Way back when, I went on this class trip to a spaceflight simulator. I was assigned to Mission Control and was on a team with two other kids overseeing life support. We sat at these clunky computers with an unwieldy rollerball mouse and clicked through a giant manual of everything that can go wrong regarding life support, which is apparently a lot.
My poorly-received art project about the collapse of childhood dreams.
The way the simulation worked was that a random series of errors would occur, and those of us in "Houston" would have to find a solution in our manuals and notify the astronauts. At some point, the astronauts said they were experiencing static electricity, and it was our time to shine. My little crew and I dug through this giant manual, looking for anything related to static electricity. This was a minor inconvenience, right? There had to be an easy fix.
But we weren't having much luck. Every comparable situation in the manual didn't quite line up in one way or another, and our time was ticking down.
"We need an answer, Life Support," said the director.
We gaped at each other. There wasn't a solution. We had to pick the closest match, something to mitigate the situation while a better answer could be found. My teammates were afraid to pick.
So I was the one who sent the communication to the astronauts to diffuse the electricity into special bars in the cabin of the spacecraft that had been placed there for that purpose.
I picked wrong. The astronauts did as they'd been told, but the problem persisted, and the director stopped the simulation.
"What happened, Life Support?"
Again, my teammates didn't want to come under fire. We were pretty sure we were being graded on this, and we were the only unit to screw up so badly that the mission had to be effectively aborted.
I knew I had to be the one to do it. My reasoning was selfish. I thought I could demonstrate that I was calmly and confidently taking responsibility for a mistake, and that I would get good marks for being so noble and honest and for taking the hit while my friends cowered.
I stood, and all of Mission Control stared at me. I explained that there was no perfect match for the situation, so we'd chosen the next best thing. I apologized for the error and asked what we should have done instead.
The director was not impressed. Though he didn't tell me what the right answer was, he made it clear that we'd chosen incorrectly. "Don't say you're sorry. Had this been a real mission, you would have killed them."
I had been so ready for a pat on the back for owning up to a mistake in front of so many people. And I was so sure we had done the right thing. We'd problem-solved and come up with something to treat the symptoms of an issue while we searched for a solution.
I'd been wrong. I'd ruined the mission. I'd hypothetically killed a group of people because I couldn't read a manual properly. My "humility" hadn't mattered. Everyone on the trip saw me as the one who murdered the mission, even my Life Support teammates, who got to sit safely on the sidelines.
And I wasn't supposed to say "sorry"? That seemed like the perfect time to apologize!
Then again, I've always had a problem with apologies.
Has this ever happened to you? You casually apologize for something minor, and the next thing you know, everyone's up in arms and acting like you just kicked a puppy? And then, obviously, you have to apologize again, and they get even more frustrated with you, and you seriously contemplate jumping out the window to avoid all this new and unexpected shame?
That's where I live. I'm constantly at that auto-defenestration shame threshold.
I, like many women, am a chronic apologizer. It's a sucky-but-true fact that women learn at an early age that they must apologize for everything. For their bodies, for their needs, for taking up space, for speaking, for not being good at things, for being too good at things, etc. Pair that with persistent self-hatred, a desperate need to be considered "good enough," and the baseline anxiety level of a chihuahua stuck in an electric fence, and you get me.
I apologize for a number of reasons. Here are some common ones:
- I'm sorry I screwed up such-and-such-work-related-task, especially since that particular task could have been handled by a 1998 original-release Furby.
- I'm sorry I pooped in the bathroom before you were going to take a shower.
- I'm sorry such-and-such-bad-thing happened to you (in addition to the pooping before you showered thing).
- I'm sorry for staring blankly at you while you explained something simple that I subsequently failed to comprehend because I was A) inexplicably tired, B) thinking about a stupid story, or C) just straight-up wasn't paying attention for no freaking reason.
- I'm sorry that I can't remember if I've met such-and-such-person that you're asking me about, especially since when I see them I won't be able to recognize them anyway because I'm just face-blind enough to be a social nuisance, and they're going to think I'm rude if we have met because they'll think I'm a forgetful and rude person, which is not true, because I'm actually forgetful, rude, and have a slightly dysfunctional fusiform gyrus.
These are all situations in which I have inconvenienced another human being, which is my very-special talent in life. And yet, I hate inconveniencing people. I don't even like it when someone at a store offers to help. I don't care if I will die in the next 5 minutes if I don't find the stationary aisle at Staples, I will not ask an employee for help. My last words will be a breathy apology to whoever finds my prone body by the clearance printers. Yes, I recognize dealing with a corpse is more inconvenient than having to show someone where to find note cards, but at least I won't be alive to be ashamed of myself.
Because it all comes down to shame. I'm ashamed of almost everything about myself. I'm deeply aware of my many, many shortcomings, which is a problem because I very badly want to be the best at everything ever. So I sometimes apologize for not understanding something quickly enough, or for asking questions, or for not knowing an important name, or forgetting to do something, no matter how minor.
After all, I killed a bunch of imaginary astronauts over something I thought was minor at the time.
Apologizing is how I convey to people my self-awareness and my conscientiousness. Like, "Hello, I'm aware that I've failed to measure up in some way, and I feel bad that my failure has inconvenienced you, and I'm going to do better."
I've been told not to apologize so frequently, else people think I'm insecure or incompetent. Which I'm not. Or, not entirely. But I'm often in situations in which I don't have the right answer, or I'm stepping on someone's toes, or I'm otherwise blundering around, and I feel like I must express an apology, or come off as rude and unaware of my mistakes.
Here's the thing. I don't understand why apologizing gets equated with a lack of confidence. Can't confident people make mistakes? And shouldn't they say "sorry" when they do? Because that's what nice human beings do when they mess up? That's what you do when you're a smart person who happened to do something wrong? Like misunderstanding a fake Life Support manual?
It's true that I sometimes apologize when I shouldn't. Or worse, I apologize when I don't really mean it. However, I'm sticking to my Life Support guns. I think there are times when an apology is important, and it shouldn't convey self-doubt. It communicates that you're human and capable of error and that you're aware of it. You have to be aware of your shortcomings in order to make progress.
But you shouldn't expect accolades, either.
Anyway, this entire entry has been an experiment in bitterness after being called out for apologizing too much. I'm not sorry for my sorries. Not all of them. I think they're important. If people think they betray a lack of confidence, then I'll have to demonstrate confidence in other ways.
Though perhaps I will think harder about what I mean when I say, "I'm sorry."