360 Degree: Jane Eyre's Trust

The reading of Jane Eyre has really drawn my interest into the dynamics of trust.

Trust is key in developing who we are. When Jane was little and live at ----shire, she trusted Mrs. Reed to take care of her and supply for her. But, what Jane experienced as a child due to the lack of trust caused her to go into a state of shutting herself off from most human connections. She feared that the hurt she experienced would occur again so it was better to close herself off then to stay open and risk being hurt again.

But then Jane went to Gateshead and through her professional relationship, she began to build bonds of trust with Mr. Rochester. I believe that due to the trust bonds being built, they were able to fall in love with each other. Their love was possible in this period of time where two people of very different class getting married was unheard of because of their mutual trust. Relationship will remain stagnant if there is not some degree of mutual trust.

But then Mr. Rochester betrayed her trust by revealing that he was still married, and in a couple of minutes, he had lost all of the trust that he had spent so much time to attain. And, no matter what his efforts, he could not bring Jane to trust him to the degree that she previously had. She came to the conclusion that she could not be with someone for the rest of her life if she could not know that she could put all of herself in his hands and know that she would be safe. But Jane would never have been vulnerable to this hurt if she had remained shut off from the world and had not allowed Mr. Rochester to breach her defenses. I am curious about whether or not Jane will close herself off even more due to this second betrayal or if she will continue to remain open to other people regardless of the risk of being hurt because of the joy that she had while in Mr. Rochester's presence.