What is trust in a relationship? In the end, it’s just about everything!

Love and trust are completely intertwined subjects; trust is absolutely essential for the most sincere of love to exist and affects quite literally every aspect of a romantic relationship. Trust, however, is very much a broad term, manifesting into many different definitions and varying qualities of which make up your own forms of trust. 

With this, we will explore the unique manifestations of trust in a relationship to help guide you along a path to a trusting relationship that will blossom like the beautiful wildflowers on the mountain of your love. 

Sexual Trust

As the purveyors of the most invigorating sex lives through our incredible sex toys and sex education, it only seems fit that we begin with sexual trust in a relationship. 

Sexual trust is a form of trust that has a massive influence on your relationship as a whole. When you look at the happiest, healthiest couples, a recurring theme is a bountiful sex life led by trust in sexual endeavors. 

Trusting your partner sexually means that you:

• Trust them to be open with your sexual exploration.

Do you feel comfortable telling your partner if there is an aspect of sexuality that you wish to explore? And if so, do you trust them to comfortably and openly explore whatever it may be with you without fear of judgment or negativity?

Communication is your best friend and is the baseline to expanding on your sexuality with another person. Communicate your desires maturely, have consistent sex talk surrounding sexual exploration and determine ways to explore whatever you have your mind on together. And on the other end of the spectrum, you must provide the same amount of trust in exploring their own sexual desires as well. If this is lacking, you can build this form of sexual trust by slowly exploring new sexual endeavors with one another with open minds and willing hearts. 

• Trust them to satisfy you.

If you don’t fully trust your partner in their ability to satisfy you, then you are leaving a void in your sexual fulfillment that may cause struggles down the road. Suppose your sexual interactions seem one-sided, as one partner tends to receive the maximum benefit of physical interaction (such as the male partner consistently reaching climax but the female missing out). How can you trust that you will be satisfied years down the road?

If you notice a trend of not feeling fully sexually satisfied, then you should address the issues as to why this may be happening so that you can actively work together to change things, and with this, you build trust around the fact that you will maintain this satisfaction for the years to come. 

• Trust them to be sexually intimate.

Sexual intimacy is derived from the feeling of connection between two partners when engaging in sexual activity. It is that sensation of being drawn closer to your partner, both on the spiritual and physical realms, and results in a calmness surrounding life and the notion that you are, essentially, a part of your partner. 

Sexual intimacy is different from sex meant only for pleasure. This type of sex is a necessity as well, those quickies before work to relieve a bit of sexual tension, but do you trust your partner to engage in lovemaking with you that brings you closer as a couple through this sensational connection? If not, you should work on strategies to boost sexual intimacy. 

Try taking things slower, engage in prolonged periods of kissing and foreplay, and don’t try and have sex like you are the start of a pornography film. If sexual intimacy is lacking, it is your job to build it. You can often build sexual intimacy by catering to the different types of intimacy, as not all people need sex to define themselves as intimate with you. 

Emotional Trust in a Relationship

Let’s face it; humans are emotional beings. We have all sorts of feelings rushing through our bodies throughout the day, and although destructive emotions can be detrimental, sometimes there is no avoiding them. This is where emotional trust in a relationship comes into play, as emotional trust allows you to feel confident that your partner will be there for you when your emotions need it the most, that they do everything in their power to ensure that they provide you emotions positive in nature and that you will do the same for them. 

Emotional trust means that:

• You can express your feelings to them

Emotional trust is an aspect of emotional intimacy, and a significant component of emotional intimacy is the ability to feel comfortable in sharing your feelings with them. This emotional trust is derived from knowing that they will respond helpfully, that they will provide advice when needed, and most importantly, they will listen to you without negating what you have to say. To build this type of trust, try talking to your partner more about your feelings to better learn to express them and to understand how they tend to respond. 

If they have difficulty responding to your emotional insecurities or even just the emotions that might arise after a tough day of work, don’t fret yet, that’s not entirely their fault! Everyone is raised to respond differently, and sometimes you have to provide them the direction they need to respond to your emotions in a way that makes you more secure about how you feel.

• You can be vulnerable.

Vulnerability and emotional trust are entirely related. Emotions feel vulnerable, especially negative ones, and expressing them to another person can be scary. But worse yet, the result of not expressing them leads to bottled-up emotions that might explode on your partner one day. 

Trusting your partner to cater to your emotional trust means that you feel good being vulnerable to them, as this provides you an outlet to work through your problems, no matter where they come from, and that you have someone that you always know you can rely on for a much-needed venting session that makes you feel better about the situation. 

• You trust them to provide positive emotions.

Does your partner make you happy every day? Do they make you laugh and feel loved and enjoy fun activities together? We sure hope so, as this is indicative of healthy emotional trust!

A relationship is a shared experience, and part of that experience is making your partner fulfilled in the realms of positive emotions and vice versa. If you feel this isn’t the case, you must be diligent in your approach and work hard to change things. 

Try to make them smile with simple compliments on a daily basis, ensure that experiential intimacy is fulfilled by going on fun experiences together such as a sexy date night, and make them feel loved and appreciated for who they are. If you are on the end of poor positive emotions, express your emotional needs to your partner and provide them ways that they can improve, as sometimes they aren’t aware of your internal emotions that you have kept a secret. 

Relationship Trust

What is trust in a relationship? Many would argue that the answer lies solely in the ability to trust your relationship as a whole. This means many different things for different people/couples, but the primary examples of relationship trust include:

• Trusting them to be monogamous

Although we are all about triad relationships and relationships that fall outside the standard forms of monogamy, many couples rely on this ideology to hold true throughout their lives. If this is you, then trusting your partner to be monogamous is vital. 

Nothing is worse than mistrust with your partner, such as when they go out with their friends, and not having this trust is rather a toxic trait. If you feel these scared emotions surrounding your partner being honest with you in their monogamy, you have to approach why before your mistrust damages them, and the same goes for them. Although you can rebuild trust after cheating, if you fear your partner might cheat on you, then there might be a more deeply rooted reason as to why, and you have to dig up these roots to plant a new, more flourishing tree of love. 

• Trusting them not to leave you.

The fear of a partner leaving you is common. After all, love is a scary thing! It’s heartbreaking when it doesn’t work out, but you cannot leave this fear on the table, as this results in not trusting your partner to be with you for the rest of your life. 

Instead of wishing for forever, try living in the present moment. There’s no need to have trust in the present, as the present is happening now, so enjoy every moment together to work towards negating this fear, and this long-form version of relationship trust will then build naturally. 

• Trusting your/their love is genuine.

When love is real, it’s real, and you’ll know it. But sometimes, our partners or we have been through things in the past that negatively affected them and changed their views on love, and you might be left on the other end feeling like they don’t fully trust that your love for them is genuine. 

Instead of being bitter or angry that they cannot fully accept your love, just work to build on this type of trust by constantly reminding them why you love them. This can be done by expressing all the positive ways they make you feel, ensuring them of their beauty, helping them reach success and follow their dreams, and overall just being consistent in your love. With time scars can heal, and they will soon trust that your love is genuine, but don’t let this fear hold you back from doing things to prove otherwise, even when you feel as though you don’t have anything to prove at all.