1. Instead of taking a clear-eyed view of your recent behavior, base your apology on how angry someone else is. The more upset they are, the more wrong you were. Conversely, if the person you’re trying to apologize to insists that it’s “not a big deal” or it “happens all the time,” you can’t have done something wrong. Remember, the goal of apologizing is to keep someone from being angry, because you’re responsible for how other people feel about you. Take your cue from their emotional state and act accordingly.
2. Remember that you are a different person now, and this new person that you are cannot reasonably be expected to take responsibility for the old, bad version of yourself that you used to be. Remind other people, too, so they don’t waste any time being mad at a version of you that no longer exists.
3. Consider adopting new spiritual beliefs, which may or may not include an exculpating God that cleans up your messes for you.
4. Make a cursory moral self-examination excusing yourself from all responsibility and justifying everything that you did. If this does not work for you, try an exhaustive moral self-examination in which it turns out that not only is everything is your fault, but that you are also responsible for the feelings of everyone around you, and if they experience disappointment or frustration or resentment, it is because of some inner flaw of yours, and it’s up to you to make them feel better.
5. Forgiveness is something that other people owe you after you’ve hurt them, and it’s your right to extract it whenever you’re ready to have it. That forgiveness is yours, and you deserve it. If anyone tries to withhold it from you, you go in there and retrieve it through any means necessary.
6. When you’re ready to move on, so should everyone else. Anyone who continues to suffer or experience anger after you’ve decided this falls into the category of “the past” is choosing to be unhappy when they don’t have to be. How sad for them. Tell them how sad that is for them, and encourage them to join you in the future, where it’s not a problem anymore.
7. Explain to your friends that “not doing it again” is the same thing as “making amends for the last time I did it,” and that you should be credited for no longer doing the thing rather than forced to apologize, especially for something that you don’t even do anymore!
8. Related: If you do a lot of good, nice things for other people now, that cancels out whatever you might have done to someone else in the past. Does the person who’s still mad at you know about all the good, nice, new things you do now? Maybe if you explained them to her, she wouldn’t be so angry. You can’t help it if she’s angry. You’re not angry. You’re at peace with what you did happened. It’s so sad that she can’t find peace, the way you have. Maybe there’s something wrong with her.
9. If none of this works, consider taking a different approach, and make it your job to maintain and improve the emotional well-being of everyone you have ever known. Someone else’s anger, no matter what it’s being directed at, can be fixed, if you can only find out how to apologize for it.
10. Related: Anger must always be fixed right away. Anger is never acceptable. If someone is feeling angry, that’s a problem. More specifically, it’s your problem. Find a way to make their anger your fault. That way you can fix it more quickly.
11. There is no difference between “someone you have harmed with your words and/or actions” and “someone who just doesn’t like you.” Both of these have to fixed. Apologies are about making sure everyone likes you. Make them accordingly.
12. Everyone has to like you. Everyone has to like you. Everyone has to like you.
I’m seeing a motivational poster here.
This explains so much about Mallory.
The biggest, baldest lie I tell is when I preface complaining about someone with “I understand that I have a big personality and that’s going to annoy some people and that’s fine”. NO PEOPLE MUST LOVE ME AMD FIND ME HILARIOUS AND IF YOU DON’T YOU ARE THE WORST PERSON WHO EVER EXISTED
Same here except if they don’t love me it just reinforces my secret fear that I am a monster constantly harming those around me through my selfishness and desire for happiness and harmony. Like a Labrador with a three-week-old kitten.
This used to be me and then I got old and tired and the saying I didn’t care became actually not caring.
Tech note! The tags, starting with “I’m a monster”, are linking to Google searches for those phrases. (The first two are linking properly.) I’ve noticed this on a few other posts too.
(The Google results for “my garbage heart” are pretty disappointing tbh.)
that’s because those are part of the new FAKE TAGS that exist only as JOKES and not to clutter up our backend!
if you hover with your cursor over the tags you can see which ones are Real and go to actual tags on the site and which ones are made up
I WONDERED how you guys were fixing the problem of tags, after the mournful tweets about cataloguing, esp when they were still here, post-re-design. But I am slightly sad that “my garbage heart” won’t have other articles filed under it….
I really liked the idea I read in one of the redesign comment threads of turning fake tags into real ones when there’s more than one article using them, though I have no idea how hard that would be to implement.
Is there a procedure for fake tags to become real ones in the future if another article/other articles would fit?
I thought that the “i’m a monster” tag would be an ongoing series of you confronting yourself and not accepting your own bullshit, either for self-improvement or to mine your psyche for comedy material.
