apology |əˈpäləjē|
noun ( pl. -gies)
1 a regretful acknowledgment of an offense or failure

In coaching, we talk a lot about personal responsibility and how we create our own experiences in life through our choices. We speak often of personal integrity, to thine own self be true. This is different than moral or ethical integrity.  We learn about being a person who is “inner-referring” rather than relying on other people to define the kind of person we are. From this perspective, when is it appropriate to offer an apology and how should it be expressed to qualify as such?

Toxic emotions such as shame often trigger an apology, and shame is a feeling of guilt because of something we have done or for a characteristic we have. Feeling sorry or feeling regret or a sense of penitence for our actions is usually present within an apology.

For one to feel apologetic to another person or community, they must share the same system of values. From a place of shared values or shared morality, it can be determined when one has failed. Then a judgement can be made regarding the distinction between right and wrong, good and bad. This judgment is a criticism or condemnation of another from a position of assumed moral superiority.

But what if we find ourselves living within a system of values that we have not consciously chosen and do not fully understand or perhaps, even agree with? When we act outside of this system, are we compelled to apologize for our failure? Only if we have failed to act within our own integrity.

And there is an important distinction to be made here: feeling sorry is not being sorry. Using bad judgement does not make us bad. The failure to fulfill an obligation does not make a person a failure. Knowing this is the starting place for recognizing what our own value system is, our own person integrity.

I believe that an apology is appropriate when we have violated our own integrity or the integrity and morality of a value system we have agreed to embrace.

I believe that it is inappropriate to demand an apology from someone. We cannot ever demand or command the emotions of another. An apology offered by demand would be insincere at its best and self-serving at its worst. And I think that this is the sphere of the well-known concept of “public apology.” Public apologies are demanded and offered as a way of reassuring ourselves that our public figures share our morals, that we are all on the same moral page, which if you watch the news, of course, we are not.

The expression of an apology should be directed to those whom were harmed by our lack of integrity and poor choices. Sometimes the only person we really owe an apology to is ourselves, a clear, specific, sincere acknowledged regret. It is without judgement, internal or external, and without blame, shame or resentment. It serves no selfish purpose  beyond personal accountability.

The landscape of public figures is littered with forced, false or fake apologies. But, what is it they are really apologizing for? Their actions or for getting caught being who they really are, knowing that the public is not interested in who the public figure really is. The public demands that the public figure be just that, a figure not much unlike an action figure that we manipulate for our amusement. There is one crucial difference though. The public figure usually volunteers for this job and has agreed to play by the same value system. The action figure did not.

Being true to ourselves means to stop lying to ourselves about who and what we really are and it means to stop making ourselves wrong because we fail to measure up to someone else’s expectations. We get to decide our own value. That’s the power of personal responsibility and for that, never apologize.

perspective |pərˈspektiv|
noun
2 a particular attitude toward or way of regarding something; a point of view
• true understanding of the relative importance of things; a sense of proportion : we must keep a sense of perspective about what he’s done.

In my coaching practice, I often use this real life example of the power of perspective:

I know of a woman who has a personal narrative or story that she does not matter, she can’t ask for what she needs and she bothers people. This is a belief system that arose out of false conclusions she made when she was about 8 years old.

The year she was in third grade was a difficult one for her family in every way. The family dynamic was survival mode and she began to feel very emotionally needy. This manifested as pretending to be sick at school often. By the fifth or sixth time her mother had to leave work to pick her up at school, it was obvious she was “crying wolf.”

Then one day, she really was sick and the nurse called her mother at work just like all the times before and her mother did not want to come and get her and told this to the school nurse. When the nurse hung up the phone, she turned to the secretary and said, “what kind of a mother wouldn’t come get her sick child at school?”

The young girl overheard this comment and immediately began to ask herself that question and her conclusion was that a bad mother would not want to pick up her sick child. And what kind of a child would have a bad mother? A bad child, she concluded.

Eventually, the girl’s mother did pick her up and dropped her off, to spend the afternoon sick and alone. She made it mean that she did not matter, she bothers people (she was clearly bothering her mother) and it was not safe or acceptable to ask for what she needs.

