One study of more than 1,000 Brits found that the average person says ‘sorry’ around eight times per day.
If you find yourself saying ‘sorry’ all the time, even when it’s not your fault, you might be over-apologising.
Of course, apologising is not always a bad thing. It’s a nice way to show that you feel bad about something you did wrong.
But sometimes, we say ‘sorry’ too much.
It can make us seem unsure of ourselves and can make other people think we did something wrong when we didn’t.
A good way to stop over-apologising is to think before we say ‘sorry’.
We could ask ourselves if what we did was really something we should be ‘sorry’ for.
If the answer is no, then we don’t need to apologise.
So what can we do instead of saying we’re ‘sorry’ all the time?
We can change our language.
Instead of “Sorry I’m late“, we could say, “Thank you for waiting.” (This is polite and doesn’t make it seem as if we did something wrong.)
Instead of “Sorry for talking so much“, we could say, “Thank you for listening“.
And instead of “I’m sorry, I can’t come to your party“, an alternative could be “Thank you for thinking of me. Maybe next time.“
Apologising is good when we’ve made a mistake. But over-apologising can make us feel worse instead of better. And it causes other people to see us as less competent and confident.
So let’s try and use some positive phrases instead.
PS If you’d like to read more, take a look at Inc.com’s article here.
