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My wife and I are counseling some good friends who have gone through a situation that would have destroyed most marriages. He cheated on her with five different women over the course of eight years. Every sexual encounter was basically a one-night stand, and all occurred while he was away on business trips.

What’s remarkable is how she found out. His conscience finally got the best of him and he confessed it all in graphic detail. She was sad, angry, and broken. They live in another state, but within a few hours of finding out, she was on a plane, headed to our house.

She had already made the decision to go back home and forgive him. She just needed someone to talk to, and my wife is one of her closest friends.

While choosing to forgive her husband was a tough and painful process, and everything within her wanted to make him pay by divorcing him, her commitment to him was made easier by two facts:

1. He was deeply remorseful and begged her to forgive him and offer him a second chance.

2. He was never caught in the act. He confessed his infidelity to her when she had no idea what was going on.

On the first point, had he been callous, indifferent, and unrepentant, the marriage would have been over. But he was truly sorry. He was sad and broken himself, and deeply regretted his infidelity.

On the second point, she said that she doesn’t think she could have forgiven him and remained his wife had he been caught in the act before willingly confessing. She would have always wondered, “Is he truly sorry, or just sorry that he got caught?”

The fact that he could have kept his secret for another eight years, or even for the rest of their lives, but didn't, was comforting to her. Even though she was deeply grieved, his transparency showed somehow that he really did love her and could no longer live as her husband while keeping such a dark secret.

Forgiveness is a Beautiful Thing

The truth is we all do dumb stuff from time to time and damage relationships with people that are important to us. God knows I need to ask my wife and kids for forgiveness regularly. I raise my voice, I get irritated, and I say harsh or offensive things sometimes.

When I take responsibility, look them in the eyes, and ask for forgiveness, they have the opportunity to let the offense go. All can be made right again. They forgive me, relationship and intimacy is restored, and we can move on.

It’s a beautiful thing.

But Trust Takes Time to Rebuild

Back to our friends… She forgave him, but his standing in her life as a trustworthy husband was not restored immediately. In fact, it still hasn’t been fully restored, and it’s been almost a year since he confessed. He lost his reputation in her eyes as a loving and faithful husband. That will take time to rebuild.

There are times when we might screw up big, and it majorly damages our reputation. We lose trust and respect in the eyes of other people.

I remember once when I revealed something confidential that was going on in a close friend’s life. I let it slip to the larger group of our friends. It was a dumb thing to do, and I really regretted it because I lost a good reputation. From that time, I became known in our circle of friends as someone who had “loose lips.” People didn’t feel that they could trust me, and it took me a while to change that perception.

That hurt, but I learned a valuable lesson.

Benjamin Franklin said, “It takes many good deeds to build a good reputation, and only one bad one to lose it.”

My friend who cheated on his wife lost something that day when he confessed, and it will take him a long time to fully regain it. He’s on the path now, and there are some good days between he and his wife, but there are also some miserable days.

He would do anything to go back and relive those moments of infidelity because those cheap thrills have cost him dearly.

@jpiper20’s High Reputation Score is a Major Problem

If you haven’t yet heard about the @jpiper20 saga, you can read @pfunk’s exposé here, or @klye’s observations here.

@jpiper20 screwed up, tried to cut a few corners to payouts and reputation, and now he’s paying the price. I really do feel bad for him, because I’ve done dumb stuff that I regret too.

He has apologized, and I believe we should humbly forgive him, and stay connected with him in relationship, welcoming him to post his artwork and encouraging him through comments.

If we’re honest, each of us has lied and stolen at some point in our lives, so to throw stones at him, refusing to forgive him, would be hypocritical.

He has also agreed to make restitution, by paying the original creator of the work he passed off as his own. He says he will transfer to him the value of what he received in those plagiarized posts. That’s a great start at rebuilding trust.

However, that does not mean that we are obligated to trust him fully right away. Forgiveness is different than trust. Forgiveness is our decision, but winning our trust is up to him. His character must be proven by his actions, so for most of us, it will take some time before he will regain an honorable reputation on this platform.

We should also be mindful that he did not publicly confess his plagiarism until after he was caught. He even tried to cover his tracks, as the blockchain clearly reveals. This further damages trust, as it reveals his sorrow was at least initially self-directed, rather than in consideration of the community that has invested in him and this platform.

At the time of this writing, @jpiper20 has a reputation score of 67.1.

That’s down from 67.2, the high before he was caught. He was flagged by a whale or two, and lost .1 on his reputation score.

I think that’s a major problem. His reputation score did not fall as much as his real life reputation fell in the eyes of the community.

Our system is great at factoring in the time it takes to build a reputation, but it does not properly take into account how quickly reputation can be lost.

I’m not exactly sure what the solution is here.

Perhaps @jpiper20 should ask the entire community to flag every one of his posts until his reputation score is restored to something that reflects reality. Is that a score in the 50’s? In the 40’s? I guess that’s up to the community to decide.

Or perhaps @jpiper20 should start a new account and rebuild his reputation from 25 like anyone else who sets out to prove his or her worth on Steemit.

Of course, these would be purely voluntary decisions on @jpiper20’s part, aimed at communicating a selfless sorrow and at regaining the community’s trust.

A 67 reputation says…

“I am a highly trustworthy contributor on this platform. My standing has been proven over time by consistently creating quality work.”

I don’t believe @jpiper20 meets that qualification, so I personally cannot upvote his posts until his reputation score is first restored to something that reflects reality.

What do you think?

@jasonstaggers

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