just don't add up. And instead of listening to that, the person will say, yeah, but I see the potential for them. I see who they could be. I see what, you know, they're really wanting to work on this. It's really important to them to change this. Or he's trying so hard. Or she's going to make a change on this. And. Okay, okay. And so a lot of when we're too trusting, we're kind of selling ourselves on something. A hope, a wish, a fantasy. We're doing a little bit of burying our head in the sand. And the other person might be selling you too. I'm not saying that they're not making themselves look appealing, but it's on you to take in that information and run it through your own filters. That's the just right thing, right? So the too cold. No trust is person's like, hey, I'm open. And you get a sense of that they're gonna be, you know, honest with you in a relationship. And you're like, nope, no way. I know what happened in my last relationship. I don't trust men ever again. Or women are liars or whatever. You're just totally closed off. Or, I'm not enough and I'm a loser and no one's ever gonna want to date me. And the person's like, I want to date you. Get away from me. Yeah, I'm a loser. Right? So then you're. You're just not trusting in that way like we talked about earlier. Other side of the pendulum swing. The too hot in the. In the Goldilocks metaphor would be persons like, hey, you know, I'm trustworthy. I do this. And then you're like, yeah, but their text messages didn't add up or something's not quite right there. You know, I don't. This doesn't mean stop. But. Huh? How come you said you were going to be at this place, but then you weren't? What's up with that? Right? You can call them out, you can ask questions. You can. That doesn't mean you instantly are like, screw you, you're not trustworthy. It's just something's not quite right there. And that gets you more and more towards the goldilocks, the center, the porridge. That's just right where you're able to make your best assessment of the situation. And honestly, how do you find that? Well, you listen to that voice inside. Where is that voice inside coming from? Well, it could be intuition. It could be you just get a feeling. You get a sense. You know, there's really fascinating stories and research about this where people are really good. Like, your intuition is not some Made up, woo woo thing. It is a valuable data stream that is going to provide information for you. Now I wouldn't say it's the only data stream. Right. There's also your history, your intellect, your rational assessment of the situation, your emotional feeling and your intuition. Those might be, your intuition might speak to you in any of those domains, but they're all useful forms of information. You know, I remember this is a quick story about intuition. This was a little while back, maybe two years ago now. I was pulling off to a trailhead to go for a hike in the woods with my dogs and, and there it was, a kind of out of the way trail ahead. And usually there was no cars there when I got there. And so I got there and then sure enough there was no cars in the parking lot, but there was a guy out there. And you know, there was, there was a bus stop out there, which is really strange. They created this bus that goes to all these different hiking trails in, in the gorge outside of Portland. And that's not necessarily strange. You know, they want to provide people access to these trails. But this particular trail, like why was there a stop there? This trail was out of the way, but I don't know there's a stop there. Never seen anyone at that bus stop before. There was a guy near the bus stop walking around and he had like a little push cart thing, so you know, maybe homeless guy. And I looked and when I turned the corner to go to park in the parking lot and I saw the guy there, I had this very strong image come to my mind of me jamming the brakes, throwing the car in reverse, driving backwards and peeling out as if he was coming at me with a baseball bat. And that was the image, like back up and go away. And it was a strong signal inside. And then I overrode it. I was like, yeah, that's weird. I mean, he's just a dude here. You know, homeless people aren't necessarily threatening. Like that's just a bias. You know, he's fine, he's waiting for the bus out here. The dude doesn't have a car, just wants to enjoy the scenery, which he was not dressed for at all. But you know, he's kind of overrode it. Park my car on the other side of the parking lot, get out my dog, start walking and I'm about, I don't know, hundred yards down the trail and I have another impulse that says go back and drive away. And I override it too. Trusting Goldilocks, right? And then I just go for My hike come back in about an hour and, and dude's gone. Maybe the bus picked him up. But I get to my car, I left the dogs in the trunk open my driver's side door, and there's all this white, white powder all over the driver's side seat. I was like, what is that? You know, so it's like my mind's trying to compute, why would there be. There wasn't white powder when I left my car. Why is there white powder on the, on the seat? And that's when I look up and it's the first time that I looked at my windshield and my windshield had been bashed in repeatedly with rage. Just smashed it again and again with a blunt force object like a cane or something. And the dust was, was glass particle dust all over the car. And I took a moment and I processed what happened. And I was like, oh, oh, damn, damn, I'm not going to solve this problem, figure out, I'm going to get home and oh, why didn't I listen to that? Right? So you're going to have those little messages. You're going to have those messages and you got to listen to those. They're important. It's important data for you to take that in. And you know what the best way I've learned about being too trusting is being too trusting. That case there, the case with investing with that guy. I mean, all of a sudden I get a lot more data and I become, I become a lot more okay with talking to someone and being like, no, I don't like that. No, I don't want to do that. No, I'm not going to pursue that. It's totally clear in myself, I don't need to do that. And that comes from being too trusting. So if you've been too trusting in the past, don't beat yourself up. That's learning, that's training. What did you learn from that? Can you draw? In fact, let's go to your action step. Time for action. Action, action. So your action step is there's two options. If you tend to be not trusting enough and withdrawn, just pay attention to how you're doing it. What stories do you tell yourself? What beliefs or stories do you tell yourself that keep you distant and not willing to trust others? And then the question I have for you is, are you willing to challenge those stories? And if the answer is no, well, then you're going to stay where you're at. If the answer is yes, well, then you can liberate yourself. And there's many, many episodes in this podcast alone that can help you do that. And also I mentioned Confidence University beginning of this episode. That could be a powerful way for you to build those that ability of social confidence, to be able to put yourself out there more and challenge those old stories. If you've noticed that you've been too trusting and of course you might say Z's, I do both. And that's okay, I get it. You might be like avoidant, avoidant, avoidant, and then jump into something and be way too trusting. I've done that too. But when you're being too trusting or you think you have that tendency as well, then I want you to think back to a time where you were too trusting. And instead of beating yourself up and making yourself terribly wrong or making the other person terribly wrong, just tune in. Say, what do I learn about that? What is the takeaway? What are the two or three top insights? What are the lessons that I can bring forward to the next opportunity in this situation so that I am better protected and I'm able to make better choices that serve me more? Okay, I feel like there's so much more I want to share about this and perhaps they will in a future episode. But just know that there are abundance of opportunities for friendly people and beautiful connections and we gotta choose to trust sometimes some places, or else it's a lonely, lonely life. And also know that the nice guy spiritual wants to see the good in everybody version of me has learned that there's sharks out there, man, and you gotta learn how to listen to your own self, be your own authority, value your own perspectives and choose accordingly so that you find that place. It's not too hot, not too cold. That's just right. All right, thanks for being with me today. Until we speak again. May have the courage to be who you are and to know on a deep level that you're awesome. I'll talk to you soon. Thanks for listening to Shrink for the shy guy with Dr. Aziz. If you know anyone who can benefit from what you've just heard, please let them know and send them a link to shrinkforthshyguy.com for free blogs, ebooks and training videos related to overcoming shyness and increasing confidence, go to social confidencecenter.com it.