Focus on the Family with Jim Daly

Dr. Henry Cloud: And we begin to trust when we begin to feel like and experience the other person has got my interests in their mind and heart as well as their own.

John Fuller: That’s Dr. Henry Cloud sharing about the importance of trust in all of our relationships, uh, trust between spouses, uh, business partners, teammates. And we’re gonna be talking about trust today on Focus on the Family with Jim Daly. I’m John Fuller, and thanks for joining us.

Jim Daly: John, trust is an unusual thing. It’s like you give it until you can’t.

John: Hmm.

Jim: You know when it’s violated, uh, you kind of take it back. I’m sure everybody has a different approach. It’s not something you wake up to every morning, go, “Okay, who can I trust today?” Maybe unless you’re in a business situation-

John: Mm-hmm.

Jim: … or maybe your marriage is in trouble or something like that, then trust becomes a neon sign.

John: Mm-hmm.

Jim: And you’re worried about it. But it’s so critical to think through the importance of trust. I think everyone’s been the victim of trusting somebody that broke that trust. Might have been a friend, or again, a spouse or something like that.

John: Mm-hmm.

Jim: We want to talk about that. And if you do a word search in scripture, trust comes up a lot. You know, certainly love does.

John: Hmm.

Jim: But think of, uh, Proverbs 3:5, “Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding.” That’s one of my favorite actually. But right there, it’s telling us to trust the Lord. Sometimes, uh, we struggle with that given our circumstances, but the Lord is saying, “No, no. Keep trusting me. I’m trustworthy.” Right?

John: Yeah.

Jim: And, uh, it will be a great discussion today with one of our best and favorite guests.

John: (laughs) Yeah. Dr. Henry Cloud has been here a number of times. He’s a clinical psychologist and a lot of his time is spent with businesses helping improve culture and, uh, uh, performance. He’s a public speaker, uh, about a variety of, uh, topics. He’s authored a number of books approaching 50, I think.

Jim: Wow.

John: And, uh, he and his wife, Tori, live in Nashville, and they have two adult daughters.

Jim: Everybody’s moving to Nashville. Have you noticed (laughs)?

John: It is a popular spot.

Jim: That’s funny. Uh, Dr. Cloud, how are you? And welcome back.

Dr. Cloud: Very well. Thanks for, um, having me. It’s always good to be with you guys.

Jim: Well, you heard that little open there, Henry. Uh, do you agree that people are afraid to trust because it could, uh, entail a lot of risk?

Dr. Cloud: Well, that-

Jim: (Laughs).

Dr. Cloud: … that goes without saying, like, you know, I was thinking when you were talking about, we don’t wake up in the morning thinking about it, but actually the way that God has wired our systems, the number one question that your entire being is asking 24/7 is, am I safe?

Jim: That’s interesting. Yeah.

Dr. Cloud: You’re wired for that. In other words, now for the last minute, you know, you’ve been breathing, right?

Jim: Right.

Dr. Cloud: But you weren’t thinking about it.

Jim: Correct.

Dr. Cloud: Because your system has run the algorithm and has hit the green light for the air is okay to breathe so you can be careless.

Jim: Huh.

Dr. Cloud: So you’re just breathing until something comes up like a toxic fume, and all of a sudden you hit pause. Well, it’s easy to see in the physical world, but in the relational world and the business world, there’s an algorithm that we have to be just as diligent about knowing that all the boxes are checked before we hit green.

Jim: That’s really interesting. What a great metaphor to think about, uh, the aroma of lack of trust.

Dr. Cloud: There you go.

Jim: What you smell.

Dr. Cloud: Yeah.

Jim: (laughs).

Dr. Cloud: And how many times do you hear, do hear people-

Jim: Wow.

Dr. Cloud: … you know, I had them, something doesn’t smell right here. And they’ll, they’ll use those words without saying it.

Jim: Right.

Dr. Cloud: And it’s so interesting. If you go to, like, the book of Hebrews says that solid food, now think about, what’s solid food?

Jim: Meat.

Dr. Cloud: Marriage, business.

Jim: (laughs).

Dr. Cloud: Raising teenager (laughs), that’s solid food. We don’t give that to children.

Jim: Right.

Dr. Cloud: Solid food is for the mature who through practice have had their senses trained to discern good from evil.

Jim: Mm-hmm.

Dr. Cloud: So it takes a lot of experience and development to make, because everybody’s had the experience of I trusted that person, and then this happened. But then they rewind the, the tape and they go, uh, there were some signs that I either ignored or excused or let ’em go by. And the algorithm is right there in front of us a lot of the times.

Jim: Yeah.

Dr. Cloud: Now, sometimes people, good people get fooled.

Jim: Yeah. What a great banner for the discussion today and next time. Uh, how to develop your senses.

Dr. Cloud: That’s right.

Jim: So that you are discerning good and evil. I mean, that’s great. Let, let’s move into it. Trust, uh, you say is more than a feeling.

Dr. Cloud: Yeah.

Jim: Or is it a feeling? Differentiate for me what trust actually is.

Dr. Cloud: Well, trust as a, let’s get technical here, trust is a construct. It’s a principle, right?

Jim: So it’s not an emotion.

Dr. Cloud: Well, it’s not an emotion. And emotions can be built and result and drive trust either, in either direction.

Jim: Yeah. Either positive or negative.

Dr. Cloud: A lot of people fall in love and next week get married because the trust hormones that God wired into you have gotten triggered, and you go on a drug trip.

Jim: And one out of four, those marriages will last. (laughs)

Dr. Cloud: Yeah. On a good day. Right. So, so certainly emotions are involved, but that gets into the senses. And sometimes our trust muscle can be either ill-trained, naive, or broken. And so many times people can be with a really trustworthy person and yet having the emotion of fear because of trauma they’ve had or where, and the spouses-

Jim: Yeah.

Dr. Cloud: … you could tell me, why don’t you trust me? And, and it’s really the trust muscle is broken. It’s not that the other person lacks trustworthiness. So that’s why I thought it was really important to, if, because I use this with people in companies all the time. Let’s look at the algorithm that the science tells us and the Bible tells us these are the components that we need to make sure we know are there before we engage in deeper and deeper levels of trust.

Jim: So getting into trust in the book on trust, uh, I’m interested in a story you tell about helping a CEO and a chairman of the board. I think they had some conflict.

Dr. Cloud: Oh yeah.

Jim: And you said the book is filled with illustrations and examples of, uh, marriage issues and business partnership issues, because that’s where these-

Dr. Cloud: Yeah. And even parenting.

Jim: And parenting where trust is a big issue.

