It's Not About Them

In a twelve-step process, there's a part where you have to make amends for things you've done wrong.  In some cases, it means offering an apology to someone you hurt, in others it means paying debts that you owe... amends can look very different depending on the nature of the offense in question.

One thing amends can never be, though, is book-ended with the question "How can I make it up to you?" primarily because it undercuts the whole process of recovery.  The idea is to take responsibility for one's own problems and behaviors and, by ending it with that question, the ball has been bounced back into the offended party's court.

Even beyond that, though, there's the bigger problem of what to do if the person being offered amends refuses to accept it or can't forgive the person trying to make them and won't answer the question.  It's called a twelve-step program because there are, quite literally, twelve individual steps to be made within it and "Making Amends" is only step nine.  If I have to be forgiven or make restitution to every single person on my list before I can go any further, then there's a possibility that I may never make it on to the remaining steps.

Of course, the simple truth is that making amends with someone isn't about the other person.  It never is.  Whether you're in a twelve step program or not; whether you're offering forgiveness or asking for it, making amends is about YOU letting go of the baggage in a relationship and, if not being able to move forward, then at least being able to move on.

I know it's not easy, however true it may be, but it's very straightforward.  I think this is why the Bible makes it a command to go and act on and not a blessing to sit around and pray about and wait for.  I know that in my own life I tend to complicate the issue by thinking that "making amends" is the same thing as "making peace" is the same thing as "making sure that everybody is happy and we all got what we wanted and nobody will ever have problems with anybody else again because we'll all be friends and everything is great."  It's not like that.  Admit you were wrong.  Say that you're sorry.  Ask them to forgive you.  And then, whether they do or they don't, be done with it.

The only alternative is to stay where you are and let the wounds fester.  True, maybe if you wait long enough, the relationship will die and there will be nothing left worth making amends for.  Maybe time will heal it and you'll end up with a nice, big scar where your heart used to be.

"Maybe if I drink enough of this poison, they'll start to die."