We are all endowed with a sense of wonder. The world around us in inexplicable, baffling in its diversity and myriad forms. We experience an urge to organize it, to "explain wonder away", to order it in order to know what to expect next (predict). These are essentials of survival. But while we have been successful at imposing our mind's structures on outside world – we have been much less successful when we tried to cope with our internal universe.

The relationship between structure and functioning of our (ephemeral) mind, structure and modes of operation of our (physical) brain and structure and conduct of outside world have been matter of heated debate for millennia. Broadly speaking, there were (and still are) two ways of treating it:

There were those who, for all practical purposes, identified origin (brain) with its product (mind). Some of them postulated existence of a lattice of preconceived, born categorical knowledge about universe – vessels into which we pour our experience and which mould it. Others have regarded mind as a black box. While it was possible in principle to know its input and output, it was impossible, again in principle, to understand its internal functioning and management of information. Pavlov coined word "conditioning", Watson adopted it and invented "behaviourism", Skinner came up with "reinforcement". The school of epiphenomenologists (emergent phenomena) regarded mind as by product of brain's "hardware" and "wiring" complexity. But all ignored psychophysical question: what IS mind and HOW is it linked to brain?

The other camp was more "scientific" and "positivist". It speculated that mind (whether a physical entity, an epiphenomenon, a non-physical principle of organization, or result of introspection) – had a structure and a limited set of functions. They argued that a "user's manual" could be composed, replete with engineering and maintenance instructions. The most prominent of these "psychodynamists" was, of course, Freud. Though his disciples (Adler, Horney, object-relations lot) diverged wildly from his initial theories – they all shared his belief in need to "scientify" and objectify psychology. Freud – a medical doctor by profession (Neurologist) and Bleuler before him – came with a theory regarding structure of mind and its mechanics: (suppressed) energies and (reactive) forces. Flow charts were provided together with a method of analysis, a mathematical physics of mind.

But this was a mirage. An essential part was missing: ability to test hypotheses, which derived from these "theories". They were all very convincing, though, and, surprisingly, had great explanatory power. But - non-verifiable and non-falsifiable as they were – they could not be deemed to possess redeeming features of a scientific theory.

For millions of years nature embedded in us notion that past can teach us a lot about future. This is very useful for survival. And it is also mostly true with inanimate objects. With humans story is less straightforward: it is reasonable to project someone's future behaviour from his past conduct (even though this proves erroneous some of time).

But it is mistaken to project someone's behaviour onto other people's. Actually, psychotherapy amounts to an attempt to disentangle past from present, to teach patient that past is no more and has no reign over him, unless patient lets it.

Our natural tendency is to trust, because we trust our parents. It feels good to really trust. It is also an essential component of love and an important test thereof. Love without trust is dependence masquerading as love.

We must trust, it is almost biological. Most of time, we do trust. We trust universe to behave according to laws of physics, soldiers not to go mad and shoot at us, our nearest and dearest not to betray us. When trust is broken, we feel as though a part of us dies, is hollowed out.

Not to trust is abnormal and is outcome of bitter or even traumatic life experiences. Mistrust or distrust are induced not by our own thoughts, nor by some device or machination of ours – but by life's sad circumstances. To continue not to trust is to reward people who wronged us and made us distrustful in first place. Those people have long abandoned us and yet they still have a great, malignant, influence on our lives. This is irony of lack of trust.

So, some of us prefer not to experience this sinking feeling of trust violated. They choose not to trust and not to be disappointed. This is both a fallacy and a folly. Trusting releases enormous amounts of mental energy, which is better invested elsewhere. But trust – like knives – can be dangerous to your health if used improperly.

You have to know WHO to trust, you have to learn HOW to trust and you have to know HOW to CONFIRM existence of mutual, functional trust.

People often disappoint and are not worthy of trust. Some people act arbitrarily, treacherously and viciously, or, worse, offhandedly. You have to select targets of your trust carefully. He who has most common interests with you, who is invested in you for long haul, who is incapable of breaching trust ("a good person"), who doesn't have much to gain from betraying you – is not likely to mislead you. These people you can trust.

You should not trust indiscriminately. No one is completely trustworthy in all fields. Most often our disappointments stem from our inability to separate one area of life from another. A person could be sexually loyal – but utterly dangerous when it comes to money (for instance, a gambler). Or a good, reliable father – but a womaniser.