I AM PROUD OF YOU, MALLORY, YOU HAVE LEARNED MUCH ABOUT THE TAGS.
12. Everyone has to like you. Everyone has to like you. Everyone has to like you.
I remember discussing this ALL IMPORTANT truth with my therapist once, and she said “Well, logically, there are people who are not going to like you. That is just how life goes.”
My response? “Can you think of like…a few reasons…people wouldn’t like me? I can..change those things, probably.”
I understand you, and you understand me.
It JUST doesn’t seem possible that I could be disliked and SURVIVE it, is all I’m saying.
Are you me? Because that would have been my exact response.
(I like it! Therefore I like you! Will you like me, too, please?)
Official acceptance of liking one another!
Sure, LOGICALLY some people won’t like me but if they actually don’t it’s obviously because I’m a terrible person.
exactly
I suspect therapists hear this a lot, because mine got hit with that as well. She came up with nothing useful. Of course, I knew instantly that it meant she didn’t like me.
*I kid.
**Except it did happen.
***And she really did not have anything helpful to make it easier to accept.
****It also came up again in a conversation about “being right”.
I used to think this way constantly, until I took a good look at myself and came to the realization that I’m a goddamn dragon; a dragon doesn’t care to be liked or disliked, it simply is.
It honestly helps so much when I have a crisis of personal confidence like “Oh god, I’m way too talkative and I talk about things nobody likes, I’m so awkward, nobody actually likes me, oh god.” I stop, take a breath, and think “Wait, I’m a motherfucking dragon. I am what I am, and I’m fucking brilliant.” then I imagine myself halo’d in golden fire and standing 30 feet tall, and I feel better about myself.
I’m sorry you brought this up. Damn.
Ugggh #8. Once upon a time, there was an annual fundraiser “to fight cancer”. Most of the participating people were good-hearted and genuine about it! However some participating people would continue to be terrible, terrible humans, while proclaiming that they were a GOOD PERSON. Because Fighting Cancer Every Year makes it so.
I mean, as long as they’re not tobacco executives
I read #8 and thought, “Oh, this was how Jimmy Savile lived with himself…”
Does anyone else find “Jeb Can Fix It” disturbingly evocative of “Jim’ll Fix It”? I’m just waiting for Trump to come up with a campaign slogan referencing fava beans and a nice Chianti.
The BEST, most delicious fava beans, and the greatest Chianti out of the good old US of A, the best in the world!
Number four part two is basically my default mindset. Something’s wrong a thousand miles away in a place I’ve never been with people I have never met? IT IS ALL MY FAULT I AM SO SORRY EVERYONE I HAVE FUCKED THINGS RIGHT UP
(ugggggggh)
11. There is no difference between “someone you have harmed with your words and/or actions” and “someone who just doesn’t like you.” Both of these have to fixed. Apologies are about making sure everyone likes you. Make them accordingly.
See, I would argue that neither of those things can be fixed. In either case, you should resort to absolute radio silence. If you hurt a longtime friend with your words and/or actions, the situation cannot be remedied; they now dislike you as a person. You must cease all contact. Become your own witness protection program. You can never speak to them again, because they hate you, and the only way you can deal with this is to ignore it.
….Right?
Or if you have hurt someone with your words or actions and they haven’t said anything about it clearly they don’t want to talk to you so you must cease and desist all contact because they are clearly better off without you in their lives.
Absolutely! When you think about it, you are doing what’s best for them by ghosting them like this. Further contact with you could only bring them more pain. In fact, they probably would have been better off if they had never met you in the first place. But it’s the best you can do for them, at this point, to make sure that they don’t meet you again.
Ignore any texts or emails they send you saying they do in fact want to see you again. You are doing what you must to secure their happiness.
Definitely, and also you have to avoid any mutual friends, because they have by now heard all about the awful awful thing you did and think you’re a bullshit person.
This is far too real and far too applicable to my life right now/always.
[throws self away]
12. Everyone has to like you. Everyone has to like you. Everyone has to like you.
NO TOO REAL
13. I apologize too much? Oh, I am so sorry.
That would be my mother (for real), by the way. She has done this.
13. I apologize too much? Oh, I am so sorry Canadian.
My partner gets into this adorable loop of catching themselves apologizing reflexively, and then apologizing for that, etc. Usually they catch it by the third apology and are reduced to wordless rueful-face.
Irrelevant ad update: This is one of very few sites I see ads on and now there is one for apparel based on a video game I play and another one for CSA standards and it’s starting to be creepy, Google. Back when I did see ads the algorithms weren’t nearly this good.