Dr. Cloud: Extended family.

Jim: Yeah. So in that context, uh, what’s that story and how did the sw-, situation play out? What was the resolution?

Dr. Cloud: Well, it was a, a big global entity that everybody would know the name of. And they were at a stalemate with the chairman and the CEO and the board was divided. Half of ’em were the chairman, half with the CEO. And it really could have blown up, but you would’ve read about it. And hundreds of thousands of lives would’ve been affected and all of this. And so they, we’ve got the big weekend hole up in a hotel and, and solve this dilemma. And so, so I’m facilitating the, the meeting and, um, I come in and say, “Look, I wanna start with, let’s just start with some things that aren’t disputable. Let’s make sure we all start with the same set of facts and wanna hear from the chairman and the CEO.” And so the chairman starts to talk. And, and not too long into it, you know, the CEO’s kind of coming back and negating some things. And, and, and I could see it wasn’t helpful the way that he interacted with him. And so after about 10 minutes, the chairman of the board sits up, closes his, his book, his portfolio, looks at the board and says, “I’m done here. You guys can have it. Good luck.”

Jim: (laughs) Just that-

Dr. Cloud: Just like, and everybody, everybody knew what that meant. I mean, it would’ve been awful. So he starts to get up and walk out of the boardroom. I didn’t know what to do. I mean, this, we’re 15 minutes into a two-day retreat and it’s over.

Jim: Right. And they’ve brought you in to fix it.

Dr. Cloud: And they brought me in to fix it. Right?

Jim: (laughs).

Dr. Cloud: So I didn’t know what to do. I don’t know what possessed me, but I, I got up out of my chair. I ran in front of him and sat down in front of the door, and I said to him, “Look, you can walk out that door, but if you do, you will have set into motion a chain of events that have huge consequences and can’t be undone.”

Jim: Mm.

Dr. Cloud: “So I want you to do me a favor.” The chairman says, “What?” I said, “I just want you to sit down for a minute on the floor.” And the guy looks at me like, this is a big powerful figure, right? Looks at, I guess when a crazy person tells you to do something, you do it, right?

Jim: (laughs).

Dr. Cloud: So he sits down on the floor, and I looked at him and I said, “Just, just tell me something. What’s it like for you when he does what he was doing right there?” And he paused for a second, and he looks at me and he says, “All right, I’ll tell you.” And he started speaking and his lip, his chin starts to quiver. And he was kind of breaking up, and he was starting to hold back some tears. And so we keep talking a little bit, and then I see this movement from the table. It was a CEO who got up. He comes over. He sits down next to him. He reaches out, he puts his arm on his shoulder, and he says, “I am so sorry. I never knew I made you feel that way.”

Jim: Hmm.

Dr. Cloud: “I would never want you to feel that way.” I said, “Hold on a second.” I said to the board, “Can you guys just give us the room? We’ll call you back in.” We sat there for about an hour, hour and a half. Those two guys went back into the foyer at the end of that and said to the board, “Okay, you can come back in now. I think we can work this out.” Now if you roll the clock backwards, the chairman was the one that recruited the CEO. There was so much trust, right, at the beginning and the board, but it had broken down. And it took, I mean, I worked with them for quite a while, you know, after that. And it, you know, it’s not done in a minute, but it started because what he actually did that he didn’t realize he was doing, was he did the very first element of the algorithm of trust. He stopped talking and illustrated to the chairman, now I understand.

Jim: Well, it’s interesting how all these principles apply to so many situations to your marriage, to your business associates or your work associates, to your kids.

Dr. Cloud: Trust fuels life.

Jim: Right.

Dr. Cloud: All of it.

Jim: And that’s in there. Let me, let me-

Dr. Cloud: Oh- Can I (laughs) give you a quick-

Jim: Yeah.

Dr. Cloud: … story about… I’m sitting on a plane when I was writing the book, and I’m, I’m doing research on trust. And the guy next to me says, says, “What are you doing?” I said, “Well, I’m, I’m researching trust.” He goes, “Oh, well, I don’t trust anybody.”

Jim: That’s the question I was gonna ask you. This is the story.

Dr. Cloud: He said, “I, I don’t trust anybody.” I said, “Really?” He says, “No, I learned a long time ago I can only trust myself. You can’t trust people. I learned that. You can’t trust ’em. They’ll let you down. I only trust myself.”

Jim: (laughs).

Dr. Cloud: And I’m like, “Well, I’m a psychologist, and you’re crazy.”

Jim: (laughs).

Dr. Cloud: He’s like, “Well, what are… What do you mean?” I said, I said, “Of course you trust.” He said, “No, I don’t.” I said, “Dude, look out the window. You’re at 40,000 feet.”

Jim: (laughs).

Dr. Cloud: “Did you get yourself up here?”

Jim: Yeah. Right.

Dr. Cloud: You trusted. So you trust a couple people in that cockpit you’ve never… How do you know the guy that filled up the plane didn’t put chocolate milk in the tank? You trusted. When you drove to the airport, you trusted people on the other side of the road to stay in their lane. You can’t do life without trust.

Jim: Right.

Dr. Cloud: But if I heard your story, which I’d like to, I bet there have been some instances where in deeper heart ways you’ve been hurt, and you stopped trusting in those ways. So I wanna hear your story, and you could see it and how it had limited his life, broken relationships, all of that. So we can’t do anything without trust.

Jim: Yeah.

John: Uh, this is Focus on the Family with Jim Daly, and our guest today is Dr. Henry Cloud. And, uh, I don’t think I mentioned the book title at the beginning of the show-

Dr. Cloud: (laughs).

John: … but it’s called, Trust: Knowing When to Give It, When to Withhold It, How to Earn It, and How to Fix It When It Gets Broken in Life and Business. This is a terrific resource and, uh, we’re gonna encourage you to get a copy from us here at the ministry. Uh, just stop by focusonthefamily.com/broadcast.

Jim: Henry, you’ve laid out five essentials of trust, and I wanna kind of unpack those with you. So the first is this idea of understanding.

Dr. Cloud: Yeah.

Jim: So how, how does understanding lead or take away from trust?

Dr. Cloud: Well, it actually is the foundation. You know, it’s very important for an infant to trust its mother, right, when they’re born.

Jim: Right. And those bonds are occurring naturally. Right?

Dr. Cloud: Those bonds-

Jim: Like you said earlier, you don’t even think about it.

Dr. Cloud: They are occurring naturally if the mother is attuned.

Jim: Okay.

Dr. Cloud: Right?

Jim: So that healthiness.

Dr. Cloud: It’s a diet. Yeah.

Jim: Yeah.

