if you’ve done something genuinely awful and you’re panicking bc everybody’s mad:
you can’t (and shouldn’t try to) control how people feel about you. all you can control is your own actions - acknowledging what you did and figuring out how to be better. their feelings are out of your hands. focus on what you can do.
trying to pressure, guilt, or argue people into forgiving you/letting it go is A Bad Idea. it will only make things worse. even if it seems to work in the moment, real forgiveness and reconciliation doesn’t come from debate or coercion. give people time to process and decide for themselves.
if you apologise (here’s how), all that does is let them know you understand it was wrong (and WHY it was wrong) and you’re going to try to do better.
it’s giving them info for THEM to choose what they do with. it doesn’t automatically change their feelings one way or the other. don’t expect it to; this is not what an apology is for. this is for them. it’s not for you.
people can be angry and hurt and need space from you, without giving up on you completely. they might still care about you or want you around once they have had some time to process and heal. they may need time to make sure there’s real evidence that you are genuine in your desire to change. you might need some space to process too! don’t rush yourself or them.
if you DO permanently lose friends/an SO/etc over something terrible you did, I know that feels awful but they get to choose who they’re comfortable being close with. even if you’re sorry, even if you didn’t mean it like they took it, even if you’ve learned better – only they can and should decide about their personal boundaries.
even if you did something truly awful, it’s important to remember that you are capable of better! doing a terrible thing is a choice, not a built-in part of you. you have it in you to make better choices!
you might need help to figure out HOW to make better choices. you might need help to sort out how to resist certain impulses, or how to get your needs met without hurting others, or how to see things from another’s perspective, or whatever else.
it’s okay to need help, as long as you put in the work to seek it out - try therapy or therapy workbooks or talking to your clergy. be wary of people who make excuses for what you did and talk like you didn’t have a choice. it’s good to understand why you do certain things, but always remember you make your own choices.
you will always be the person who did that awful thing. but you can ALSO be a person who learned and grew afterward and became someone worthy of the trust people place in you. you might lose friends over what happened, but you can also choose to seek out new relationships which you approach in healthier ways.
maybe you did a bad thing. maybe you did a really, really bad thing. but you don’t have to stay the kind of person who does that kind of thing. you aren’t fixed in stone. you are capable of being better. and you owe it to yourself as well as whoever you hurt to put in the work to do that.
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