She could have chosen to make it mean that she was a big girl who could stay home alone for a few hours until her mom could come home. But she didn’t.

And this is the power of perspective. When it comes to what we make things mean, or perspective, we really do have a choice. The choice of our perspective is powerful because it is another example of personal responsibility about how we see the world and our place in it. It is the doorway through which we must walk on our journey to create our greatest self.

Taking responsibility for how we choose to view the events and people in our world is like opening the door to a beautiful spring morning that is full of possibility. It creates the opportunity to experience the scope of untapped possibility within us.

Tap into the greatest source for transformation you have, the power of perspective.

The practice of personal responsibility creates a new level of awareness because we acknowledge what it is we actually have control over in our lives. Understanding this takes us off default behavior and puts us in the driver’s seat of our own lives.

There are only three things we have true control over. Master these and you are well on your way to self-mastery.

1. Our thoughts We have control over the things we allow our self to think about. One good place to begin is to ask what are we making things in life mean about “us.” How are we creating drama, blaming others and being a victim of people and circumstances. Where do we hold onto grudges and resentments and allow them to rattle around in our brain? Another self-inquiry we can make is, why do I think this and does this thought process serve me?

2. Our words We have the power to control the words we speak, the manner in which we speak and the meaning of our words. Once a word is spoken, it can never be taken back or changed. We can clarify, certainly, but words are weighty business. What we choose to say and what we choose  to remain unstated is entirely in our control. A good question to ask before speaking is, what do I want this person to do with this information and why do I want them to have it? Do I have an intention that will lead me toward my goal or will it keep me stuck in the past?

3. Our actions We always have the power to be responsible for our actions. I always told my five daughters that I did not want to take the credit for their positive actions because I did not want the blame for their poor actions. Awareness that each action taken or avoided is our choice and that we alone empower ourselves to practice this kind of responsibility will lift us up and out of the pattern of false responsibility.

Understanding places where you might be taking false responsibility is a key part of stepping forward toward a new way of living. Living beyond your automatic default behaviors is possible and essential, but most of all, it is liberating. When you free yourself and resign as general manager of the universe, a huge weight is lifted. You can then choose to redirect all of the wasted energy of false responsibility toward creating the best life possible and fulfilling your dreams. No one can do it for you and you can’t do it for anyone else. Embrace that and you will have created the shift you need to move forward.

 I have a friend who often quotes his grandfather by saying, “one way or another, it’s going to cost you.”  This bit of trite but true wisdom is no less applicable when it comes to false responsibility. Taking on false responsibility has a high price tag both for you and your unintended victims. Yes, our addiction to false responsibility not only harms us, it makes hostages of those whom we believe we are saving.

We harm ourselves in many ways including these top three:

1. You deny you yourself inner peace.

When every thought is one of responsibility for all things, there is no quiet moment to cultivate inner peace. In fact, inner peace is not an option in the chains of false responsibility because, by default, we are always and at all times subconsciously scanning for the ball that’s about to be dropped by someone else. There is no rest for the falsely weary and there is no inner peace under the sun.

2. You deny yourself the opportunity to live in the moment

Ever vigil, we, the falsely responsible, are never in the present moment. We cannot afford ourselves that luxury. We must live in ready anticipation of what might happen in the next moment. Any spare moment must be spent reevaluating the past, searching for ways we failed or others failed us.

3.You deny yourself the experience of authenticity

So long as we are trapped on the merry-go-round of false responsibility, there is no time to even ponder the question of who we really are. If we’re not responsible for all, then who are we? That’s a question that is just too frightening to acknowledge, much less contemplate. But if we can never consider the question, we will never know the answer and without the answer, we will never be able to develop our deep uniqueness, our true and authentic self. This is the highest price we can pay. We pay with our life.