Dr. Cloud: And so what you see is what happens? If they… is upset and they’re crying, and what does the mother do? “Oh, that’s okay, I got you.” And the tone and looking him in the eye. And gradually the infant learns what David said in the Psalms, “God, you taught me to trust you at my mother’s breast.” That that’s where it begins. We have to learn to trust in life, to trust God or to trust other people. And so it begins with that basic sense of understanding. Now, later we put words to that, and we call it deep listening or empathy. And what you’re doing is you’re looking somebody in the eye, you’re present with them, you’re emotionally present. They feel that and you say, “Gosh, that, that really is sad.”

Jim: Yeah. In fact, you, you used the, uh, I think it was a hostage negotiator as an example.

Dr. Cloud: Yes.

Jim: That’s fascinating.

Dr. Cloud: So I was talking about this in a leadership event, and the dynamics of trust and to CEOs. And guy walks up to me after he says, “I’m the lead hostage negotiator for the FBI, and everything you just described is our entire training program.”

Jim: Huh.

Dr. Cloud: I said, “What do you mean?” He said, “Well, a guy’s got a bomb strapped to him in a bank with 40 hostages. I’m the one that’s gotta go talk him out of the building. And we don’t walk in and start convincing him like, “Dude, this is a bad idea, (laughs). You know, this doesn’t end well.” You start by going in and say, “Hey, I’m, I’m Jim, and they sent me in here to talk to you. So tell me your name.” And we get his name, and then we say, “So how did we get here today? Tell me what’s been going on.” We just listen.

Jim: Hmm.

Dr. Cloud: We keep pulling more and more. And the more that that empathic listening is happening, what they don’t know, the hostage guy, doesn’t know is his system is starting to let down a little bit because he, he’s initially feeling I’m safe to at least talk about it.

Jim: Yeah.

Dr. Cloud: And so gradually the heart opens up. We’re wired this way. So that’s the first one. But obviously, and Jim, how, how many times do you see this in leadership? Somebody’s trying to sell their team and convince the customer- You know, leaders are persuasive. Sometimes parents can try to teach a kid why this is right and this is wrong and all, which we need to do, but nobody’s listening until you feel like they understand them first.

Jim: Interesting. Yeah.

Dr. Cloud: And in marriage, it’s so important for each one to feel like they’re safe. I can talk about my side of it and the equation without instantly getting negated or me saying, well, that’s not true, or I didn’t do that. Or what, they kind of feel heard first. And we’re gonna get to finding reality later, but you’re not gonna find reality until you’re on, both on the same side of the table and the problem’s over there.

Jim: Okay. So that’s understanding.

Dr. Cloud: Understanding.

Jim: Your second of the five is motive.

Dr. Cloud: Motive.

Jim: This is starting to sound like a negotiation hostage (laughs). No. So how does motive fit into that?

Dr. Cloud: Well, we can, you know, even thieves and predators show up and try to build empathy and connection with somebody to get them to do somethin’.

Jim: Right. It’s a tool.

Dr. Cloud: It’s a tool. But the motive behind that is for themselves. And we begin to trust when we begin to feel like and experience the other person has got my interests in their mind and heart as well as their own.

Jim: Hmm.

Dr. Cloud: And right before I wrote the book, I had, um, I had spine surgery and two knee replacements. And it was an awful three years. But when I was choosing my first knee surgeon, everybody says, “You gotta go to the guy. He’s the one.” Right. And so I go to this guy, and he comes in, uh, “I’m Dr. So-and-So,” and puts the MRI and the X-ray up and he goes, “Oh yeah, you need a total knee replacement.” I mean, he had been in there less than a minute. He looks at it. “You need a total knee replacement.” And I said, “Really?” He goes, “Yeah. And, and, and by the way, this is what I do. Anybody tells you differently, they’re wrong.”

Jim: (laughs).

Dr. Cloud: Said, “I understand what’s going on here, so I want you to schedule it with the front desk, and it’s good to meet you.” And he starts to walk out. I said, “Doc, wait, hold on a second.” He said, “What?” I said, “You, you haven’t even, you just looked at the, that’s it? That’s, that’s the whole-”

Jim: Didn’t move your knee around or anything.

Dr. Cloud: Yeah. He goes, “I understand what’s going on,” and walk, and walk. I’m not hitting green yet. Right? I don’t feel like-

Jim: Well, he’s hitting green.

Dr. Cloud: He’s hitting green.

Jim: (Laughs) It’s that new Porsche he wanted.

Dr. Cloud: Right.

Jim: (laughs).

Dr. Cloud: And so, so I go to another one, and he was very different. And he, he started asking, “So where’s the pain? When did this happen? And where’s the pain start?” And, and I got a feeling where he’s really, you know, he’s understanding me. So I like this guy better. So I go to a third one. Now, he was empathic and a listener too, but after about five minutes, he goes, “Hold on a second.” He says, “Guys, come in here.” And he had three residents that he was training. And he brings them in the room. He says, “So see this knee?” And he turns me and he’s telling to the guy, says, “This is exactly, this guy, this knee right here. This is what’s going in our research project ’cause this data is exactly what we’re presenting. It’ll help, you know, make the devices, and we need to get the,” and all of a sudden I’m realizing I’m just an object of research for him.

Jim: Huh.

Dr. Cloud: This is about, his motive is, it’s all about his paper and his research.

Jim: Mm-hmm.

Dr. Cloud: And all of that. So I go back to the second guy and say, “I think I’m, you know, I’d like to talk further.” And he instantly goes, he goes, “Yeah.” He said, “I, I, I really hope to help you.” He said, because he says, “You, you’re a competitive golfer. I’ve read about you. We gotta get you back on the golf course. And you got two daughters, you got a lot of years, you’re gonna be traveling. You gotta get this thing fixed so you can,” all of a sudden he, I can feel it. He cares more about me being able to do stuff than getting paid or any research. So I’m feeling like it’s not only his own interest. You know, the book of Philippians says, “Do not merely look out your, look out for your own interests, but also the interests of others.”

Jim: No, that, that’s good. And I, I was gonna move to that third, which is a person’s ability and keeping that kind of the knee, knee surgeon example-

Dr. Cloud: (laughs).

Jim: … I mean, you have to weigh that empathetic attitude. But if he’s the worst surgeon in the group, that’s not a good thing either.

Dr. Cloud: Yeah, exactly. What if I go to Dr. Caring and Dr. Good Motives?

Jim: (Laughs) Dr. Empathy.

Dr. Cloud: Yeah.

Jim: (laughs).

