How to ask for forgiveness?

Asking for forgiveness is a ritual. This is what it is customary to do and what educated people do in a situation where they were wrong. This is an interpersonal ritual that reduces guilt towards a partner and one’s own guilt.

We are not perfect, sometimes we are wrong, giving people inconvenience and problems. If the situation is minor, it is enough to apologize, in more serious cases, you should ask for forgiveness. “Well, stop sulking already! Forgive me, I was wrong! — such a request to forgive is not the worst option, but not the best either.

Unlike “ask for forgiveness,” apologies are just words, and in some cases, apologies alone are not enough…

The best way to learn how to ask for forgiveness the right way is to start teaching it to your children. Children really do not know how to do this at all, and then they need to explain the following things.

If you want to be understood and heard, you need contact with a person. You need to look at the person, and not to the side, keep eye contact, and in close relationships it’s good to touch the hand or hug. Sincerity and sincerity are required from you, intonations are soft, intimate, asking, but without excuses. Excuses — remove, they are not needed. The feeling of guilt is not necessary, sometimes it even interferes — here it is more likely due to the circumstances and expectations of the partner.

Excuses and guilt are your showdowns with yourself, and when you ask for forgiveness, your soul should be occupied only by a partner.

When starting to speak, use the full wording. Not briefly “I’m sorry” or “Forgive me please”, not even “I ask your forgiveness”, and even more so not “I’m sorry”, but as detailed as possible: “I want to ask your forgiveness”.

“I want” is very important. You are not forced to ask for forgiveness, but you want to do it …

Next — a detailed understanding of their guilt. Namely, from you about your guilt at least three sentences, and tell convincingly, from the position of a partner. We emphasize this: THREE TIMES, no less. From the second time they will hear you, only from the third time they will believe you. They will believe faster if, in your understanding of your guilt, you will speak with those formulations that sound about you in the soul of a partner.

Attention: when you ask for forgiveness, categorically do not allow accusations and demands to forgive in your words, by doing this you will cross out everything that you have said from the heart before. This mistake can be seen in the video «Josephine, come back!» (film «Chocolate»): the first part of the conversation, when the actual request for forgiveness was formulated, was successful and was accepted. Here it was necessary to thank and leave in order to return to the conversation in three days (optimal time). To continue immediately and essentially demand a return is already a mistake.

One of the most important points in asking for forgiveness is conclusions for the future. For someone who is angry with you, it is important that what happened does not happen again, and your task is to tell your conclusions for the future so that they believe you; so that you yourself are sure that now you are not just saying beautiful words, but make sure that next time what was not repeated.

It’s good if your request for forgiveness has a beautiful ending: compensation for damage or grief. Once it’s money, sometimes it’s flowers, but repentant words are sometimes not enough, and if you love (or respect) the one you caused trouble, you probably wanted to make a good gift in such a situation. Do it!

How might this look in reality? For example, a young man wants to apologize to his beloved for being a stranger, cold and withdrawn last night. Maybe today everyone is already in a good mood, but he still wants to tell his beloved that he remembers yesterday, considers himself wrong, considers his behavior unacceptable and asks her forgiveness. Possible option — he covers her hand with his hand and says

“I want to ask your forgiveness about yesterday. Yesterday I was nasty, yesterday I was a beech. You came up to me, you took care of me, you were warm and attentive, you wanted to talk to me, but I was businesslike and didn’t hear you, as if I were a stranger. I was closed, I was cold, I was like I don’t love you. Please forgive me for this! You were absolutely right when you were angry with me. I shouldn’t be like that. I should always and always be next to my beloved woman, attentive, warm, loving. I promised to be loving, and I must be loving. I will be loving. I want to once again ask you for forgiveness for yesterday, I have already said everything to myself, I have drawn all the conclusions. I had a difficult situation yesterday, but this does not justify me: no matter what the situations are, you should always be my favorite. I promise this won’t happen again. I love you very much!»

Or — from a woman who ate naked to her beloved: “I want to ask your forgiveness: yesterday I was very angry with you and wrote nasty things to you. Today I came to my senses and I understand that this is unacceptable and dishonorable. For this I punish myself: I don’t write to you for a week, although I really want to. Without communication with you, it will be very hard for me, but that’s what I need: what if I become wiser? Once again: please forgive me, in fact, I admire you and cherish you very much.

A good, beautiful option, how you can ask for forgiveness — watch the video from the film «The Young Lady-Peasant Woman».

In business relations, the formula «How to ask for forgiveness» remains, only the accents change. Reduce the topic about the partner’s feelings, increase the topic «compensation» and «conclusions for the future.»

​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​Important: if people are in partnership, the point “conclusions for the future” is thought out jointly. This is really not an easy point, and if, suppose, the wife forgot to wash your cue, or the husband was seriously late for the meeting, so that the wife had to wait a long time, is it always easy to formulate conclusions for the future? If you take this issue seriously, then you need to think together.

“You say that you have been remembering the uye all day, you wanted to wash it, and then you suddenly got twirled and forgot … Look: you are now promising that this will not happen another time, you will definitely remember and do it. Not everything is so simple: after all, you tried to remember this today, but you had a lot to do, and it’s hard to keep everything in your head. Can I help you somehow, maybe make a reminder, hang it on the refrigerator, or just call from work to remind you? What do you think? I love you!»

Probably so, in a joint way, it will be easier to find a good solution.