Next week’s Jewish High Holiday Yom Kippur brings many thoughts. My childhood memories of that day are spotty and mostly painful. Our dad being the cantor was more nervous and irritable than ever, as that was the day when he had the fullest house of the year, meaning the “once-a-year-crowd” showed up. The sanctuary would be opened out into the social hall, and set up with chairs; the place would be filled with throngs of dressed up people. The Yom Kippur service was literally all day long, for me an endurance event. I always tried to be super “good” and sit in front where my dad from up on the pulpit, and my mom from her spot in the choir loft could both see me, if they should be looking. I would will myself to stay glued to that seat all day long, even though most of the kids were hanging out in the parking lot socializing (and probably smoking cigarettes).
Yom Kippur is considered a day of “fasting,” which to my anorexic mind hardly counted as a fast, given that once the sun goes down, there is a ceremonial meal. That made it seem like more of a cheat in my lexicon of fasts (which sometimes spanned up to fourteen days with only water. That was my idea of a fast). But at least I didn’t have to deal with breakfast and lunch that day. And Yom Kippur is the “Day of Atonement,” meaning it is meant to be a day where one takes stock, reflects on the year reviewing all their deeds and misdeeds, whatever needs to be cleaned up or repaired. For me, being in a constant state of uncertainty and critique, I did not need a special day devoted to that, as it was on the order of a natural if not constant habit. All that being said, I do deeply value and respect a process, even a tradition, of reviewing, owning and hopefully healing hurts I may have caused and mistakes I may have made, whether or not I could have controlled them. And relationship repair is an area dear to my heart, my work and my teaching. I consider it endemic to keeping relationships safe and strong. So, although I am pretty much a scrooge for holidays of any kind, it does feel timely to make it the topic of this week’s blog. And to begin I must apologize for being so late with the blog! I know some of my readers count on me to show up promptly every Thursday, with something to say! And I did fail you this week. I am sorry!
Why Apology Matters
Sadly, apology appears to be an endangered species, at least in the cultures that I know best. Certainly, apologies that “work.” Most of us with histories of trauma and neglect, never ever heard an apology from a parent or perpetrator, or anyone for that matter. I know I never did – quite the opposite. Absolutely everything was my “fault.” I was convinced (or they were!) that both of my parents were completely and utterly blameless and without remorse for absolutely anything. Of course, under those circumstances a child not only does not learn about fallibility and repair, but gets the message that being perfect is the only way to be in any sort of relationship. And it is a recipe for blame and defensiveness. Mistakes, mis-steps, even accidents are an unfortunate fact of life. If we learn how to make repair, they are simply no big deal. Without it, we must be flawless in every way. Or the interpersonal world becomes a wasteland of wreckage. My childhood was fraught with both.
Perhaps most importantly, prompt and effective repair is the royal road to relationship safety. I often tell the story of a most poignant moment in my marriage. My husband turned to me and with earnest, almost incredulous eyes, said to me, “Wow I feel safe with you! Because I know that if we have a rupture, which of course in real life is inevitable, we can get back together. It is not fatal.” What a difference from both of our childhoods of trauma and neglect, where when there was a disconnect, which certainly with children is a regular if not daily occurrence, there was no help to reconnect. No comfort, empathy or understanding, but most of all no modeling of how on earth to get back together. For the child, and especially the young child, the experience of loss is devastating, terrifying and wildly dysregulating. The very young infant will experience the withdrawal as life- threatening. They are at sea, flailing desperately to figure out how to retrieve the lost connection. For my husband this meant endless “performing,” and being the perfect and silent “fur coat.” Silent, invisible and presentable “arm candy.” For me (and for many of us) it meant being the ceaseless caretaker. Both false selves. Both never able to simply be, let alone comfortably and authentically be in relationship. What a difference. In effect, repair may be the most powerful tool not only for attachment, but also for regulation. So, apology matters hugely! I can’t say it enough!
What Heals?
I also remember painfully, in the “bad old days” my husband saying to me, with great frustration “Hey I told you I was sorry! Why do you continue beating me up?!” I do spend a lot of time these days working to help people learn what makes for a “successful,” healing apology, that actually heals the injury. I once read a book called The Five Languages of Apology, by Gary Chapman (Northfield, 2006), which I in many ways liked. But I find it a bit religious and moralistic for my taste, so I summarized it in an article which can be found on my website for those who are interested (Amending Our Process: Crafting Apologies that Heal). However, since I wrote that, I have honed my ideas and identified some key elements that I think account for why some apologies do, and others do not, produce the desired result, even magic.
First and foremost is empathy. The apology must be primarily, even uniformly for the benefit of the injured party. I need not “agree” that what I did was “wrong” or “bad,” “that bad,” or bad enough to warrant the outsized reaction I got. If I want to make repair, I must have the humility and the compassion see it through the eyes of the other, and apologize for that. Even if the apology is well intentioned and sincere, if I am apologizing for the “wrong” thing, i.e. not what hurt you, it simply won’t work.
Along those lines, it rarely works to make an apology under “duress.” I.e. if one party says, “I deserve an apology!” or “you owe me an apology!” it is highly unlikely to receive a heartfelt apology. An empathic starting place, and a genuine desire for repair is a necessary ingredient for success.
The 12 Step Program of recovery which I consider to be both brilliant and lifesaving in so many ways, includes an “amends” process, steps 8 and 9:
- We made a list of all persons we had harmed and became willing to make amends to them all.
- We made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others.
Of course, these steps are part of the program because unhealed guilt and shame about regretted harms and hurts committed, are likely to rear up and compromise recovery. So clearly the amends process is for the benefit of the apologizer. What I have found, however, is certainly in my own experience if someone comes to me with an apology that seems too much for their own benefit, and not really about my hurt, about harm done to me, it may feel somehow “cheap” to me. As if I am once again being used. In making amends, even for a recovery program, we must come from a genuinely empathic place.
Perhaps most of all, however, and I have made this mistake plenty, is the terrible trap of “explaining.” So very often our mistakes are well intended, or come out of our own trauma, or simply our own bad day. If my apology is followed by a “case” for how I could have done this, and all the evidence of why what I did was “innocent” and not so bad, or because I “meant well” or “couldn’t help it,” once again it is all about me! Which for so many of us, is at the heart of the trauma experience: there was no you and only me.
Apology and forgiveness are central to relationship safety and regulation in general. We will take up the forgiveness side next week. For now, best wishes for the New Year for those who observe these holidays, and a good week for all. Thanks for your understanding about my tardiness!
This week’s song: