Trust: Who or What Might Support Us?

5. Self-Confidence

68 f i v e Self-Confidence Chapter 2 approached the phenomenon of interpersonal trust through the simple model of my entrusting you with a certain task. When re- flecting on the phenomenon of self-confidence, can we approach it by adapting the structure of “my entrusting you” to my own trusting (or distrusting) myself as the one who—instead of you, him, her, them, all of you, or us—accomplishes a task or work that has to be done? If so, can I explain the structure of self-confidence or trust in myself as a trust of which I am the origin or the subject, while I am also the person “in the dative” to whom I confide a work that I want to be accomplished or that has been asked of or imposed on me? can i trust myself? If so, the first necessary modification of the analysis given in chapter 2 is, of course, that the relation between two persons (for example, you—or she—and me) be replaced by one person who has an internal relation to this same person. This presupposes a distance between me (I) and myself (I), but at the same time a difference between the Self-Confidence 69 I who wants a task to be accomplished and imposes it on me, and the I that must accomplish the task and thereby realizes what I want. I want me to accomplish what I want. I want myself as fulfilling my wanting; or I want to do what I want to be done by me. I want myself as active in realizing a certain work, which involves myself as wanting this realization. When I ask whether I can trust myself with regard to this event, the me that is trusted is, as trusted, not exactly the same I or me as the one that does the trusting. On the other hand, it cannot be another person, because it is my own self that, as wanting and willing, spurs itself to accomplish what I will. But how, then, do I differ from myself in this relationship? My identity (with myself ) is functionally dual: as wanting—and then as trusting or distrusting—I take a distance from myself insofar as I address myself as the I that is working (but also wanting—and trusting or distrusting—its own operation). Let us first focus on the self that is trusted or not (by the self that trusts it or not). What is at stake here? At least two properties: Is the self capable of performing what it has to do, and is it willing to do so? When someone asks me to write a book on trust, I suppose that this person has enough trust in my having the capabilities that are required for indeed writing such a book. She shows her trust by entrusting me with it, but she is not sure whether I will accept the task. Depending on several uncertain factors, she might hope or trust or expect that I will accept the task, but she cannot predict whether I will agree and indeed want to perform the work. My will is uncertain, although she might know me so well that she trusts that I indeed will accept the responsibility for it. My capabilities (or, in other words, the skills required for the wanted work) and the decision of my will are both required to make a deal or sign a contract. In signing a contract , however, I not only agree with the will of the entrusting other, but I also bind my own will and the mobilization of my skills, insofar as they are required, to the obligation that from then on governs my working on the projected task. A task is not always contracted or entrusted; it can be a self-imposed task, which then, before or after my taking it on me, may prompt the 70 What and Whom Can We Trust? question: can I do it? Am I able to bring this task to a successful end and will I, when difficulties arise, be stubborn enough to will its continuation ? In other words: can I trust myself as capable and willing with regard to this work? Will the book I am writing be good enough? Will it satisfy my own criteria and those of the commissioner? Before continuing the analysis...