Six Major Deposits that Build the Emotional Bank Account
(How to Build Trust in a Relationship)



1.Work on understanding the other person
  • What is important to the other person must be as important to you as the other person is to you.
  • True understanding of others requires that you listen for understanding not in order to respond.

2.Attend to the little things
  • Little kindnesses and courtesies as well as little discourtesies and unkindnesses are important.
  • In relationships, the little things are the big things.

3.Keeping commitments
  • Keeping a commitment or a promise is a major deposit; breaking one is a major withdrawal.
  • Being unwilling to make any commitments is as much a withdrawal as making them and not keeping them.

4.Clarifying expectations
  • The cause of almost all relationship difficulties is rooted in conflicting or ambiguous expectations around roles and goals.
  • You make deposits when you make expectations clear and explicit in the beginning.

5.Showing personal integrity
  • Integrity includes but goes beyond honesty. Honesty is telling the truth — in other words, conforming our words to reality.
  • Integrity is conforming reality to our words — in other words, keeping promises and fulfilling expectations.

6.Apologizing sincerely when you make a withdrawal
  • Sincere apologies make deposits.
  • Repeated apologies interpreted as insincere make withdrawals.


***Excerpted from The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen R. Covey