Wow. I said it, I’m sorry.
Despite a little hit to my ego and the fraction of a second it takes to type or utter these two words, it doesn’t really cost anything to say, “I’m sorry.” Not saying them, however, can cost thousands even millions of dollars, split up marriages, drive wedges in families, and result in years of litigation.
It seems to me that as a culture we’ve adopted a hard stance against the two words, and when someone humbly utters them it’s newsworthy. Last week Jim Joyce made headlines when he apologized to Armando Galarraga for blowing a call, which instantly destroyed Galarraga’s perfect game. He said the magic words, I’m sorry-I screwed up.
Somewhere between little league and the big league we get out of practice of apology. We build better justifications, bigger blame, and less frequently simply say sorry.