Betrayal

It is a hard thing, to be betrayed.  Harder still when the one who betrays you is someone you trusted, opened up to, and considered that all important and rare commodity, 'a friend'.

The dictionary defines betrayal in a couple of ways:

To deliver or expose an enemy to treachery or disloyalty
To be unfaithful in guarding, maintaining or fulfilling
To disappoint the hopes, or expectations
To reveal, unconsciously

The worst form of betrayal is not the exposure of an enemy to treachery or disloyalty.  It is the exposure of a friend's treachery.  How difficult to be betrayed by someone who professed to have one's best interests at heart, one who is coaching, offering advice and providing feedback. Someone one looked up to, listened to, trusted.  How hard to look at that person in the face, knowing that the facade is just that, a facade that hides someone who is untrue.

It is folly to think that anyone lives a life empty of dissembling or manipulation (or even dishonesty) but there a levels and a scale in which dishonesty and betrayal go from 'benign' to toxic.

What happens to one who is betrayed?  Does that individual seek revenge, slink away to wallow in pain, or lift one's head and recognize that one who betrays is really betraying themselves and that in time the machinations will open them up to a certain vulnerability as well as a degradation of spirit and soul that will lead to unhappiness, loss of prestige, power and control.

At the end of the day, it is better to be truthful, to protect one's own soul, then to betray a trust, for what ever reason.