Then there are our unintended victims. There is a cost to be paid by those we try to save through our own needy, falsely responsible actions. Here are three:

1. You deny others their opportunities to learn personal responsibility

Every time we succumb to our need to take charge, make a decision or martyr ourselves for the sake of the whole, we obstruct the nature process of learning responsibility through personal experience. We all have a god-given right to learn from our own mistakes, but we, self-rightiously demand that others deny their own natural desire to learn from experience because it is more important that we “save the day” or “get it done.”

2. You deny others their independence

In the raw truth of our story of “no one can do it but me,” we become a thief of the most dangerous kind. We undermine slowly and carefully any sense of independence in our victims. We’ve essentially created emotional and psychological cripples for the benefit of our own greedy desire to be needed. Who would we be if they didn’t need us?

3. You deny others the opportunity to develop self-confidence

Every time we do for others what they could and should do for themselves, we say, in effect, that we do not believe that they are capable of figuring things out for themselves, of making appropriate decisions on their own. And with each offense of this type, we reinforce this ugly and untrue message. We wrap it up in the pretty bow of “support” or “loving helpfulness” but the truth is ugly because we have an agenda. We need them to believe they need us because we need to believe it more.

As you can see, the cost is high, and those listed above are just the highlights. It’s important to note that the process of taking on false responsibility is a part of our default behavior, those things we do effortlessly and without thought. A large part of coaching is to support you as you uncover your default map.

False responsibility, part IV: How to shift the behavior of taking false responsibility

False Responsibility Part II

So, if we dabble in the alchemy of false responsibility, what we are sure to conjure up is a big pay-off. What do you get out of taking responsibility for people and circumstances in your life that are not yours?

Close your eyes and think about it for a moment. Here are the top five:

1. You get to be in control

What better way is there to gain control of people and life than to take on the responsibility for EVERYTHING AND EVERYONE. We are the general manager of the universe, at least that’s what we tell ourselves.

2. You get to feel significant

What kind of person is in control of everything and everyone in their lives? Smart? Probably. Reliable? Most definitely. Significant? You bet. If we are the hub of our world, all traffic goes through us. We usually describe ourselves as “hands-on.” That’s an understatement.

3. You get to be self-righteous

Through thick and thin, whether we realize it or not, one of the biggest pay-offs of false responsibility is that we get to be right. When things go well, we have the opportunity to feel the charge of power. When things don’t go so well, we can claim smug self-righteousness. We’re the first to say “I told you so,” even if it is only a silent comment to ourselves.

4. You get to be justified

When everything is our responsibility, the end always justifies our means. After all, we carry the burden of the our entire world, more or less. We have to do whatever it takes, however destructive to ourselves and others.

5. You get to be the victim

And our favorite…we get to be the victim of everyone else’s incompetence, low morality, greed, selfishness, lack of self-discipline. “If only they would do what we tell them to do, if only they could be like us…” But, they rarely do and are, so it is up to us to take care of everything. Poor us.

False responsibility is a cunning component of ultimately feeling stuck and trapped. Because we feel responsible for everything and everyone in our lives, we can’t possibly just quit. It would be against our self-righteous code of morality and principles.  

And this is the lie that we tell ourselves and others…you can’t do it without me…I can’t do without it. The truth is that we believe that we actually are responsible for everything and everyone. That is who we believe we are, deeply and truly. It is part of our identity. Because after all, who would we be without our pain?

Part III: The cost to ourselves and others of false responsibility

I speak with clients daily who struggle to know when they are helping someone and when they are enabling someone to continue poor or destructive behavior.

Most of us want to be as supportive of others as possible, often to a fault. We see this frequently between parents and children. The line becomes blurred here because our children come to us in a state of total need and complete dependence. Supporting them, doing for them, providing for them is a natural part of the relationship.

This behavior can also be seen between spouses, siblings and friends with disasterous results. Once we position ourselves as the savior, the martyr, the provider or the one who is responsible or to blame, we have eliminated any other possible dynamic within the relationship.

When we do for others what they could and should do for themselves, we cheat them out of their god-given right to learn from their own choices. By letting go of our false responsibilities, we free both ourselves and others to learn our most important lessons.

Part II: What we get out of false responsibility