What Is A Real Apology? There Are Three Parts - Miss One And You're Not Apologizing

When you say your sorry a lot of things are being perceived that give validity to your intentions or that invalidate your intentions.

• Body Language

• Verbal Language, Including tone, volume, infliction, pauses and where they appear and so on

• The connection of the two are like a mental check-sum to the person your talking to

When we are sorry and when we aren't we come at it differently. Many people try to fake a sorry and often this is subconsciously if nothing else "perceived" by the other party.

Realize also when in pain all we want to do is cast the pain away from ourselves. We want to blame someone to get closure and to feel at least someone else is suffering with us. When you apologize and show compassion completely selflessly you give them that venting (the yelling that will inevitably follow your taking responsibility is a gift you give them when you just listen and don't react to it) as a gift.

You have to brace yourself and expect that they will react negatively, because depending on the amount of pain you caused (even if that was completely not the intention) they will have to expunge that pain.

Until they can remove the pain, and you, being the one who caused it, need to take that responsibility to become an outlet for them to release it a sponge of that reaction, they won't be able to think rationally about it, or even you or your intentions.

The pain is often the roadblock to them healing and them even being able to process what happened. The good news is once they do release this negative energy they are going to feel better, they are going to be more receptive, and they are far more likely to hear you out. Then the real healing can begin and your words will actually carry some weight.

Don't let your pride get in the way of healing the wound! Don't let their reaction govern your reality- realize even if what you did wasn't in any way supposed to be hurtful- that to them, it was, and perception is reality!

The reality you need to comprehend here is that regardless of your own feelings or the reality of the situation, the goal should be the focus. The focus is to penetrate their pain so you can explain yourself but first you have to take responsibility for hurting them, even if they are only hurt because they mis-percieved the reality of your intentions.

If you were wrong, and your intentions selfish, hurtful out of a "heat of the moment" out-lash, and you later realized that your outlash wasn't deserved, rather it was the result of built up frustration of your day and they were just the proverbial pin being pulled in the grenade of your stress- the same rules apply, but in this case you will need to grovel because regardless of the source of your lapse in reason, your at fault- for the accidental out-lash, and for hurting them.

When they completely get it out there then realize they are not alone, and you are accepting responsibility its like you took the bullet for them. An amazing thing happens next, they feel compassion for you (unless you react then they feel disdain!) because they now see the pain they just unloaded on your shoulders.. a certain distillation process happens that defuses this bomb and now communication can pick it apart and heal it

Your error in judgment of these bad guys so to speak caused your friend pain so it's not the act your apologizing for most of the time.

It's compassion for your friends pain you want to heal (a pain you likely didn't mean to cause).
The tragedy of rumors is that even the twisted or malformed versions of the rumor often carry the original persons name so you can see how someone may think YOU spread a negative rumor when you likely didn't or didn't mean to!

If you yourself deserve (or feel you deserve) an apology from the other person, you should really assess if you do. Chances are your hurting them caused them to react negatively and yes they should apologize to you, especially if your intentions weren't to hurt them and they over-reacted.

BUT they need to first reach closure that will allow them to think clearly about the situation.
Chances are, if your patient (all things in good time), they will eventually realize they over-reacted and will feel bad. A true apology is one way, none the less.

You should actually try to be more understanding about their reaction if what you did hurt them and not expect an apology back. It's about maturity not yin for yang.

If you told them you were sorry and meant it and they blew up at you and said its all your fault, for example, this shouldn't change your stance on compassion and wishing them healing.

By realizing that there will be blow-back from an apology- and only a real apology will really trigger their release (which is anger that once they dispel the energy/emotions) leading to rational thinking, thus likely a full emotional lashing- your better equipped to handle this.

You will likely realize they are just "venting" and the irrational anger they are feeling will pass. Most of the time, even if you intentionally hurt them, the anger is reactive so it will pass.

Realize this anger is based on their perception (not always reality) that your the source of their current pain.

How then can you get mad at them for feeling this? You need to comfort them and ignore their outbursts, expect them even, but don't take them personal. Again this is about their healing not your justification, especially if your actions that hurt them were purely unintentional and you actually have a reason to justify yourself (you can do this when they are in the right frame of mind and open to hearing you out, not filtering your words through the perceived pain of betrayal).