Dr. Cloud: And I’m, Dr. Empathy (laughs). Yeah. Now I do, I want you to do my knee. And then he goes, “That’s great.” He said, “I’m so excited about doing your knee because I’m an OB-GYN and I’ve never done a knee before.”

Jim: (Laughs) I’ve always wanted to do a knee replacement.

Dr. Cloud: (Laughs) I’ve always wanted… Since medical school I’ve wanted-

Jim: (laughs).

Dr. Cloud: Now we’re hitting-

Jim: Yeah. Oops.

Dr. Cloud: Oops. So the third thing that we have to make sure is there, and, and this gets huge in families and businesses. The third thing we have, we can trust somebody with our lives in certain contexts. You see this in churches all the time. I’ve seen so many church situations or nonprofits where somebody’s got a vision, and they bring a board around ’em that believes in the vision and is supportive of them and all this. And that’s great. But then five years later, you find yourself in a big… You’re buying a property or you got a legal issue. That board doesn’t know anything about that. They’ve never been there. The board wasn’t selected-

Jim: For expertise.

Dr. Cloud: Expertise as well.

Jim: Right. He, um, character plays a role in developing trust.

Dr. Cloud: Mm-hmm.

Jim: That seems obvious, but you mentioned it in the book.

Dr. Cloud: Yeah.

Jim: So it must have some nuance to it.

Dr. Cloud: It’s so important that we understand the biblical nuance of this as well as the research. A lot of times you ask people, do you trust, you know, somebody? They go, yeah, he’d never lie, cheat, or steal. Well that, you’re talking about moral aspects of character.

Jim: Mm-hmm.

Dr. Cloud: Which are foundational. You go to 2 Peter 1, for example, that says, “Add to your faith, moral excellence,” but doesn’t stop there. Then it goes into all of these other things. Perseverance, self-control, mutual affection, kindness. So what if Dr. Good Motive, Empathy, Caring, all that stuff says, “Okay, we’re gonna do your knee replacement. This is a teaching hospital. If you wanna watch one, you can look through the window. I’m gonna do one in a half hour.” And I go in there and what if I had been watching him and 10 minutes into the surgery, all of a sudden he goes, “Oh no, he’s bleeding somebody do something. The patient’s bleeding.”

Jim: (laughs).

Dr. Cloud: Well, now he just flunked the character piece.

Jim: Hmm.

Dr. Cloud: Because in the Bible and in life, character has to do with somebody’s total makeup.

Jim: Hmm.

Dr. Cloud: And are they glued together in a way for the context that I’m trusting them in, that they’ve got the emotional intelligence, the perseverance, the emotional regulation or whatever that’s gonna be needed to trust them with that situation.

Jim: Yeah.

Dr. Cloud: It’s huge.

Jim: It’s good. And it’s, you know, self-evident. Of course, there’s bad character that tends to show up as well. And you gotta manage what to do with that in your marriage or, you know, in your business relationships, et cetera. So that’s the four. The fifth is track record.

Dr. Cloud: Track record. What happened the last time?

Jim: (Laughs) Yeah.

Dr. Cloud: You know, it’s-

Jim: But wait, wait a minute, because the scripture says, you know, “Your sins are forgiven. I won’t remember them.” So how does track record fit in with God’s great forgiveness?

Dr. Cloud: I won’t remember them. And you’ll be born again. So now you’re an infant, so I’m not gonna turn over the keys to the kingdom to an infant. Right? And what you see, what you see in the scriptures is that trust is always built on incremental performance done well.

Jim: Hmm.

Dr. Cloud: You know, you’ve got kids, they handle one situation well. Then you let ’em go to another one or you let ’em go to a bigger one. Alright? You got the Parable of the Talents, for example. You’re faithful and little. You’ll be given more. If you’re not, we’ll take those keys away from you. And it’s very, very, you know, Paul says, “Don’t lay hands on any man too quickly.” And so the diligence throughout the scriptures, God always tells us to trust more when you’ve seen more of what’s trustworthy.

John: Mm-hmm.

Jim: Huh.

Dr. Cloud: And in trusting Him, what does He always do? Look at my track record. You were slaves in Egypt, and I rescued you with a mighty hand. Every time He asks us, He says, “Look at what I’ve done ’cause it’s not gonna look like I’m doing anything right now. And you gotta remember, I’m gonna pull you through this.”

Jim: Yeah.

Dr. Cloud: That’s what God does.

Jim: Yeah.

Dr. Cloud: And we can bring Him anything. And He’s not going to condemn us. He may discipline us, but it’s always gonna be led with that tree of the algorithm of trust. He’s gonna understand, He’s gonna listen, come let us reason together. He’s gonna understand the driving forces. He’s, whatever He does is gonna be with good motives where it’s for us. And His character’s dependable, and His abilities are dependable. And He asks us to remember that, remember the track record.

Jim: Yeah. This is good. And we’re getting rolling on this one.

Dr. Cloud: Mm-hmm.

Jim: But those concepts are so true. I’m just thinking of-

Dr. Cloud: Well take, take a concept of an adulterous, um, affair in a marriage. Okay? There’s a breach in trust. They’re trying to put it together. You would never want somebody to say, oh, they’re forgive- Certainly you want them to forgive. Right? If we we’re gonna go forward, you gotta forgive. Forgiveness is free, but trust is earned.

John: Mm-hmm.

Jim: Right. So true.

Dr. Cloud: Now we’re gonna start watching incremental steps, changes that are happening, how the relationships work and competencies and skills are being built along the way. And maybe in the first, however long, she’s tracking his phone. Right? But I know a lot of couples where we put it back together and you know, however long later they’re like, “I don’t need to watch him. He’s fine.”

Jim: Right. And we’re gonna pick that up.

Dr. Cloud: Because it’s being rebuilt.

Jim: We’ll pick that up next time and talk more about how that trust is earned and regained and those kinds of concepts. But this has been a great first day talking about trust and how you navigate it, how you earn it, and how you give it. And uh, what a great book. Dr. Henry Cloud. Trust: Knowing When to Give It, When to Withhold It, How to Earn It, and How to Fix It When It Gets Broken. And uh, this is the kickoff. We’re gonna come back and learn some more concepts next time. Can we do that?

Dr. Cloud: It’s been great to be here. I’ll-

Jim: You’ll be back.

Dr. Cloud: So much fun. We’ll be here.

Jim: We’re gonna chain you to the chair there, so-

Dr. Cloud: I trust you to keep me here.

Jim: (laughs) okay, good. Yeah.