Anyways speaking as a Canadian I’m sorry.
Mine are all MEC, all the time. Probably because I like to talk on the internet about how I used to work there and have ambiguously negative feelings about them. Not….quite the target market there, google.
I get ads for Victoria’s Secret, as I do everywhere else. I’m a single man. Google has decided I’m Moe from The Simpsons. Still, at least it isn’t Sears.
I’ve never seen a Victoria’s Secret ad and I’m a woman with boobs who once had my credit card stolen to buy about half a grand worth of VS undies. I don’t even know what kind of juju you have to work to get on their ad algorithm.
I’m a queer Muslim who posts about botany a lot, and Internet advertisers have decided that I am a straight white guy with kids who likes large muddy trucks and blonde girls and might like to become a “ripped beast.” I have no idea. Based on my location, I guess? The invitations to take a “man break” are getting kind of tiring.
Invitations to take a “man break”? That sounds like a recruitment ad for lesbianism. Good, good.
I recently saw an ad to submit an abstract to a conference in my very specific field, which I had already submitted an abstract to.
I’m sorry that you feel I did something wrong. I didn’t, so I’m not apologizing for my own actions, but I’m sorry about your feelings.
And while we’re on the subject of your feelings and things that are really your fault, perhaps we should talk about everything you have ever done wrong? I have a list stored for such an occasion as this. Just to give some background information for my sincere apology.
Man, this is too relevant. I have been struggling with apologies (mine and friends’) and what’s good and what we’re responsible for. This felt like vindication. But maybe I’m confusing intent lol
I think “letting go” is the lesson to be learned here. On both ends.
But, but, but I *am* responsible for the feelings of everyone around me! I need to make sure everyone around me at all times is happy, and if they aren’t happy, I must endeavor to make them happy, or I will have failed as a human and nobody will like me, and per #12, everyone has to like me.
::nods:: Any feelings other than happiness are bad and wrong and must be fixed.
Cringingly apologize for the thing you’ve just done–your apology should be so excessive that it is 100x less tolerable than whatever you did. Apologize for all the wrongs you’ve ever done this person while you’re at it, in case they notice the terrible and inexorable pattern of your mistakes. Keep mentally reissuing the apology in the dead of night for the next ten years, so that it’s carved into your heart and you can just bleed it back out automatically the next time you make exactly this same mistake.
Apologise until it becomes so uncomfortable for the other person that they start voluntarily forgiving you for any potential future transgressions. That’s how you know you’ve won.
Regarding #1: On the other hand, past some arbitrary point on a graph only you can see, if the person you are apologizing to is TOO upset, then obviously she or he is either faking it, milking it for personal gain, wronging YOU by making you feel bad, unreasonable, or “damaged,” thus also negating the need to apologize. In fact, they now owe YOU an apology.
Apparently.
Were you married to him too?
Child of, actually.
My own process goes more like
#1: Hide out for a week. Check if I can find a new job/identity in a different state.
#2: Cry hysterically in front of everyone.
#3: Make excuses that plainly have no basis in reality, because people seem to want an explanation and “I’m a generally incompetent person” usually doesn’t go over very well?
#4: ???
#5: Lie low and keep on my best behavior until people are no longer talking about it.
#6: Assume that the incident has been forgotten and slowly slide back into bad habits.
I always feel like I’m trying to explain why I did something, and then I’m like “that’s not an excuse, I’m still sorry, I just want you to know that I’m not TOTALLY culpable” or something like that.
If I were being honest, the answer to “why did you do that?” is almost always “I dunno man, why do we do anything? Why are we here on this planet? Also I was daydreaming and didn’t hear a single thing that was said on that conference call, my bad.”
Too real.
cringing reading this from my perspective as a mom. One of my kiddos is a sulker and I have a really hard time not being like WHAT MUST I DO TO FIX THIS GAHHHHH when really all he needs is 10 minutes to sulk.
edit: in reference to #10
Speaking as a [former] sulker, I know it’s tough to witness but sometimes we just need a few minutes alone to let go of those negative feelings. Confrontation just fans the flames. You are a good mother <3
Yeah, other people’s sulking gets to me. I have to remove myself from the situation, or otherwise it’s no good for anybody involved!
TOO REAL, MALLORY.
Instead of taking a clear-eyed view of your recent behavior, base your apology on how angry someone else is. The more upset they are, the more wrong you were.
