The Power Apology: It Can Repair the Damage

Maya Angelou’s poem, “On the Pulse of Morning,” read at Bill Clinton’s 1993 presidential inauguration, loudly rang the bell of truth when she put forth the following:

“History, despite its wrenching pain,

cannot be relived, but if faced

With courage, need not be lived again.”

In a manner paralleling Angelou’s penetrating insight but with a slight twist of meaning, the respected Spanish-American philosopher George Santana warned us, “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it,” a maxim heard so often and repeated in so many variations, it has morphed into a cliché and for good reasons.

Inescapable Friction

Perhaps in no other relationship does our past haunt us more, or are our faux pas more consequential or potentially harmful, than in the intimate relationship where so much of our self is deeply invested and therefore at stake. And notwithstanding our common inclinations, shared attitudes, and beliefs, partner differences inevitably rear their heads and can be an ongoing and active spawning ground of troublesome friction. The hurt feelings generated by this friction are virtually inescapable and afflict, to varying degrees, every meaningful relationship, making apologies a necessary requirement or “standard equipment,” even sin qua non, for healthy relating.

Mending Fences

But what is the most effective way to apologize, “to mend a broken fence?” Are some apologies more effective than others? Can apologizing be improved upon like a learned skill? Is the mere mouthing of your apology a curative salve that can be counted upon for healing the inevitable emotional wounds we inflict upon each other? Surely, not always.

Re-Doing Our Relational Past

As risky as it might seem, in my clinical practice, I’ve often found it helpful to purposefully revisit the couple’s conflicts, especially those saturated with intense emotion, because of the strong possibility they will repeat themselves, which they tend to do, and often with even greater ferocity.

Now, post-fight, in the relatively peaceful aftermath of their argument and reinforced by the “emotional neutrality” of my office, the tides of intense emotion have receded—“higher-brain-anesthetizing” emotions return to a manageable range—better judgment “has now moved back in.” The couple is prepped and ready for rational self-examination and flexible problem-solving.

A Post-Hoc Powwow

Specifically, I’ll recommend to the couple that we cautiously search their conflicts by shining a bright, detail-illuminating, and constructively critical light upon each partner’s questionable personal need management style. Our clinical chore is to discover how each partner might avoid the crippling, hair-raising emotions that are the nasty by-product of poor individual need management, which can, and often will, foreclose on their chances of meaningful, connecting communication.

In its practical or applied form, re-doing the couple’s history can be a very powerful means by which the couple can learn to make “world-class” apologies, ones that can significantly improve their communications and thus bring them greater closeness.

In concrete form, it could look something like this: After the emotional dust has settled and both partners are re-equipped with reason, one partner turns to the other and says, “I’ve had some time to reflect on our last argument, and I apologize for my role in it and the emotional harm it may have caused you... I regret it and want to try not to repeat it if I can. So, if I could do it all over again, I would have managed my needs and feelings differently... this is what I would’ve said....”

Now, with reason, good intent, and vulnerable self-exposure in place and fully operating, the repentant partner attempts to manage their need and the feelings associated with it in a way that strives to keep a balance between self and partner respect while pursuing conflict resolution via improved need management.

A Simple Example

Jennifer readily confesses to her short fuse and the harm she causes her partner, Juan, when she launches her sharp verbal darts at him out of her frustration that she bears the lion’s share of responsibility around their house. She is equally aware of how her frequent apologies for her “relationship sins” are swiftly losing their potency.

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Fortunately, throughout her couple’s therapy sessions, Jennifer kept her commitment to practice re-doing her history. She agreed that following her “attacks” on Juan—and regrettably, there were many—she would return ex post fact to Juan and offer him more than just another impotent apology; she would practice managing her needs more effectively and with less volatility.

Dutifully, in the aftermath of her verbal assaults, armed with a revised and improved version of her personal need management tactics, Jennifer would approach Juan in a contrite, apologetic mood and express her need for his help in a new way that both surprised Juan and brought his attention to the validity of her need. Jennifer practiced expressing her deepest feelings, those she had felt earlier in their relationship and would surely feel again were Juan to more fully “partner” with her in creating an equitable division of household responsibilities. She would often preface her efforts with, “If I could do our last argument over again, I would have told you how much your help means to me... how your help leaves me feeling understood, respected, and cared for. I always benefit so much... Thank you.” By taking these risks and expressing her deepest needs and feelings in this manner, Juan has little, if any, need to protect himself or deploy any counterattacking defensiveness. Again, his attention is called to the undeniable legitimacy of Jennifer’s need for his help.

The Perks of Revisiting Our Past Struggles

Re-doing our personal histories of conflict for the purpose of making a comprehensive “power apology” takes time and energy, but it delivers several clear advantages in terms of improved personal need management. Here’s a short list of some of them:

1. We are now purged of the intense and debilitating emotions that warped and inflamed our heated argument and kept us from finding compromises, effective bargaining, and flexible solutions.
2. More than an apology, our partners directly witness and can even participate in our efforts to practice avoiding repeating our personal need management mistakes.
3. We can now provide our partners with the respectful considerations not given during our previously heated discussion or argument.
4. The growth in self and partner respect previously forfeited by virtue of poor need management (e.g., arguing) can be reclaimed through our efforts to improve our need management skills.
5. With each effort at re-doing our history, our skills of effective need management improve proportionately and incrementally.

Conflict Prevention: “The Wisdom of Forethought”

By re-doing our past conflicts, we can learn to correctively modify our need management style in such a way that this “wisdom of retrospection” informs us and can literally convert to the “wisdom of forethought,” which preempts future instances of poor need management and the heated conflicts it often ignites. What’s been learned from our past conflicts can be put to use to prevent future upheavals and thereby create improved relating.

This, arguably, is the most powerful form of apologizing! With persistent effort, maybe we don’t have to re-live our “wrenching” pain.