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I’M SORRY
Q U I C K:
When’s the last time you said:
I’M SORRY. . . ?
I’m not asking when’s the last time you apologized. . .
NO,
When’s the last time you actually said the words,
I’M SORRY?
I just did it a couple of days ago
when I visited the Dr.’s office
and actually said,
“I’m sorry for being here and taking your time and any inconvenience I might have caused. . . .”
SERIOUSLY. . .
I’ve often joked if you told me that I was the cause of everything that’s gone bad in 2020
INCLUDING COVID19
I would pause, consider,
“WOW, YOU MAY BE RIGHT!”
Are you in that boat
paddling with the other oar. . .
When we needlessly apologize, we end up making ourselves small and diminish what we’re trying to express, says sociologist Maja Jovanovic. . .
I recently listened to Maja on her TED talk and it made me pause and consider in another way and now, hopefully you, too.
Think about all the times you use the word “sorry” in a typical day. There are the necessary “sorry”s — when you bump into someone, when you need to cancel plans with a friend. But what about the unnecessary “sorry”s? The “sorry, this may be an obvious idea” at a meeting, the “sorry to cause trouble” when rescheduling a haircut, the “sorry, there’s a spill in the dairy aisle” at the supermarket.
The Canadian sociologist Maja Jovanovic believes the “sorry”s we sprinkle through our days hurt us. They make us appear smaller and more timid than we really are, and they can undercut our confidence.
Jovanovic, who teaches at McMaster University and Mohawk College in Hamilton, Ontario, became interested in this topic when she attended a conference four years ago. The four women on a panel were, she says, “experts in their chosen fields. Among them, they had published hundreds of academic articles, dozens of books. All they had to do was introduce themselves. The first woman takes a microphone and she goes, ‘I don’t know what I could possibly add to this discussion’ … The second woman takes the microphone and says, ‘Oh my gosh, I thought they sent the email to the wrong person. I’m just so humbled to be here.’” The third and fourth women did the same thing.
During the 25 panels at that week-long conference, recalls Jovanovic, “not once did I hear a man take that microphone and discount his accomplishments or minimize his experience. Yet every single time a woman took a microphone, an apologetic tone was sure to follow.” She adds, “I found it enraging; I also found it heartbreaking.”
Jovanovic found the outside world not so different: “Apologies have become our habitual way of communicating,” she says. Since then, she’s collected needless apologies from her colleagues and students. One stand-out? “My research assistant said ‘Sorry’ to the pizza delivery guy for his being late to her house,” says Jovanovic. “She said, ‘Oh my gosh, we live in a new subdevelopment. I’m so sorry. Did you have trouble finding this place?’”
We can eliminate the “sorry”s from our sentences — and still be considerate. “The next time you bump into someone,” Jovanovic says, “you could say, ‘Go ahead,’ ‘After you’ or ‘Pardon me.’” Similarly, during a meeting, Jovanovic says, “instead of saying, ‘Sorry to interrupt you,’ why not try ‘How about,’ ‘I have an idea,’ ‘I’d like to add’ or ‘Why don’t we try this?’” The idea is to be polite while not minimizing yourself.
The “sorry”s that fill our written interactions also need to be noticed — and banished. For emails, Jovanovic says, “There’s a Google Chrome plug-in called ‘just not sorry’ that will alert you to all the needless apologies.” With texts, she points out, “Every single one of us has responded to a text you got when you weren’t able to respond right away. What did you say? ‘Sorry.’” She says, “Don’t apologize — say, ‘I was working,’ ‘I was reading,’ ‘I was driving, ‘I was trying to put on Spanx.’ Whatever it is, it’s all good. You don’t have to apologize.”
And, in some of the instances when we’d typically throw in a “sorry,” we could just use the two magic words: “thank you.”
Jovanovic tells of the moment when she realized the effectiveness of gratitude. She says, “Four of us were at a restaurant for a work meeting, and we’re waiting for number five to arrive … I put my sociological cap on, and I thought, ‘What would he say? How many apologies will he give?’ I could barely stand the anticipation. He arrives at the restaurant, and you know what he says? ‘Hey, thanks for waiting.’ … The rest of us said, “Yeah, you’re welcome,” and we all just opened our menus and ordered. Life went on, and everything was fine.”