John: Well, we have the book here at the ministry, and it’ll be yours for a generous donation of any amount to help support Focus on the Family. And, uh, we’re gonna encourage you to join the pledge team, uh, the sustainers who donate every month if you can. That really helps kind of even things out for us. And it’s a really critical aspect of being a financial supporter of Focus. If you’re not in a spot to do that, please know that a one-time gift is deeply appreciated. Either way, donate today, and we’ll send that book to you as our way of saying thanks for your support. Our phone number is 800, the letter A and the word FAMILY. And, uh, you can find all the details at focusonthefamily.com/broadcast. And along the way, if we’ve touched on something that has kind of struck a nerve and you wanna reach out and talk to somebody, but you don’t have anybody within your spirit that you can trust, uh, please know that we have caring Christian counselors here, and it’s a privilege of ours to be able to, uh, recommend that you make a phone call to us, and we’ll schedule a time for one of those counselors to give you a call back. They’ll, uh, begin the process of getting you toward a better place and probably be able to recommend some resources and maybe even a counselor in your own area. Again, our number is 800, the letter A and the word FAMILY. Well, thank you for joining us today for Focus on the Family with Jim Daly. I’m John Fuller inviting you back when we continue the conversation with Dr. Cloud and once again, help you and your family thrive in Christ.

Day Two

Dr. Henry Cloud: Forgiveness has to do with the past, and it’s free. One person can forgive, takes two to reconcile, but one person can forgive. But while forgiveness is free, trust is earned.

John Fuller: Well, that’s Dr. Henry Cloud talking about the importance of trust in all of our relationships. And he’s back with us today on Focus on the Family with Jim Daly, and I’m John Fuller.

Jim Daly: John, trust is such a, uh, a crucial part of the human experience because it leads to intimacy. You think about broken intimacy, you’re usually looking at broken trust of some sort. And I think everyone’s been a victim of trusting the wrong person, we have kind of colloquialisms that we use in the culture for that. You know, when someone breaks our trust, who can you trust? Last time as we talked with our guest, Dr. Henry Cloud, he mentioned a story about a man on an airplane saying, “I trust no one.” To which he quickly pointed out, uh, you trusted the pilot, right?

John: Mm-hmm.

Jim: You’re up at 40,000 feet.

John: Yeah.

Jim: So a lot of the trust that we have is unseen. We just trust because we get in the car, we get in the airplane, we do what we do. We trust the food we eat, how about that? Uh, but, uh, to nurture and to cultivate trust is gonna deepen our ability to have intimacy in our workplace, in our marriages, as a parent. And so that’s why we’re coming back for day two. Uh, let’s just think of Isaiah 12:2, which says, “Behold God is my salvation, I will trust and will not be afraid for the Lord, God is my strength and my song and He has become my salvation.”

John: Mm-hmm.

Jim: Okay. There’s one, trusting God.

John: Yeah. We, we all need trust. And I’m so glad Dr. Cloud is back, he’s a very popular speaker. He is a clinical psychologist. He’s written, uh, dozens of books and-

Jim: Almost 50.

John: … I believe so.

Jim: (laughing)

John: And uh, the book that forms the foundation for our conversation today is called, Trust: Knowing When to Give It, When to Withhold It, How to Earn It, and How to Fix It When It Gets Broken in Life and Business. There are so many applicable principles in this book, uh, get a copy from us. Uh, we’ve got details at focusonthefamily.com/broadcast.

Jim: I think it’d be good to mention too, if you missed last time, uh, you can go back and get that at our website or download the smartphone app-

John: Mm-hmm.

Jim: … that’s another way to do it. Or, uh, you can watch YouTube. So that’s a good reminder. Henry, welcome back.

Dr. Cloud: It’s good to be here.

Jim: Hey, could you, uh, just give us the five essentials, or the algorithm as you referred to it last time? Just hit those five, people can go back and listen to that on YouTube or the smartphone app like I just mentioned.

Dr. Cloud: Yeah. You know, we’re, when we’re trying to figure out, can we trust somebody or when trust has been broken, how do we get back? It’s really good to have a map. And so what we talked about yesterday was, when you look at all the research and what the scriptures say and all of that, I took all of that and tried to do, you know, what’s called a factor analysis. What does all this add up to? And they’re really five essentials. The first one is, we trust someone when we feel like they really understand me, they know what I need-

Jim: Kind of empathy, right?

Dr. Cloud: The empathy and the deep understanding, what hurts me? What do I n- what do I need from this relationship? What do I need from you? So the deep empathy. Number two, is we trust somebody when we sense that their motive is not just about them and their agenda, but they’ve got a motive to look out for me and what’s good for me, they’re for me.

Jim: Mm.

Dr. Cloud: … they actually want me to do well in this relationship.

Jim: Being selfless.

Dr. Cloud: Being selfless-

Jim: Yeah. (laughs)

Dr. Cloud: … and being other-oriented, right?

Jim: Yep.

Dr. Cloud: The third one is, that we trust somebody when we begin to sense that they’ve got the ability to pull off what I’m entrusting to them. So we can have somebody that’s caring and have good motives, but we’re gonna trust them with a job, or trust your teenager to drive a car, or trust your, you know, your spouse to, you know, uh, do something for the house. We gotta, we gotta believe in their abilities-

John: Mm-hmm.

Dr. Cloud: … so that’s number three. Number four is, there are character makeup. Now, what I mean by character is it certainly includes moral character, lying, cheating, and stealing, that’s foundational. If you don’t have that, you don’t have trust. But it’s past that. Because we all know people that… We’ve had bosses or people you work with, you, they wouldn’t lie, cheat, or steal, but you wouldn’t wanna work with them again because other things about their makeup, you know, what’s their emotional intelligence? What’s their compassion, their patience?

John: Mm-hmm.

Dr. Cloud: Do they have an anger problem? Are they calm under pressure? Can they persevere through an issue? Or do they run from problems or, you know, get into big conflicts? So the character piece, their makeup, is very important. And the last one is a track record. You know, we build mental maps in relationships, and when somebody has a track record of being trustworthy, then we tend to trust them again without even thinking about it-

Jim: Yeah.

Dr. Cloud: … ’cause the track record, the map drives that.

Jim: That’s really good. And, and it’s the small things and the big things. And we even create these things around that. Like, you know, my, my word is my bond-

John: Mm.

Jim: … and things like that.

John: Yeah.

Jim: Those are people that carry a certain amount of trustworthiness because what they say is what they do.

Dr. Cloud: That’s right.

Jim: And we all know that working in the business world, or even in your relationships-

Dr. Cloud: Mm.

Jim: Um, in your book you list several fears that hold us back from trusting people. I, I guess i- as a precursor to this question, that first one being the dependency. You know, being fearful of de- depending on someone.

