---
title: You Can't Trust Yourself of Command
description: As we sit frozen in front of a task, Trust is something that can only be built over time.
image: https://www.kouroshdini.com/hubfs/You%20Cant%20Trust%20Yourself%20on%20Command-blog.jpg
---
[](https://www.kouroshdini.com)
- [Blog page](https://www.kouroshdini.com/the-dini-group-ltd-blog)
- [Podcast page](https://www.kouroshdini.com/podcast)
- [Music page](https://www.kouroshdini.com/music)
- [Courses & Books page](https://www.kouroshdini.com/courses-and-books)
- [Psychoanalysis page](https://www.kouroshdini.com/psy)
- [About page](https://www.kouroshdini.com/about)
- [Contact page](https://www.kouroshdini.com/contact)
- [Waves of Focus page](https://www.kouroshdini.com/waves-of-focus)
[](mailto:kmdini@gmail.com)
[Return to Blog](https://www.kouroshdini.com/the-dini-group-ltd-blog)
# You Can't Trust Yourself of Command
Oct 23, 2026
Just trust yourself. Maybe we read that in a book.
Maybe a kind friend says so, or a course, or a poster with a sunrise on it.
We can nod because it sounds true, and then tomorrow shows up and we sit down to the work and nothing's different.
Whatever those words were pointing at evaporates. So what's going on?
## An Instruction That Cannot Be Followed
I've defined trust before. I'll do it again because it is absolutely fundamental, not just to engaging our work, but our lives in general.
###### Trust is a developing sense that something will continue to behave as it has been, such that we can rely on it. Trust is a feeling. It's grown from experience. It's not a decision.
That's the trouble with the phrase, "Trust yourself," we cannot decide our way into a feeling.
I've never won an argument with an emotion. I cannot tell an emotion what to do. I cannot will an emotion into existence.
Told to trust ourselves while the evidence argues otherwise, we have two options.
One, we fake it. We repeat the words until they sound like our own voice. The power of positive thinking and its many descendants wait there to cheer us on.
Or two, when it inevitably doesn't work, we conclude that we're broken Everyone else seems to be able to follow the instructions. Why can't I?
Neither path is any good, so let's maybe consider a third option.
## The Other Word
The other word that I think gets confused with trust is faith. And this is faith with a little F.
###### I'm defining faith with a little F as a decision we make without complete evidence.
While trust is grown, faith is chosen. There's a risk in it. There's a leap. We make a decision feeling the risk, all the emotions that come with it. It's a well-reflected list to take that leap.
Those two words are often blurred together on the self-help shelf and in our own minds. When someone says, "Trust yourself," what they're really inviting is an act of faith, a decision to risk something before the evidence is in.
That name change, that perspective change is important because it allows us this different path in, because now we can reflect on the risk.
The feeling cannot be commanded, but a decision can be made. We can't practice trust directly, but we can take leaps calculated.
## The Smallest Leap
When I talk about building an honor guide in other episodes, this is the sort of thing that we use to help develop things over time, to orchestrate our days, to remove our dependence on deadlines and the like.
The initial seed of a guide begins with a question, not a promise. And it's a question made of risk. It's, "Can I make a visit to this tomorrow?"
It's not a vow. It's not a new life starting on Monday. It's a question inviting a measured act of faith, a risk, that tomorrow we might show up to something, look at a thing, and then decide for ourselves what to do in that moment.
The art and practice is in keeping that leap small.
It might be a visit rather than a finished project, a glance at the pile rather than a cleared room.
We spent a recent episode, [episode seventy-five, on building trust the way we build a muscle](https://rhythms-of-focus.captivate.fm/episode/building-trust-with-adhd-wandering-mind/), starting at a weight we can lift. It's the same principle here, beginning with where we are.
If tomorrow comes and we can make that visit, something happens beyond argument.
The evidence changes. The experience, more importantly, changes. A small invitation was kept, and a tendril of trust grows along behind that leap. That way, faith is about that leap. Trust grows behind it.
## When the Leap Is Not Met
Now sometimes tomorrow comes and the visit does not happen, and then we might think, "See? I knew it. I can't be trusted."
But a broken leap does not mean we are untrustworthy. It means that something didn't work.
Something about the conditions was off. The conditions then can be changed. Maybe the visit was too large.
Maybe the type of thing that we were visiting was too large. Maybe we could scale it back. Maybe we put it at some scheduled time that didn't work.
Maybe we wrote it as a task for completion. Like "read a chapter" or "run a mile," and we'd be better off writing it as an entry for beginning, like "begin a run" or "open the book."
We make the leap smaller or move it, and we ask the question again. When we want something to be reliable and it repeatedly is not, fear tends to grow where the trust would have otherwise been.
That is true of the people we have leaned on, and it's true of ourselves. We can't argue that fear away. We already know how arguments with emotions go.
What we can do, however, is change what the fear is about, in that we shrink that invitation, understanding the risks, and measure them to one where we can say again, "Hmm, maybe this one I can try."
## The Risk Is the Point
Every real decision has some risk or loss in it, otherwise it wouldn't be a decision.