Another time when “thank you” can work better than “sorry”? When you’re with a friend and you realize you’ve been doing all the talking. Jovanovic says, “instead of saying, ‘Sorry for complaining’ or ‘Sorry for venting,’ you could just say, ‘Thank you for listening,’ ‘Thank you for being there’ or ‘Thank you for being my friend.’”
Besides removing them from our own communications, we should tell other people when they’re overdoing their “sorry”s, suggests Jovanovic. You can start with your family and friends — and if you’d like, go beyond them. She says, “I have been interrupting these apologies for three years now. I’ll do it everywhere. I’ll do it in the parking lot, I’ll do it to total strangers at the grocery store, in line somewhere. One hundred percent of the time when I interrupt another woman and I say, ‘Why did you just say ‘sorry’ for that?’ she’ll say to me, ‘I don’t know.’”
The World
has become quite the place in 2020
and there might be a ga-zillion reasons to apologize
but
I’M SORRY
for right now
JUST NOW
I’m thinking of some pretty awesome reasons to say,
“THANK YOU!”
Thank you for
reading
pausing
considering
for
YOU. . .
THANK YOU
Eyes and EARS
We use to play it as kids
usually in the back seat of the car
on longer-than-we-ever-wanted-trips:
PLAY THE GAME
WHAT WOULD YOU RATHER BE:
RIch/Poor
Hot/Cold
Get bit by a poison snake/Get bit by a shark
Be Deaf/Be Blind. . .
The Game was endless
and it did pass the time. . .
The question about the S E N S E S
seemed to always be the hardest. . .
even now. . .
What’s most important to you:
To be Heard
or to be Seen. . .
To See
or to Hear?
Tough decision, huh. . .
hopefully one you’ll never have to make,
but maybe S C I E N C E
can help. . .
When it comes to understanding how someone truly feels, it may be best to close your eyes and just listen, a new study shows.
Empathy allows people to identify the emotions, thoughts and feelings of others. To do this, people tend to not only focus on the exchange of words, but also a person’s facial expressions and other nonverbal cues.
But a new study from the American Psychological Association suggests that you could be trying to do too much. In fact, relying on a combination of vocal and facial cues may not be the most effective method for understanding the emotions or intentions of others, the study said. [5 Ways Your Emotions Influence Your World (and Vice Versa)]
“Social and biological sciences over the years have demonstrated the profound desire of individuals to connect with others and the array of skills people possess to discern emotions or intentions,” study author Michael Kraus, an assistant professor of organizational behavior at Yale University, said in a statement. “But, in the presence of both will and skill, people often inaccurately perceive others’ emotions.”
The new research found that people who focus solely on listening to another person’s voice — including what the person says and vocal cues such as pitch, cadence, speed and volume — were able to better empathize with that individual.
In the study, the researchers examined how more than 1,800 individuals communicated with others. Some participants were askedto listen but not look at each other, while others were asked to look but not listen. And in some cases, the participants were allowed to both look and listen while communicating with one another.
In addition, some of the participants listened to a recorded interaction between two strangers that was read to them by a computerized voice lacking the usual emotional inflections of human communication.
On average, the study found participants were able to interpret the emotions of their partner more accurately when they just listened to the other person and didn’t focus on facial expressions. Furthermore, listening to the computerized voice proved to be the least effective for accurately recognizing emotion.
In the study, the researchers examined how more than 1,800 individuals communicated with others. Some participants were askedto listen but not look at each other, while others were asked to look but not listen. And in some cases, the participants were allowed to both look and listen while communicating with one another.
Although facial expressions can tell a lot about how someone is feeling, Kraus said that people are good at using facial expressions to mask their emotions. Also, watching and listening may reduce empathetic accuracy because more information isn’t always better, and trying to do both at the same time can actually make it harder to understand the meaning behind a person’s vocal inflection and facial expression.
“Listening matters,” Kraus said. “Actually considering what people are saying and the ways in which they say it can, I believe, lead to improved understanding of others at work or in your personal relationships.”
So let me ask:
DID YOU HEAR WHAT I DIDN’T SAY. . .
DID YOU SEE WHAT I DIDN’T S H O W
Uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh. . .
L O O K Again
and see what you
H E A R