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Areas › Focus, starting, and ADHD › Feelings and focus
So keep the apology specific and small. Name the thing, do not explain it away, say what you will do differently, and then let the doing carry the argument. Some things are also past apology, and pretending otherwise does its own harm. If you are on the receiving end, you are allowed to say that you would like to see the change before accepting another one of these.
'repel evil with what is better' (Quran 41:34). What is asked for is a better action rather than a better explanation.
فصلت
وَلَا تَسۡتَوِي ٱلۡحَسَنَةُ وَلَا ٱلسَّيِّئَةُۚ ٱدۡفَعۡ بِٱلَّتِي هِيَ أَحۡسَنُ فَإِذَا ٱلَّذِي بَيۡنَكَ وَبَيۡنَهُۥ عَدَٰوَةࣱ كَأَنَّهُۥ وَلِيٌّ حَمِيمࣱ
Good and evil cannot be equal. [Prophet], repel evil with what is better and your enemy will become as close as an old and valued friend
Qur’an 41:34read it in the library
Translation: M.A.S. Abdel Haleem, The Qur'an, Oxford University Press, 2004.
A systematic review and meta-analysis of mediation studies asked which parts of mindfulness based programmes actually carry their benefit for mental health. The wider lesson travels well: the visible ritual is not automatically the active ingredient. It is evidence about therapy programmes rather than about apologies, so take the parallel as a way of thinking and not as a finding.
Gu J, Strauss C, Bond R, Cavanagh K. (2015). How do mindfulness-based cognitive therapy and mindfulness-based stress reduction improve mental health and wellbeing? A systematic review and meta-analysis of mediation studies.. Clinical psychology review doi
Strength of evidence: one line of research. A single study, or a theoretical account.
An apology only repairs when it arrives with something the other person can watch change.
If the same apology has come round many times, the useful question is what would have to change, and whether it is changing.
Pulling back from things is easier. That is not the same as safer. The cost of a smaller life arrives later and quietly, which is exactly why it goes unnoticed.
The unkind thoughts tend to arrive in a handful of familiar shapes. One friend is busy so nobody wants you. One bad mark so you are going to fail everything. Someone did not say hello so they must dislike you.
A small annoyance can be steered. A full blaze cannot. Nearly all of the winnable work happens in the first thirty seconds, before the feeling has finished arriving.