It all goes back to the same concept we all, as kids, tried with our parents when wanting to get a positive response to a question like "can I borrow the car?". Would you ask your dad to borrow the car when he's in a non receptive or bad mood? of course not! So why justify yourself when someone feels you betrayed them?

You humiliated them, hurt them, whatever it did, your putting the cards on the table and realizing regardless of your intentions you were a key player in their pain.

Once you take responsibility this invokes the law of reciprocation, and they feel and understand their part in it:

"wow, I didn't realize you felt that way, and in some ways that's true, but I know you didn't mean to hurt me, but you did and I appreciate you taking responsibility for that part. I like that we can communicate without blaming each other. I want you to know that maybe I should have been more attentive to what was really happening and maybe I wouldn't have gotten so hurt and reacted the way that I did, so I'm sorry too."

When you take responsibility you remove the defensiveness of the situation. You need to deal with the perceived reality of the other person, remove the pain, then you can get to the facts.

The last part and often ignored is what makes the mental Neosporin work. This step is crucial to salvaging the relationship and creating an actual mend of the situation, not leaving a scar built in distrust or animosity.

When you're dealing with this part you're getting into what's called the emotional bank account. When you hurt someone you are making a huge withdraw from their emotional trust of you. You have to pay that back usually with interest to show that you're good for it.

If you apologize then take responsibility but make no efforts proactively to prove you feel remorse, the wound will heal but the scar will always remind that person of your causing them pain. You must find a way that to them, not just you, is like not only taking it away but drastic enough to show you've suffered for your part and really mean you're sorry.

This has to be something you do; you should ask them what you can do then over deliver on it. If they say no its ok, don't worry about it, you should still try to do something to show your sorry, even if its just being a good friend to them and making sacrifices for them that they know are important to you.

Even annoying someone with over delivering shows more remorse than doing nothing proactively. Depending on the degree of your crime, you will have to not only maintain close cohesion of proof that you won't repeat the offense, but you will likely have to be patient and give them time to recover and trust you again. Some things may not be forgiven at all.

Things like outright betrayal, cheating, and lying are amongst some things I could forgive eventually but never forget, and never trust again on. I'd forgive because I want to release the emotional hold it has on you if you don't, but trusting someone who lied to me is something that would be hard- cheating is grounds for termination of the relationship. Period. So although an apology could help give them closure, don't expect every offense to be forgivable (to the point where your record is expunged)...

Forgiveness is about you. To forgive is to release yourself from the anger, resentment and pain their memories their involvement in your life are causing you. When you truly forgive your not liberating the other person you're liberating yourself from their control over you, even if only in spirit or experience. You're saying you can no longer hurt me. You don't need their permission, or for them to even know you forgave them for it to be effective.

A lot of people attribute this to apologizing. Apologizing is not about you at all. You're not apologizing so you get closure, so you feel less guilty for what you did, or anything of the sort.

Apologizing is not forgiving, it's a selfless act if done correctly. Selfless acts require no reciprocation, not even forgiveness but it often breeds their forgiveness as a side effect.

A real apology is about remorse, and wanting them to heal. It's about realizing you hurt someone regardless of if you did it on purpose or not. I never believed in parents forcing kids to apologize to other kids they hurt in a forced manner.

My way of doing this is to take the child aside, and show them the reality of the situation (that they hurt the other child and their feelings were hurt), then guiding them through the reasons they should apologize- just telling a child to say they are sorry without any real lesson about apologizing is asinine and ridiculous. Many would say, "well your showing them how to be polite" but in my opinion, your showing them how to cop out apologize, not really meaning it!

I believe to teach the kid why he should feel bad then giving him the choice to apologize (or you keep working on teaching him how bad it was till he does make the choice to apologize) so when he does its felt by the other party not something they know you were forced to say (which does not a dam bit of good).

It's pretty ironic that people completely swap the polarities of forgiveness and apology.. And when you do that they mean nothing, and no healing happens on either side!

The sad fact is that most kids are taught to apologize with no real interaction to teach them the true meaning, and they grow up having no idea. I believe most people grow up learning to be polite not to actually apologize and they become confused when saying sorry sounds like just another excuse to bypass taking responsibility for what they did!

I hope this brings you some peace, and helps you to realize what will work and what doesn't. Good Luck!

An apology is only good and real if you don't do whatever you did again. I should say "try" because some things happen even through the best of intentions (the road to hell is paved with good intentions)... but if you blatantly do something you've apologized for again, this null in voids the apology!