Several years, I was in the process of raising sand. I don't get to do it often, so please believe I take GUILTY pleasure in being... together.
(Please also know, I don't get approval to do it often, if EVER. 😫)

Now what do I mean by this?

I mean:

I felt I was done wrong. I felt others were incompetent. I was offended. I was penalized for the mistakes of others and those penalties cost me $1900 and months more agony than I had initially planned. The problem with it all is that I knew I would bear the weight of the mishaps. I'd said as much months before. As my predictions came true, I started printing all my documentation. I grabbed my pens, my arrows, and my highlighters. I bit my lip. And I got to work on correcting and being... Together.

Well...

As it turns out...

Contrary to my belief...

I.

Was.

Wrong.

It was me.

I was wrong the entire time.
Yes, there were many nuanced ways where I was right. However, I was wrong. PeriodT.

My pens and arrows and underlines and highlights showed me that. It was me.

So!
I finally had my peace.

And because I was wrong, I immediately knew that I needed to apologize. No questions asked. No explanation required. I was wrong, and that warranted both acknowledgment and apology.

Everyday for a month, I thought about how I would apologize. I had already planned to send breakfast to a full team of people, yet every day I was either too tired or too busy or too "careless" to do so. I wanted convenience to aid me in apologizing. However, my initial carelessness that caused me to be wrong in the first place.... well, that didn't require any convenience at all. I was blatantly wrong without even knowing it, yet I wanted my apology to be well-planned, organized, and convenient... for me.

Funny how we do that.

We so carelessly discard the values, the systems, the processes, and the humanity of others, and even IF we apologize, we often do so on our terms in a fixed manner.

🗣️🗣️🗣️ If only we put as much effort into being wrong as we put into being right...

We could prevent MUCH much!

😌

Well, I was grateful to be leaving for 10 days' worth of retreat with a big ole apology under my belt. I took a dozen HOT glazed donuts to the team that I had been at odds with. Many didn't even know what I was apologizing for, which didn't matter to me. I was wrong. And making it right was the most important thing.

So I simply told them that I had been a bad girl so I brought the entire team donuts along with an apology.

One guy said, "So... let me get this right... you got upset with me and you bring me boatloads of sugar to make it right? Now, that's just wrong!!!"

And, I bought myself 2 hot glazed donuts too for doing the right thing.

Apologies are always the right thing.
Apologies teach lessons of acknowledgment, humility, and honor... one to another.

Apologize.
Period.
And when you're done, go buy yourself a donut. 🍩
#TheTravelingEvangelist