Apology

In March, I did a post on the Five Love Languages {Quality Time, Physical Touch, Acts of Service, Gifts, Words of Affirmation}. Theoretically, every person has a way that they interpret and feel love the most.

A little while ago, I learned that there are also Five Apology Languages. That sounded interesting; I had never consciously thought about people preferring different types of apologies, although I immediately realized that it's true.

When I saw there was a quiz attached to the page, my interest turned to total fascination and I took the quiz XD I had no idea what result I was going to get, because I didn't actually know what the five languages were.

Turns out, the Five Apology Languages are Expressing Regret, Accepting Responsibility, Making Restitution, Genuinely Repenting, and Requesting Forgiveness.

The highest possible score in each language is 20, but my highest number was a 6. I guess I pretty evenly value all forms of apologizing XD But here were my results:

Making Restitution: 6

Genuinely Repenting: 6

Accepting Responsibility: 5

Expressing Regret: 2

Requesting Forgiveness: 1

You have chosen Making Restitution as your primary Apology Language. You find it easiest to forgive when action is taken to compensate for the wrong done to you. You listen not only to admission of fault, but also for the question, What can I do to make it better?

Quite accurate, actually.

It annoys me when people apologize with just words and then continue as if nothing happened. If you're really sorry, do something about it. Make a change. Make it up to me. Don't be thirty minutes late, brush it off with an, "Oh, sorry," and then do it again the next day. Bullcrap.

It's also really important to me that people mean it when they apologize. I can't decide if I'd rather have a fake apology or none at all. My gut reaction is that if you're not sorry, shut up and don't say you are. However, if someone at least pretends to be sorry, at least they realize it's a big enough deal that they should apologize. So I'm torn on that. Either way, genuinely wanting to act differently in the future is a huge deal, so it rightfully ties for first place.

Accepting responsibility is a very close second. Reasons are fine, excuses are not. And especially don't blame ME if it's not my fault. I actually don't believe I have a problem with accepting responsibility that is mine, and it's a HUGE pet peeve of mine when people do.

To me, Expressing Regret is kind of a wimpy, half-assed combination of Making Restitution and Genuinely Repenting. I'm glad you feel bad about what you did, but don't just say that. Mean it and do something about it.

Requesting Forgiveness is not even something I look for. If I'm going to forgive you, I will. Conduct yourself differently in the future, win back my trust, make a change. Don't ask me for forgiveness. It almost seems overly submissive to me, which is something I hate in people.

This stuff fascinates me. Maybe I should just forget political science and go into psychology.

I'm really interested in what your Apologies Languages might be. If you want to, take the quiz HERE and let me know what you get.

~Stephanie

P.S. I also took the Love Language quiz again, 'cause it was there and I was bored. My results are exactly the same, except that Gifts went down one point and Physical Touch went up one. Cool.