Wellbeing & Culture

The Art of an Apology

Now that we are back in the swing of school, it feels like a good time to think about key aspects of relating to each other in healthy ways. This week I thought we could spend a short time reflecting on the meaning and importance of apologies.

Apologies are so important in all communities and in every culture. We all make mistakes. Admitting when we made a mistake and apologizing, is one of the most powerful and important things we can learn to do. Apologies are needed in fostering healthy strong relationships. Ultimately, apologies help our own health and wellbeing. It is always a good idea to teach our students/ children how to apologise well and to model good apologies.

Steps to the ideal apology:

Understand and accept responsibility for your actions- this essentially is what a good apology actually is doing. “The centrepiece of an apology is understanding and accepting responsibility for what you have done.”
Seek to better understand the person/ people you impacted by your actions/ words. Empathy is key to strong healthy close relationships. If we seek to understand what happened to the person, we may have caused harm to rather than defending ourselves and what we have done, our relationships will quickly grow deeper and stronger.
Offer Repair- think through how you can make things right. Simply saying ‘sorry’ will not make things right for the other person. What is powerful and supports a person who has felt harm is taking responsibility to fix or repair the harm or damage done.

Things that can make an apology week/ meaningless:

Make an apology about you. Humility isn’t thinking less of yourself it’s thinking of your self less. Humility is needed for a decent apology.
Make excuses- ‘I wouldn’t have done it if you….’
Try and get through the apology too quickly.
Saying you are sorry that they are hurt, and not for what you did. - “I’m sorry your feelings got hurt.”
Force someone to make an apology- young children may need reminders that an apology is a good thing to do, but if they don’t choose to make the apology themself, then they likely won’t mean it. If a person doesn’t mean it, and the person on the receiving end knows that, the apology is completely meaningless.

The best way to apologise video- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q-ApAdEOm5s

Cheyenne Mason – On behalf of the Wellbeing and Culture Team