Dr. Cloud: Mm-hmm.

Jim: But before we get to that answer, family origin has to play into all of this, you know, what you learn as a child. I’m sure, I’m more and more amazed at the fact that so many of my reflexes, so many of my triggers, my buttons that can get pushed-

Dr. Cloud: Sure.

Jim: … particularly by Jean, you know?

Dr. Cloud: Sure.

Jim: She, i- i- i- those are things that I learned early on, in- in- insecurities or something like that-

Dr. Cloud: Absolutely.

Jim: … so let me ask a two-parter then, as we go into this, as we talk about the fears. A lot of those fears are developed through childhood teenhood, et cetera. So speak to that, and then talk to the dependency one or fear of being dependent on others as the first example.

Dr. Cloud: Well, there’s a reason you guys call it Focus on the Family-

Jim: (laughing)

Dr. Cloud: … right? Because the family is the place. If you think of a factory, building a car, okay? The factory’s pretty important to that end consumer.

Jim: Yeah, that’s true. You don’t want the wheels on the roof.

Dr. Cloud: You don’t want the wheels on the roof, or what about some parts that weren’t installed?

Jim: Mm-hmm.

Dr. Cloud: They’re gonna be needed later. It’s pretty good if you put the ignition switch in there, right? Or what if somebody along the process came with a sledgehammer and bent the axle? So our developmental years-

John: Mm.

Dr. Cloud: … God has designed His ways to be followed, and they’re in very, very specific stages. And what happens in the growing up years is the equipment that you bring into marriage or you bring into the workplace, you’re coming in with equipment that was built in the past. Now, it’s not only childhood, it could be a prior boss that taught you to fear future bosses, it could be a trauma that happened, you know, later in life. But we carry those until we have new experiences. New experiences of healing can undo prior experiences that were traumatic or lacking, but we always come to every situation bringing who we are as a person. And that becomes hugely important. You know, the Navy SEALs have a great saying, “No one rises to a challenge, you fall to your level of training.”

Jim: Huh.

Dr. Cloud: Mm-hmm.

Jim: Speak to, to that idea of fearful of dependency on others.

Dr. Cloud: Well, trust basically is all about dependency. When we trust somebody, by definition, I am opening myself up to be able to be hurt by you. That’s what we’re doing. When a boss gives an assignment, “Somebody go open up a division across the country.” If that person doesn’t perform well, the company get hurt by that. When a spouse begins to open up and invest more and more of their heart to somebody, by definition we’re making ourselves vulnerable. Trust, I love the word careless. Trust equals carelessness in this way.

John: Hmm.

Dr. Cloud: That right now, today I, I’ve been here with you and doing all this, I’m not obsessing, worrying about how’s my wife gonna do me in today? You know, she’s gonna run up big bills, or she’s gonna go-

John: (laughing)

Dr. Cloud: … do something bad or… So I can be careless, I’m not guarding my back. Trust means to not have to worry and guard yourself because somebody is worthy of what you’ve given to them to trust them-

Jim: Yeah. That’s really interesting, I-

Dr. Cloud: … it could be your heart, your pocketbook.

Jim: Yeah.

Dr. Cloud: … it could be the car with a teenager. It c- i- it’s everything in life.

John: Hmm. Isn’t that interesting. Well, this is Focus on the Family with Jim Daly and our guest today is Dr. Henry Cloud. And of the many books he’s written, the one we’re talking about today is called Trust: Knowing When to Give It, When to Withhold It, How to Earn It, and How to Fix It When It Gets Broken in Life and Business. And you can find a copy of that book at our website. That’s focusonthefamily.com/broadcast.

Jim: Henry, let me ask you about narcissism-

Dr. Cloud: Hmm.

Jim: … it’s used a lot. You know, if you’re scrolling through, uh, YouTube or something like that, “how to identify a narcissist”… It occasionally pops up.

Dr. Cloud: Hmm.

Jim: And I, I, I’m just saying, y- I think in this culture today with social media, again, the incidence of narcissism might be on the rise-

Dr. Cloud: Oh, for sure.

Jim: … ’cause it’s really a self-centeredness that is blind to everything else, seemingly. So why don’t you give us that definition, and just touch on this issue of narcissistic behavior.

Dr. Cloud: Well, it’s a big one in trust, you know-

Jim: Yeah.

Dr. Cloud: … because we started with trust. Um, having elements of being empathic towards others, you know, caring about the other and what’s good for them and all of those. And what a narcissistic personality disorder is concerned about, is themselves. It’s all-

Jim: Nothing but-

Dr. Cloud: … nothing but themselves.

Jim: Yeah.

Dr. Cloud: Now, one of the big problems, and, and, and I hear this a, a lot, uh, in, you know, in call-in shows and all their p- people call in and say, “Well, you know, my therapist said my husband is a, a narcissistic personality disorder. And you know, they never change, so I’m gonna divorce him.” Well, stop. That’s not true-

Jim: Hmm.

Dr. Cloud: … that narcissistic personalities can’t change. We’ve been doing this for decades. What’s true is that many times they don’t. Sometimes, many times they do. And not only that, there’s different kinds of narcissists, and some of them-

Jim: Hmm.

Dr. Cloud: … are more malignant and resistant to change than others. Broadly speaking, you’ve got an invulnerable, arrogant, God-like, envy-based narcissist who wants to be God. And they’re out to seek and destroy if somebody doesn’t do what they want. But you’ve also got people that illustrate a lot of narcissistic behavior that are really shame-based, and they’re very vulnerable underneath that.

Jim: Mm-hmm.

Dr. Cloud: And you approach those two very differently. So it’s a big problem in the culture, Jim, but it’s also a big problem ’cause we’re fueling it. You know-

Jim: Hmm.

Dr. Cloud: … a, a, a, and you know, you see this a, a lot of times wh- when you deal with singles. Y- I’ll always say, “Look, you’re, you’re attracted to their outsides initially-

Jim: Mm-hmm.

Dr. Cloud: … probably, maybe it’s how they look or how they perform in life or their, you know, th- great things they do, but you’re gonna live with their insides. It’s the character that you end up experiencing. You don’t experience somebody’s externals, you experience their internals-

Jim: That is really good.

Dr. Cloud: … their heart, mind, soul, and strength.

Jim: Again, the scripture talks about that, right?

Dr. Cloud: It i- God looks, man looks on the outside, God looks on the inside.

Jim: Yeah. Nothing’s changed after thousands of years.

