It’s too Late to Apologize…Is it?

I love that song by One Republic and Timbaland!  We have been listening to it a lot over the past couple of days because Kayla got a karaoke Wii game for Christmas from Aunt Kay and Uncle Mike. She loves to sing, and this game, Sing 4 has some awesome songs on it.  {Lady Gaga, Hinder, K$sha, Usher, etc.}

Anyways, back to my reason for this post…According to One Republic there is a time frame where apparently your apology won’t matter if you wait too long.  I find a little true meaning to this, but then again I also believe that a sincere apology can come at anytime after some one has been wronged. But the later you wait to offer your apology the less it actually holds any sincerity to it. 

To me there are two types of apologies.  Those that people let slide off their tongues all the time, not necessarily meaning them but more for the benefit of the person you have wronged to get on with life.  And a sincere apology is where you recognize what you have done to make the other person feel the way they do/did.  These are the hardest ones to say sometimes.  But when they come the person is truly sincere in their apology, they admit their wrong doing and instead of repeating the actions that caused the need for an apology they try their hardest to keep from repeating the past.  They may slip up but when they do they realize it immediately and correct their wrong doing and apologize as soon as it happens.

When your wanting to own up to your mistakes and offer that sincere apology you should never say…”I’m sorry but…”, this is not a real apology and your pushing blame away from yourself.  The person you say this to may accept your apology BUT the relationship has no hope for ever being the same, because you didn’t accept full responsibility.

The other apology that isn’t really acceptable is “I’m sorry you feel…”.  This apology is for the benefit only for the person that says it. It’s also one where the person that said it can go on to others and say “well I apologized but they didn’t accept it”. This apology is really saying-I’m sorry that you feel that way but I’m right.  I will probably not take steps to keep it from happening again because I didn’t see anything wrong with what I did. Only you see any wrong.-This is the apology that usually doesn’t get forgiven because your not admitting anything.  Your just sorry that the person/people involved didn’t see it your way.

When you think of an apology think of it sorta like when you pray to ask the Lord for forgiveness.  It’s not exactly the same, but you would never say to God, I’m sorry about but blah blah blah…nor would you say I’m sorry you feel this way Lord. You only apologize to God because you are truly sorry that you sinned and you are asking him for your forgiveness.  When you think of apologizing to a person this way then it’s going to be sincere.  Because you would then only say I’m sorry when you are owning up to your mistakes and wrong actions.

Apology is hard.  Apology doesn’t come easy but sometimes it’s one of those things that if it doesn’t happen, your just holding up the situation.  Most people are just waiting for that apology.

The longer life goes on without that apology relationships seem to fall further and further apart. 

So maybe One Republic was right, perhaps there is a time frame for an apology.