The interactions between people are complex. Sometimes we hurt each other, and rarely is that hurt contained in a single, discrete word or action. Far more often, there are patterns and sequences that we get caught up in, webs of hurt we weave around each other, even when we don’t mean to.
If you are genuinely remorseful of that (and hopefully you are!), you may be driven to apologize. Good! Do it sincerely. When you do though, you may discover that the thing you feel the most need to apologize for isn’t the thing the other person was most hurt by. (And vice versa.) The thing you’re apologizing for, the thing that weighed so heavily on your soul, barely registered to the other person. Meanwhile, some other thing you thought so minor it wasn’t worth mentioning has been lodged in their heart ever since.
This can be complex, difficult, and painful to navigate. But there’s a benefit, too – if you truly care about that person and want to use the opportunity for apology as a way of strengthening a personal relationship, then you’re in luck. You can use this experience as a way of truly getting to know something deep and meaningful about another person – how they experience pain. We almost never get the opportunity to really understand another person’s pain, and seeking that knowledge, even if it bruises your own ego, is an essential part of expressing ownership of the harm that you caused.
It isn’t punishment. It’s growth.
The Opportunity Machine 