Dr. Cloud: How about that? (laughs)

Jim: So really the, that idea of fear, your fear of being controlled, uh, fear of commitment, fear of imperfection, uh, fears around trauma, fears around inequality. We’re not covering them all, I just wanna make sure we mention them, and then fears around oneself. Uh, the book is what you need to get (laughs) in order to get a definition of all that. Let’s move into repairing trust-

Dr. Cloud: Yeah. Yeah.

Jim: … and what that means. Y- y- you have a story in the book about Drew and Bella. What was their situation, and how did it turn out?

Dr. Cloud: Oh, well, you know, good ole Drew had two lives. (laughs)

Jim: Okay. He’s one of those guys.

Dr. Cloud: And… yeah, one of those guys. And then he got found out and, um, his wife and his business partners, and everybody decided they would give him another chance. And he had multiple affairs. And they would, would give him another chance. And so we, we started to engage in a process of how you repair it. And, and what the story does is it really chronicles how both the mistakes that people make, sometimes, um, you know, he or she will come around and say, “I’m sorry.” And, you know, they’re really repentant and you see all this brokenness. And then the other one goes, “Okay, I forgive you,” and we move on because of forgiveness. Well, remember, forgiveness has to do with the past, and it’s free. One person can forgive, it takes two to reconcile, but one person can forgive. But while forgiveness is free, trust is earned. And so the immediate thing that had to happen was, we needed to structure a process where this could be repaired, both in the wounding that it, that had happened in everything that it, had happened. But also in the changes that he had to make to ever get to a place where she could really trust him again. Or even his business partners ’cause he had done a lot of the context of this, or in the context of the business.

Jim: Hmm. In that context, just for description k- purposes, that mountain can seem so high.

John: Mm-hmm.

Dr. Cloud: It is high.

Jim: … for both the spouse and the offending spouse. I mean, y- you’re having those discussions. Can we ever get to a better place? That’s gotta be one of the darkest discussions you could have.

Dr. Cloud: Well, it- i- it’s sort of what we said earlier, you know about the narcissist. And you understand why people say, “They never change.” Well, that’s not true because we know of, given the right process that many of them can and do. But by and large, in some situations, the mountain is so high that, can Everest be climbed? Yeah, but you better be pretty good (laughs) at mountain climbing to pull it off.

Jim: And carry some oxygen.

Dr. Cloud: And, and you don’t just go up there without a guide, right?

Jim: Yeah.

Dr. Cloud: And so what, the main thing I wanna offer here is I wanna offer hope.

Jim: Mm.

Dr. Cloud: Because remember, God had a horrible breach with us, and God repaired it. Now, in the sa- just like the narcissist or the people with affairs, not everybody comes into that offered reconciliation because they don’t go through the process that He requires, but some do. So the hope is marriages can be restored. I’ve seen marriages, horrible things happen, and they’re restored. And they can be, but it can’t be just this, you know, “Oh, you know, all is forgiven.” And what do you see oftentimes, is the offending spouse will, when they start to get into it… Let’s, let’s say, you know, however long down the road they’re in a situation, and something taps into a memory for her or a fear for her, and she starts to bring it up, and he gets defensive and reactive, “Why can’t you leave the past… You know, can’t you forget this? You”-

Jim: Mm-hmm.

Dr. Cloud: …. “you said you had forgiven me.” The forgiveness has to do with the debt, but the woundedness might take a process. And he or she’s gotta come to that other person’s woundedness with the elements of trust we talk about, and show that you can trust me with even bringing your pain about this to me.

Jim: Yeah.

Dr. Cloud: And the reason I wrote about… And, and in fact I think I said this in the book when I was writing that, I called him and I said, “Dude,” ’cause they’re like five years later now and they’re just doing great. I said, “I just gotta call you and say, you are like my hero.” And par- particularly, I was thinking about when they started to go through the repair. I watched him when she had to unload the pain, and the anger, and everything that she went through. I watched him live out that number one understanding without getting defensive, with empathically seeing what he had done to her, and hearing that. And he did it better than anybody I’ve ever seen.

Jim: Yeah.

Dr. Cloud: And it’s so important.

Jim: Well, also I’d call her and say, “You’re a hero.”

Dr. Cloud: Absolutely.

Jim: You know, ’cause that, that person has the get outta jail free card even with scripture.

John: Mm-hmm.

Jim: You know, this is the thing that if you violate that, the Lord says, “You, you, you can for the exit door.”

Dr. Cloud: (laughing)

Jim: I mean, which is amazing. Um, let me ask you here, as we zero in on the end of our time, wh- what are some indicators of true change in another person? What do we look for?

Dr. Cloud: Well, in, in some of the indicators, are also some of the drivers of the process. You know, we talk about the five elements. What I would wanna see, when, when you’re repairing trust, can you sit down with the person, you talk about whatever the violation of trust, could be work or personal. Are they really listening and understanding what their behavior did to other people? Because if they’re really getting it and empathic about it, that’s what Corinthians calls Godly sorrow. It says there’s a sorrow of the world that leads to death, people feel guilty, and I’m so bad, and all that. But a godly sorrow is other-oriented. We say, “I could, I see what I did. I would never wanna do that again.” That leads to a change because of the care and empathy for the other. The second thing is, can they see how self-centered and only self-oriented, whatever they was doing, was without taking others into consideration of how that was gonna affect them? ‘Cause you wanna see that going forward, that they’re thinking about the other person so it doesn’t happen again. Thirdly, are they developing the abilities there? You know, in a marriage, for example, maybe that whole breakdown happened because there was, you know, all sorts of, of, they get triggered, and they start screaming, and yelling, and they don’t have the skills of conflict-

Jim: Right.

Dr. Cloud: … resolution, that third piece of competency. Do, are they developing the abilities to stay sober? Are they developing the abilities to, to resolve a conflict, to all of this stuff? And then, you know, you go down the line. So I like to see them, let’s work back through the tree. And the indicators, as you’re saying, are not only gonna be indicators that we can go a little further in trusting, but they’re also building new elements into the marriage, or the work relationship to go forward. That becomes important. Now, you get on another trail, and I talk about it in the book as well. I, I’ve told so many spouses this. Look, and they’re going, “Okay, I don’t know how I can trust him he won’t have another affair or she or whatever.” I go, “Look, the last thing you need to be doing is feel like you gotta be a fortune teller or have a crystal ball.”

Jim: Right, or be the police officer.

Dr. Cloud: Or be the police officer.

John: Hmm. Yeah.

Dr. Cloud: Here’s what we’re gonna do, we’re gonna establish a process. You’re gonna sit in the bleachers-

Jim: Hmm.

Dr. Cloud: … and you’re gonna watch.

Jim: Hmm.

