You panic the moment a new relationship hits its first fight.
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Trust is not built in the quiet moments. It’s not built by having lovely dinners or three weeks of no conflict. People think trust is something that accumulates when everything goes smoothly. And that’s just not how it works.
Trust is built in the ruptures. Trust is built in the repair.
Here’s what I know from seventeen years of sitting with couples: the relationships that end up being the most secure, the most connected, the ones where both people genuinely feel safe, those are not the relationships that avoided the hard moments early on. Those are the relationships where two people discovered, again and again, that their bond could survive a difficult moment.
Volatility is a feature, not a flaw. The fact that you and this new person are going to scare each other, disappoint each other, misread each other, that is not a sign something is wrong. That is two nervous systems trying to find stable ground together. That’s just what love looks like up close.
So here’s what I’d actually tell you to do in a new relationship.
First, stop trying to prevent rupture. You cannot, and trying to will just make you perform instead of connect. What you want to do is pay attention to what happens after the hard moment. Does this person come back? Do they take responsibility? Do they actually sit with the impact they had on you, not just defend their intention? That is what you’re watching for.
Second, do your own repair work. Don’t just say sorry. I call empty apologies the cherry without the cake. The cherry looks sweet, but without the cake underneath, it’s just a weird, sticky mess. The actual work of repair is being willing to cross the bridge into your partner’s reality when every instinct in your body is telling you to defend yourself or withdraw. That crossing, that moment of choosing connection over self-protection, that is what builds trust.
Third, and this is the one people skip completely in new relationships because everything feels so fragile: be honest about your fear. Real connection is not built on performing your best self. It’s built on daring to show your most vulnerable self, and discovering that you’re still wanted. That experience, being seen in your fear and not abandoned, that is the foundation of a secure relationship.
The goal you’re working toward is the place where both of you are on the same team, protecting the relationship itself rather than just protecting yourselves from each other. You don’t arrive there on day one. You earn it, slowly, through exactly the kind of work I just described.
So lean into the relationship. Show up when it gets hard. Repair when you hurt each other. And watch what happens. That’s how trust gets built. Not by playing it safe. By proving, over and over, that you’ll come back.
Trust is built the same way once a relationship is no longer new, and I walk through the daily version of it in how to build trust in a relationship.
If you are falling for someone and the old fear is creeping in, tell Figlet what you are worried will happen. It helps to say it before you act on it.
Figs is a licensed marriage and family therapist with 16+ years of experience working with couples. He’s the co-founder of Empathi, host of the “Come Here to Me” podcast, and author of an upcoming book on relationships and the systems that shape how we love.
Read more: How to Rebuild Trust After Lying: What Actually Works
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If you’re ready for in-person help in the Bay Area, Empathi’s San Francisco couples therapy practice offers Emotionally Focused Therapy with Fiachra “Figs” O’Sullivan, LMFT and Teale Taxis, LMFT.
Related reading: How to Build Trust in a New Relationship: The Biology, the Sequence, and the Proof of Work
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