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"Excuses," bellowed our Senior Drill Instructor, enunciating each syllable individually, "are like bellybuttons. Everybody's got one, and they serve no useful purpose."
Other D.I.'s had their own version of this expression involving another part of the body, but according to our Senior, that other part actually did serve a useful purpose from time to time, which made it superior to (and placed it in a class separate from) navels and excuses. His aphorism, repeated at intervals during the course of boot camp training, made it pretty clear to us recruits: nobody's interested in excuses.
Ever since, I've had a pretty steady rule about apologies, and it's basically this: Say "I'm sorry," and shut up. Stifle the temptation to add an excuse, especially if it's a good one.
Why waste a perfectly valid excuse, you ask? It's for the simple reason that extenuating circumstances don't change outcomes, which is what the person you're apologizing to is all worked up about. If nothing else, a simple, excuse-free apology will almost certainly surprise the recipient, who likely has become weary of listening to insipid explanations of why things happened the way they did Scotch-taped to the tail end of, or offered in place of, an apology.
As with so many essential life skills, apologizing is not something that's taught in school. In fact, by pressing students to provide reasons for their transgressions, teachers can end up nurturing a mind-set that will seek to offer excuses forever after. In this regard, I was somewhat fortunate, though it took me years to realize this.
You see, back in fourth grade, several drawn-out exchanges took place between myself and my teacher (aka, "The Pill") where she would badger me to explain exactly why I had done (or failed to do) something that had been required of me. (This was something that occurred pretty regularly with me in fourth grade, but I digress...) As unsophisticated as I was, I honestly had no idea why, and said so repeatedly, to the great amusement of my classmates and The Pill's ever-escalating irritation.
It was only years later, after reading Dale Carnegie's How to Win Friends and Influence People, that I realized why my responses had so irritated The Pill: they didn't provide enough "wind" (to borrow Carnegie's analogy) with which she could "fill her sails." Carnegie observed, correctly, that most people respond to criticism by trying to justify themselves, or by offering excuses, and in doing so they only provide critics with the means with which to criticize further. Carnegie's proposed solution? "Take the wind out of their sails."
I had occasion to make use of this principle back at my first publishing job, working as a low-level production editor in charge of sending scientific journals to the printer each week. One time, I must have left my brain at home on the day journals were put to bed, because one of my journals was sent to press with the wrong date on the cover. Yikes!
Naturally, a mistake of this magnitude became known only after the issue had been printed and bound, and to say that my boss was upset underscores the inadequacy of the printed word as a medium of communication. He was furious, and as I was heading toward his office in response to his summons, I was told (by older and wiser editors) to expect a rather lengthy session on the carpet. I thought I detected a whiff of Schadenfreude in the air, as well.
"So what do you have to say for yourself?" said my boss after I closed the door to his office behind me. He held the journal up for me to see and continued, "Because if you think this is funny—you know, like ha-ha funny—you'll forgive me if I don't laugh."
I took a deep breath.
"Boss, I've seen the cover and I think I'm more upset about it than you are. It was my responsibility to make sure it was done right, and I dropped the ball. I made my department look bad and you look bad. It was entirely my fault. I'm sorry. It won't happen again."
What was my boss going to do, argue with me? I had emptied his sails of wind. And while my choice of words was intended to reduce the severity of the dressing down I was in for, I meant every word I said.
My boss gave me a hard look, threw the copy of the journal that he was holding in the trash, and said, "Right. Make sure that it doesn't. Now get out of here and get back to work."
The total time I spent in my boss's office was probably under two minutes. When discreet inquiries on the part of my peers (made to our boss's secretary) revealed that I hadn't been simply fired outright, they were frankly amazed. What had I done to escape a long, excruciating chewing-out?
I had apologized and then shut up.
Other D.I.'s had their own version of this expression involving another part of the body, but according to our Senior, that other part actually did serve a useful purpose from time to time, which made it superior to (and placed it in a class separate from) navels and excuses. His aphorism, repeated at intervals during the course of boot camp training, made it pretty clear to us recruits: nobody's interested in excuses.
Ever since, I've had a pretty steady rule about apologies, and it's basically this: Say "I'm sorry," and shut up. Stifle the temptation to add an excuse, especially if it's a good one.
Why waste a perfectly valid excuse, you ask? It's for the simple reason that extenuating circumstances don't change outcomes, which is what the person you're apologizing to is all worked up about. If nothing else, a simple, excuse-free apology will almost certainly surprise the recipient, who likely has become weary of listening to insipid explanations of why things happened the way they did Scotch-taped to the tail end of, or offered in place of, an apology.
As with so many essential life skills, apologizing is not something that's taught in school. In fact, by pressing students to provide reasons for their transgressions, teachers can end up nurturing a mind-set that will seek to offer excuses forever after. In this regard, I was somewhat fortunate, though it took me years to realize this.
You see, back in fourth grade, several drawn-out exchanges took place between myself and my teacher (aka, "The Pill") where she would badger me to explain exactly why I had done (or failed to do) something that had been required of me. (This was something that occurred pretty regularly with me in fourth grade, but I digress...) As unsophisticated as I was, I honestly had no idea why, and said so repeatedly, to the great amusement of my classmates and The Pill's ever-escalating irritation.
It was only years later, after reading Dale Carnegie's How to Win Friends and Influence People, that I realized why my responses had so irritated The Pill: they didn't provide enough "wind" (to borrow Carnegie's analogy) with which she could "fill her sails." Carnegie observed, correctly, that most people respond to criticism by trying to justify themselves, or by offering excuses, and in doing so they only provide critics with the means with which to criticize further. Carnegie's proposed solution? "Take the wind out of their sails."
I had occasion to make use of this principle back at my first publishing job, working as a low-level production editor in charge of sending scientific journals to the printer each week. One time, I must have left my brain at home on the day journals were put to bed, because one of my journals was sent to press with the wrong date on the cover. Yikes!
Naturally, a mistake of this magnitude became known only after the issue had been printed and bound, and to say that my boss was upset underscores the inadequacy of the printed word as a medium of communication. He was furious, and as I was heading toward his office in response to his summons, I was told (by older and wiser editors) to expect a rather lengthy session on the carpet. I thought I detected a whiff of Schadenfreude in the air, as well.
"So what do you have to say for yourself?" said my boss after I closed the door to his office behind me. He held the journal up for me to see and continued, "Because if you think this is funny—you know, like ha-ha funny—you'll forgive me if I don't laugh."
I took a deep breath.
"Boss, I've seen the cover and I think I'm more upset about it than you are. It was my responsibility to make sure it was done right, and I dropped the ball. I made my department look bad and you look bad. It was entirely my fault. I'm sorry. It won't happen again."
What was my boss going to do, argue with me? I had emptied his sails of wind. And while my choice of words was intended to reduce the severity of the dressing down I was in for, I meant every word I said.
My boss gave me a hard look, threw the copy of the journal that he was holding in the trash, and said, "Right. Make sure that it doesn't. Now get out of here and get back to work."
The total time I spent in my boss's office was probably under two minutes. When discreet inquiries on the part of my peers (made to our boss's secretary) revealed that I hadn't been simply fired outright, they were frankly amazed. What had I done to escape a long, excruciating chewing-out?
I had apologized and then shut up.