Fun fact: my New Year’s Resolution this year was to “stop fucking up at work.” I mean, I phrased it to other people as “do tasks more slowly and deliberately in order to do everything better,” but really, the goal was to stop fucking up at work. I have since realized that actually, many of the mistakes were ex!boss’ mistakes for which he refused to take responsibility, and also that I make many fewer mistakes when not being emotionally and verbally abused. Disproportionate anger from supervisors: the most upsetting thing.
I just wanted to get that off my chest, kthxbai.
I am glad you realised that! I hope you continue to not be emotionally and verbally abused!
The current boss is, in fact, a wonderful person who respects his employees, exudes an air of quiet authority rather than needing to shout at anybody, and inspires us all to do our best work, so I’m feeling good about the future.
Reading this did wonders for my anxiety, yessiree.
It is somehow possible to believe all of these things at once. It’s fucking exhausting and seriously self-contradictory, but it’s possible.
This was a painful reflection on myself, alright. Like a mirror shattered into a thousand passive-aggressive daggers.
Real talk: I made a New Year’s resolution to stop apologizing for things that aren’t my fault.
It is going so awesomely that I’m probably going to make it my resolution every year, forever.
I make and break this resolution constantly. I am Always At Fault.
How To Apologize (If You’re Ayn Rand):
1. Do not apologize. Apologies are for lesser, weak-willed collectivists who seek comfort in the anonymity of groups and shelter from the harsh realities of the world.
End of list.
Remember, the goal of apologizing is to keep someone from being angry, because you’re responsible for how other people feel about you.
Goal of apologising AND goal of life!
Guys I have been taking some big steps back from apologizing annnnnd it is definite that more people are angry with me than I’m used to. But also they are unreasonable people, by any objective metric, so in a counterintuitive fashion, there has been MORE conflict but also LESS stress for me, b/c the unreasonably angry who only are cool after massive levels of apology for minor infractions are self-selecting right out of my life. But I’m still coming to peace with the fact that a lot of people think I’m a dick. It’s really weird. Maybe I am a dick – but I’m happier? What a time to be alive!
Oh man, did anyone else here see that story about a former boxer who was revealed to have starred in a couple of gay porn shoots? He acknowledged that it was him in that video, but he had been drugged and didn’t remember doing any of that stuff.
The studio filed a lawsuit against him for making those claims, and then he almost immediately issued an actual, legit apology. He came out as bi and sincerely apologized for everyone he hurt by lying, taking full responsibility. It was baffling.
ahaha just curling myself into a protective ball like a lil potato bug now so nobody can ever hurt me. curl tighter. tighter. eeeeeven tighter. curl so tight I am a tiny black hole that never lets my feelings escape to inconvenience anyone at all.
oh shit, I think I just understood a whole bunch of stuff about myself
I’ve had that experience commenting on The Toast too. It’s a bit raw but good for us.
I read this just the other day, and can’t believe how apropos it is today! The ever awesome PG Wodehouse says:
“It is a good rule in life never to apologize. The right sort of people do not want apologies, and the wrong sort take a mean advantage of them.”
#13: Send your apology in the form of a long, detailed e-mail, breaking down your basic moral philosophy and where it falls short, using laboriously chastened purple prose to make a show of how deeply you’ve explored your ethical motivations, ultimately laying the blame for your shortcomings on your mother’s provincialism.
…not that I’ve done this.
#14 Realize the other person read the first line. Stopped. Sighed, rolled their eyes, and then pressed delete. :-/
I am watching The Secret Life Of Four-Year-Olds whilst reading this and it is very relevant.
I used to want everyone to like me, and would be devastated if I thought someone just. did. not.
However, I am now older plus lazy and cynical and so I channel RuPaul and say: “what other people think of me is none of my business”.
Especially if those people behave in such a way as to make one question the value of their esteem.
Life is easier these days, but it took a lot to get here.
how though? because intellectually i believe that but damn, i still absolutely want everyone to like me always.
I wish I could map it out, but it was a combination of things. The eureka moment was when I was working in a bookstore and was alerted that a drunk customer was declaiming from a book (at 11am) and there had been complaints.
Our manager wasn’t there and this lady had already cussed out a couple of other staff members. One of them came and got me and I calmly and placidly escorted her down the stairs and out the door (no touching just calm words, a poker face and forward movement) while she screamed invective all the way.
She stood outside the doors and roared that I was cold (and sociopathic!) and the c-word because I wasn’t reacting to her.
I mean, lady, you are steaming drunk in the morning and thought it was fine to scream swearwords at people, while standing ten feet from the kids’ section. Eh, nope. I care not one whit what you call me or think of me.