So when we feel a hesitation at the edge of that leap, nothing's gone wrong. There's a message there.
The risk is what makes it faith rather than certainty. The feelings that stir are messengers. We can pause with them.
That pause is not a reassurance that there's nothing to fear. There may well be something to fear.
I never liked that advice to "think how bad could it be" and "what are the chances." Those are appeals to weakness.
I prefer to appeal to strength, that if something does go wrong, we'll meet that person, the person we are when things go wrong, and then hopefully figure out our next step. And that is scary.
It's the choice to meet what we fear at a size we can carry without yet knowing how it'll go. That's the bravery in the work. It's not the grand kind. It's tomorrow-sized.
So maybe we can set down the instruction we would never follow. We're not asked to trust ourselves tonight. If we're willing, we ask ourselves for that small act of lowercase F faith. Can I make a visit tomorrow?
And then we make that leap. We keep it small. And trust, which was never ours to command, gets its chance to grow along behind.
## Music — Morning Bird
Today's piece is called Morning Bird. It was recorded, June 23rd, 2025. I hope you enjoy it.
Listen to/Download [Rhythms of Focus Podcast Episode 78: You Can't Trust Yourself on Command](https://rhythms-of-focus.captivate.fm/episode/you-cant-trust-yourself-on-command/)
Share this article
## Recent Articles
[](https://www.kouroshdini.com/the-dini-group-ltd-blog/is-the-adhd-medication-working)
#### [Is the Medication Working?](https://www.kouroshdini.com/the-dini-group-ltd-blog/is-the-adhd-medication-working)
Oct 16, 2026
Hmm, I wonder if this medication's working. Maybe it is. I've been at this game for about four hours, and the ...
[](https://www.kouroshdini.com/the-dini-group-ltd-blog/no-pain-no-gain-and-the-wandering-mind-adhd)
#### [No Pain, No Gain, and the Wandering Mind](https://www.kouroshdini.com/the-dini-group-ltd-blog/no-pain-no-gain-and-the-wandering-mind-adhd)
Oct 09, 2026
It's 9:00 at night. The report is maybe two-thirds done. My back is killing me. Well, maybe I'll just keep pus...
[Return to Blog](https://www.kouroshdini.com/the-dini-group-ltd-blog)
## Publications
Over the years, I’ve written five main works on productivity. Sign up for the Weekly Wind Down newsletter to get free previews.
 
[See all the publications](https://www.kouroshdini.com/courses-and-books)
- [Kourosh Dini Instagram (opens in new window)](https://www.instagram.com/kouroshdinimd/)
- [Kourosh Dini LinkedIn (opens in new window)](https://www.linkedin.com/in/kouroshdini)
- [Kourosh Dini X/Twitter (opens in new window)](https://x.com/kouroshdini)
- [Kourosh Dini YouTube (opens in new window)](https://www.youtube.com/c/KouroshDini)
### Contact Us
If you have a clinical matter, please call.
For books and productivity matters, please email.
- [1020 South Wabash Ave, Unit 4G, Chicago, IL 60605 (Opens Address in google Maps)](https://maps.app.goo.gl/7agnPcDjwB6PRNuX6)
- [312-391-3171 (opens phone dialer)](tel:+13123913171)
- [dinigroup@kouroshdini.com (Opens mail application)](mailto:dinigroup@kouroshdini.com)
- [Home](https://www.kouroshdini.com/)
- [Blog](https://www.kouroshdini.com/the-dini-group-ltd-blog)
- [Podcast](https://www.kouroshdini.com/podcast)
- [Music](https://www.kouroshdini.com/music)
- [Books & Courses](https://www.kouroshdini.com/courses-and-books)
- [Psychoanalysis](https://www.kouroshdini.com/psy)
- [About](https://www.kouroshdini.com/about)
- [Contact](https://www.kouroshdini.com/contact)
- [Privacy Policy](https://www.kouroshdini.com/privacy-policy)
- [Terms & Conditions](https://www.kouroshdini.com/terms-and-conditions)
© 2026 The Dini Group, Ltd.
```json
{
"@context" : "https://schema.org",
"@type" : "BlogPosting",
"author" : {
"@type" : "Person",
"name" : "Kourosh",
"url" : "https://www.kouroshdini.com/the-dini-group-ltd-blog/author/kourosh"
},
"dateModified" : "2026-10-23T17:00:00.333Z",
"datePublished" : "2026-10-23T17:00:00.000Z",
"headline" : "You Can't Trust Yourself of Command",
"image" : [ "https://www.kouroshdini.com/hubfs/You%20Cant%20Trust%20Yourself%20on%20Command-blog.jpg" ],
"mainEntityOfPage" : {
"@id" : "https://www.kouroshdini.com/the-dini-group-ltd-blog/you-cant-trust-yourself-of-command",
"@type" : "WebPage"
},
"publisher" : {
"@type" : "Organization",
"logo" : {
"@type" : "ImageObject",
"url" : "https://www.kouroshdini.com/hubfs/logos/kourosh-logo.svg"
}
}
}
```