Coaching practices for The Trust Triangle Before Bed

Describe almost anything you are working through and IX Coach finds the practices whose real-world fit is closest. For The Trust Triangle Before Bed, these are the strongest matches in the current practice library.

Does this sound like the set of challenges you might be facing?

• I won’t hand anyone real responsibility until they’ve completely proven themselves first
• With new people I try to fast-forward to being close
• I keep everything at work behind a polished, guarded front
• To smooth things over I say "sounds good," "I’m fine with it," "I understand" when none of it is actually true
• Something’s damaged my trust in them but I can’t bring myself to just say so, so instead I quietly pull back, vent to other people, and let it fester

Practices that may help

1. The Trust Triangle
   Charles Feltman’s Trust Triangle (from The Thin Book of Trust) identifies four distinct assessments that together constitute trust: sincerity (I mean what I say), reliability (I do what I say), competence (I have the ability to do what I say), and care (I have your interests at heart). Trust breaks down when any one of these assessments fails — and repairing trust requires identifying which assessment was damaged.
2. Extend trust deliberately to invite it
   Trust others first, in bounded ways, before they have earned every dimension — it is how trust is built.
   The Trust Triangle
3. The Trust Equation, Made Practical
   The Trust Equation (Maister, Green, and Galford) holds that trustworthiness = (credibility + reliability + intimacy) ÷ self-orientation. The model is a practitioner framework rather than a rigorously tested theory, but it usefully names the levers — especially self-orientation, which is the single biggest trust-killer most leaders overlook.
4. Earn the right to deepen the relationship in stages
   Trust compounds over time — start with technical credibility and expand into intimacy as it is earned.
   The Trust Equation, Made Practical
5. Lower your guard to raise the intimacy score
   Sharing something real about yourself makes others feel safer sharing something real with you.
   The Trust Equation, Made Practical
6. Build sincerity by saying only what you mean
   Only make commitments and assertions you actually believe — and retract the ones you don’t.
   The Trust Triangle
7. Have explicit trust conversations when trust is at stake
   Name the trust issue directly rather than managing it indirectly.
   The Trust Triangle
8. Anchor the wind-down with a consistent starting cue
   A repeated pre-sleep ritual — a specific tea, a book, a certain playlist — becomes a conditioned cue that induces sleepiness over time.
   The Wind-Down Routine: Engineering Your Path to Sleep
9. Demonstrate care through visible acts in the other person’s interest
   Show that your interests and theirs are genuinely aligned — not only when it’s convenient.
   The Trust Triangle
10. The Pre-Sleep Worry Buffer
    Use a 10-minute afternoon or early evening worry review to protect sleep from nighttime rumination.
    Worry Time: Containing Anxiety With Scheduled Worry

Describe your situation in your own words to search the complete practice library.