It was an extreme case, sure, but I was kind of surprised how easy it was to just shrug and go back to work. After that, I started asking myself why I cared so much what people thought of me, and why I spent so much energy trying to figure out how to convince people to like me. I switched to wondering if I respected what they thought (in general) or how they treated people (again, in general).
All I can do is be me, and be as thoughtful and kind as I can, every day. After that, it’s not up to me what anyone thinks. I’m sure there are people who dislike me, I even know of a few, but I’ve gotten to a place of ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ about it. I don’t treat the people who dislike me differently from the people who do like me, and that’s enough of an effort in my book.
Hope that makes sense!
Confront it. Confront a situation (in your mind, if need be) about someone or some situation in which somebody dislikes you. Then see how much it doesn’t match up with reality…in a few ways.
First, they are NEVER thinking about you as much as you think they are. That’s always the go-to one and most obvious.
Second, if they like or dislike you, what does that do for you personally? Sure, it might make interactions with people easier, but it still doesn’t add or subtract from yourself. It doesn’t solve any of your real world problems (necessarily. it might…but it’s not like you found $100 and can put it to physical use). Intellectually attack the reasons why you think people dislike you as well the reasons why you think people like you or why you like you as well.
Third, it all comes down to the fact that every person is the driver of their own life, goals, and emotions. Coming to terms with people not liking you also has a flip side. It’s taking a pragmatic approach to realizing that conversely, if everybody did like you, you’re still the same old you, today, tomorrow, and five years from now.
Think about it this way. You did something “wrong” or whatever, somebody is mad at you, you can feel that “heat” from them every time they look at you, and you feel shame. Shame about yourself. Yet, the next person you meet sees NONE of that internal struggle. At worst, they could care less; most likely, they don’t notice; and at best, they’d give you a sympathetic word. So if that’s the objective reality versus the cross you bear for being sensitive, what does it say about your self-worth? That it’s being put in the hands of other people, the same people that really don’t give a shit about you in another situation! We’re all people, self-interested by nature, and developing an internal sense of consistency is the best medicine you can do for yourself.
Easier said than done, but the first step is confronting your “fear” and making yourself vulnerable. You won’t disappear…I promise.
As someone waiting for an apology right now, this is so timely!! Refraining from sending this to them directly
I can’t tell if this is serious advice or not. 😉
A.
I think I’m going to need a second job after all the therapy I’m gonna need to unpack my feelings about all of this, especially: “an exhaustive moral self-examination in which it turns out that not only is everything is your fault, but that you are also responsible for the feelings of everyone around you, and if they experience disappointment or frustration or resentment, it is because of some inner flaw of yours, and it’s up to you to make them feel better.”
Or daily Co-Dependants Anonymous meetings. Or both.
This is the stuff *lolsob* was created for.
And I’m not making fun of codependency, as that is one of my most pernicious and severe issues. 🙁
TOO REAL, MALLORY.
I am a textbook firstborn, overachieving people pleaser, and the thought that someone might be mad at me or just plain not like me is unacceptable in the extreme.
I AM SMART AND ENDEARING AND PRETTY AND NICE AND SWEET. YOU CAN’T BE MAD AT ME. YOU CAAAAAAAAAAN’T.
The spouse’s therapist suggested that the spouse start phrasing apologies as “I’m sorry you feel that way.”
The spouse’s therapist’s first language (And the spouse’s first language) is a language where “I sorrow” and “I apologize” don’t use the same words. That’s… probably… what’s going on. Probably.
Hmm, the problem with “I’m sorry you feel that way” is that it’s not actually an apology.
Reginald Bunthorne is one of the most hateful characters in G & S, but he makes two statements which are among my personal maxims:
1. Life is made up of interruptions. (for the library)
2. They find me too highly spiced, if you please! And no doubt I am highly spiced. (for when people dislike me.)
So just think of yourself as highly spiced. Also think of Valancy in “The Blue Castle” when she thinks how insipid she must be, not to have even any enemies.
#5 is perhaps the most concise explanation possible of why the (malignant narcissist alcoholic) ex-boyfriend that I left five years ago is STILL STALKING ME.
Would telling him he’s being embarrassingly trite help any? (I know it wouldn’t really but I like to imagine it would.)
Coming to terms with not everyone liking you, starts with the realization that even if everyone hated you, you’d still be here tomorrow. And you still have to live with yourself.
It’s not an easy transition, or easy pill to swallow. But life is point A to point B; adding the burden the pleasing people hurts not only you, but everyone else involved indirectly…