I have always been conscious of my high levels of ego and found it very hard to control it..But occasionally I have noticed this great quality in me (oh yeah I am not modest :) ) to apologise when I feel I have to. For, an emotional person like me friends, relatives and parents matter a lot,as they give me the support without which I simply cannot be me!
So today, I felt I was acting in a petulant way, unable to pull myself together when two of my best mates got placed while I did not. There is also this friend, who has been rather good to me but has of late acted in an irksome way. He is a little too touchy and I have been typically me, (absent minded). In the evening I met my ex- room mate and for some unfathomable reason we avoided each others eyes and walked away. I was aware that for quite some time, there had been a kind of coldness, the reason for which I really had no idea of.. As I sat sipping my tea, I realised I did not like it that I was not in good terms with four of my friends, especially because each of them have made my day some time or the other. So, I decided to sort it out with all of them. Thanks to technology, it makes a lot of awkward exchanges much less uncomfortable.
Believe me, saying sorry, I mean a ‘contrite apology’ is the simplest thing on earth, provided you tell your ego to f*** off for a moment. And the relief it gives you, when things are sorted out…!!
Infact, I find it okay to say sorry even if I am sure the fault is not mine. What we basically do is pamper the ego of the other person by bending a little and thus make things a little more conducive for peace talks :) . Then, by keeping our cool and discussing things out with an open mind, we can solve most of our so- called problems.
Most often, what we consider to be an issue at one instant will seem to be a ridiculous joke when seen at some other point of time.
So let us go to the gain and loss part of this. What we are not able to do is satiate our ego. It initially hurts our ego so much, to condescend and apologise to another person ( immaterial of whether the fault is ours or not..again deciding on whose fault it is, is itself contentious :) ). And anyway, what do we gain by letting our ego reign high! It only makes us more crazy, less humane. But what do we gain by apologising?? This is the best part.. the contentment we get is inexpressible. We feel so happy with ourself, especially if we have patched up .. and even if we have not, we simply like ourself for having done our best, for not having been myopic.
Today I felt, hatred, misunderstanding and dislike only negate our life. There is only more to loathe or feel bad about. But the moment we learn to be cordial, the world will seem to be a more beautiful place.. after all, we live but once, so if not for any gain, I told myself, let me just apologise to not lose!! (note: this is not an attempt to preach.. it has always worked for me so I decided to make it into a blog post:) )
