Apology is the practice of extending ourselves because we value the relationship more than we value the need to be right.

One of the most useful tasks of apology is to bring home to us how keenly, honestly, and painfully past generations pursued aims that now seem to us wrong and disgraceful. It behooves us to consider if future geenrations will similarly regard the aims we most defend today.

No apology is equal to the task set before it.

"I would like to apologize" may sound like an apology, but it is no more an actual apology than saying "I would like to lose weight" makes you suddenly slimmer.

The purpose of apology is to extend ourselves in such a way that relationships become deeper, and life becomes richer and more human in the process.

An effective apology contains within it the answer to the question, "How am I to be held accountable?"

We rarely wrestle with apology and lose.