More on this book
Community
Kindle Notes & Highlights
Started reading
May 18, 2020
felt like I wasn’t even a person to her. And later I felt bad about myself for being so oversensitive.”
Questioning ourselves for being “oversensitive” is a common way that women, in particular, disqualify our legitimate anger and hurt.
Out of her wish to protect both Eleanor and herself, Margaret failed to express her pain or inquire how her daughter was doing with this profound loss.
It’s a profound challenge to sit on the hot seat and listen with an open heart to the hurt and anger of the wounded person who wants us to be sorry, especially when that person is accusing us (and not accurately, as we see it) of causing their pain. Yet both personal integrity and success in relationships depend on our ability to take responsibility for our part (and only our part) even when the other person is being a jerk.
But I imagine her sister might have felt insulted all over again.
An apology isn’t the only chance you ever get to address the underlying issue. The apology is the chance you get to establish the ground for future communication. This is an important and often overlooked distinction.
“I’m sorry you feel that way” is another common pseudo-apology. A true apology keeps the focus on your actions—and not on the other person’s response.
“I’m sorry that what I said to you made you so upset.” It was his standard apology for all things. “I hate his apology,” his son told me. “It bothers me and I don’t know why.” The son knew something didn’t feel right, but he wasn’t able to identify the mystifying nature of an apology that obfuscated what the dad was apologizing for, and who had the problem. He just knew that his dad’s apology left him feeling uncomfortable and off balance.
This dad’s non-apology didn’t reflect defensiveness or a sneaky attempt to avoid responsibility. It rather reflected the confused thinking that typifies anxious families. The higher the anxiety in any system, the more individuals are held responsible for other people’s feelings and behavior (“Apologize to your dad for giving him a headache”) rather than for their own (“Apologize to your dad for not turning the music down when you knew he had a headache”).
If Matt had taken responsibility for Sean’s head-banging, Matt’s apology would have been at his own expense. He would have been admitting to something he did not—and could not—do. It would equally have been at Sean’s expense, who then would be denied the agency and responsibility to manage his anger in a different way.
Sylvia felt crowded by Don’s insistence that she forgive him, which gave her less emotional space to arrive at a place of genuine forgiveness that came from within her and not from feeling backed into a corner.
worsened when Don became angry at her failure to forgive. Now Sylvia felt like Don had turned the tables by putting himself in the victim role. She had no room to forgive him at all.
Celina felt re-traumatized hearing Liza’s voice on the phone, and Liza’s request stirred up all the tumultuous feelings that she had worked so hard to put aside. Liza
The purpose of an apology is to calm and soothe the hurt party, not to agitate or pursue her because you have the impulse to connect, explain yourself, lower your guilt quotient, or foster your recovery.