Dr. Cloud: … ’cause he is going to self-select out by not performing through this process. Or you’re gonna see it, and that’s gonna help you trust. We don’t, you can’t be a fortune teller. And so do you see, number one, an admission by them, they have a problem? Okay. And they’re not blaming it, “Well, if she had been meeting my needs or if this or that.” No, I have a problem. Number two, I need help. If they’re depending on themselves, I say, “Well, this time I’m really gonna be committed, and”… of course you wanna hear that, but you were last time as well. So-

Jim: Hmm.

Dr. Cloud: … what help are you asking for? Number three, is the help that’s coming, is that Billy Bob down the street? No. We wanna have them in a proven change process by somebody who’s done this before.

Jim: Mm-hmm.

Dr. Cloud: And that could be a mentor, or coach, or a friend, but probably in the hard situations they probably have a shingle that they hang up ’cause this is what they do-

Jim: Right.

Dr. Cloud: And then are you seeing consistent self-motivation to go there? Do you have to talk them into going to the marriage counseling? Do you have to talk them into going to their meetings? You have to talk them into… They’ll tell you, “No, I can’t go to the movies at night, I gotta get to my group, or I gotta get”… You see a self-driving hunger, and the Bible says-

Jim: Mm-hmm.

Dr. Cloud: … “Hunger and thirsting for righteousness,” where it’s self-motivated, you’re not pushing it. And then also, you have some verifiable way that they’re in the process. You don’t have to know everything, and the confidentiality, and all that, but we gotta know they’re doing it. And then you wanna see some things changing over time. So we don’t have to, we don’t have to, you know, kind of like guess. There’s a difference between wishing and hoping. When you say, “I hope he turns around, I’m desiring that he turns around, I’m only gonna have hope like the Bible talks about hope.” Hope is objective. We have a hope in Jesus ’cause we have an objective reality that He was raised from the dead. And it’s in that objective reality… I’m not wishing, I’m hoping. And so what we’re gonna do is, we’re gonna watch for some objective indicators that would cause you to have a, some hope, and then a little more hope, and a little more hope. And finally, you can give up hope because we have the reality.

Jim: Mm.

John: Mm.

Dr. Cloud: What we hope for has been realized. And I’ve seen couples get to carelessness after awful situations, and some don’t. And that’s the reality we live in.

John: Mm-hmm.

Jim: Yeah. But I think too, that trust with God so you can trust others is pretty critical. And we can be shallow with that at times, you know?

Dr. Cloud: Right.

Jim: A person who suffers horribly, maybe the loss of a child as an example. And I know a handful of people that have gone through that-

Dr. Cloud: It’s the worst.

Jim: It’s the worst. And there’s this question that always lingers with them, “Lord, why did you let that happen?”

Dr. Cloud: Yeah.

Jim: So that trust connection is somewhat broken, and they’ve gotta work through that to really believe that God knew what was gonna happen-

Dr. Cloud: Yeah.

Jim: … and it’s, it’s almost-

Dr. Cloud: And He didn’t stop it.

Jim: … unexplainable. And we won’t probably know that.

Dr. Cloud: Yeah.

Jim: But even that a, a, ability to push through that, and then at the end of that process still trust the Lord, even though something that devastating has occurred-

Dr. Cloud: Yeah.

Jim: … um, that’s a bond.

Dr. Cloud: That is, I, I think it’s the hardest problem.

Jim: Yeah.

Dr. Cloud: I’m, I, I just finished writing another book that’s to my non-Christian friends about why I believe. And I go through all of the objections that I had to work through when, you know, when I came to faith, and I get through all the… You know, you got all the sciences, and all this kinda stuff. And then I have a chapter called The Hardest One of All.

Jim: Hmm.

Dr. Cloud: The hardest one of all is the problem of pain, when God doesn’t do anything about it, except He says, “I will be with you.” And how do you have an all love- all-loving, all-powerful God who could do something to have prevented this or stop it, and He didn’t. How do I trust Him? And I think it’s the toughest one. And Job said (laughs) in the midst of it, in the end of it, “Though, He slay me, I will trust”… h- you in, in the new te- where else do we go?

Jim: Right.

Dr. Cloud: And you get in all these elements of trust and it gets to, ultimately God does understand, He is for us. He does have the ability to take us through whatever we’re going through. We know His character, even then we don’t see certain things happening around us, and He has a track record. And you’ve, you’ve hit the nail on the head that, that’s the hardest. And what I would tell people that are going through that is, make sure you surround yourself with people who can be with you in it-

Jim: Hmm.

Dr. Cloud: … and understand it, and still hold on to Him with you.

Jim: Yeah. That is good.

John: Mm-hmm.

Jim: Dr. Henry Cloud. Uh, man, thanks for joining us. What a wonderful book. There’s so much more in here that we haven’t been able to cover, but Trust: Knowing When to Give It, When to Withhold It, How to Earn It, and How to Fix It When It Gets Broken. (laughs) That’s pretty good title.

John: Wow. (laughs)

Jim: It covers it all. But thank you so much for being with us. And let me turn-

Dr. Cloud: It’s always good.

Jim: Yeah. Let me turn to you the listener. If this is a place you’re living, uh, and it might be what we talked about right at the end, this unresolved, uh, bitterness that you might have toward something that’s happened in your life, and you haven’t given it over to the Lord-

John: Mm-hmm.

Jim: … that’s probably 95% (laughs) of people at some point. Uh, get in touch with us. We have caring Christian counselors who can help. If it’s specifically in your marriage, we’ve got a number of great resources there, like Hope Restored and other things g- that can get you on the right track. But right now, I mean, for a gift of any amount, and if you can’t afford it, we’ll get it to you just get in touch with us. But be part of the ministry, if you can, uh, make a gift of any amount, we’ll send you Dr. Henry Cloud’s book, Trust as a beginning to getting the help that you need-

John: Hmm.

Jim: … and you can get ahold of us.

John: Of course, uh, if you’re in a spot to do so, we would invite you to join our Friends of the Family team. These are, uh, folks who contribute to the ministry on a monthly basis, uh, signing up to sustain us month by month. It really, uh, helps level things out for us. Uh, we’d really appreciate it if you can do that. Uh, either way, donate and request your book when you get in touch. Uh, you can do so at focusonthefamily.com/broadcast, or when you call 1-800 the letter A and the word FAMILY. Next time we’ll hear from Ryan and Selena Frederick, they’ll be describing why prayer is crucial for your marriage.

Ryan Frederick: It’s impossible to have a healthy prayer life, and also have a prideful orientation toward God and a prideful orientation toward one another.