The saying goes that you shouldn't fix something if it ain't broke. However, sometimes, even when something is broken, you still can't fix it.
I'm usually very professional at work - I keep my mouth shut when I'm supposed to, even when I don't want to. I can think on my feet and improvise when I need to. I am respectful for all those around me, I go above and beyond the call of duty and I live to help and serve those around me. But I'm human. I make mistakes. We all do, right?
My weakness is that when I'm focussed on a task, I'm not really aware of anything else. I zone out. Ask my family. LOL! They can tell you stories!
A few day ago, I was working in a shared space, focussed on fixing a mini-crisis not of my own making and saving someone else's professional pride, and people were talking around me. Some part of my brain must have registered the conversation, because, before I knew it, I found myself commenting on something. As the words left my mouth I realised that I'd said something that I shouldn't.
I'd inadvertently made a comment that would lead, via a series of questions, to sharing something confidential about someone. Actually, it's not confidential. Everyone already knows this piece of information, but no-one talks about it publically, because it would embarrass the person it concerns. In other words, my comment was said in the presence of the person my private conversation had been about. Ouch!
(And before you start thinking I'd been gossipping, and had now been caught out, I hadn't. I try very hard not to gossip at work. My private conversation had been held in my position of authority, as I have responsibility for a portion of this person's work, and it was regarding that work.)
I immediately tried to divert attention, dodge the inevitable questions and otherwise wangle my way out of it. With my brain already 95% occupied with fixing this crisis, it didn't have the requisite power to find the right words to say. Naturally, I thought of what they were later, after the crisis had been solved. Naturally. *rolls eyes*
Unfortunately, my inability to find the right words to save my own ass happened with someone who is already a rather touchy person, who easily takes offence when none is intended, who easily gets on her high horse, who fails to admit that she might be human, who is so concerned with being perfect all the time. It's like the story of the person with the log in his eye trying to take the speck out of someone else's. Sigh. It would be THIS person I'd made my comment to.
As I've lain awake at night, replaying the story in my head, I've imagined what I would have done if it had been me in those shoes. My response would not have been as dramatic as hers. I would have been puzzled by the comment, and I would have asked the same initial questions. However, I wouldn't have demanded answers the way she did, and I also would not have taken it personally. I would also have followed up on it differently.
I have mused over what might cause me to react in the way she did, and I realised that it must come from a deep-seated insecurity, or fear. That realisation has helped me, actually, not to take her reaction personally. But still. I want to fix this thing I broke, and I can't. But I digress.
The following morning, immediately following our usual morning meeting, she confronted me, loudly, angrily, and in front of everyone. I suppose I deserved that, since my comment had also been made publically. However, as we were all rushing off to a second meeting, there was no time to really discuss it. All I managed to get in at the very end of her tirade was to say, "You're right. I'm sorry." and that to her back, as she pushed past me and stormed away.
She hadn't intended to give me a chance to apologise, nor had she any intention of forgiving me. She had deliberately intended to humiliate me the way she felt I had humiliated her. She deliberately tried to recreate the situation she felt she had been in, in order to wound me the way she had been wounded. I was certainly embarrassed by our confrontation, but if her intention was to humiliate me, then she failed.
We all struggle, I know, to admit it when we're wrong. In this case, I know I was wrong. I'm more than willing to admit that. I'm sorry that I said what I said. I'm sorry that I wounded her pride. What upsets me though, is that I am being barred from fixing this, that she won't allow me to apologise, nor will she consider forgiving me.
Thus, I have turned to the One who ultimately grants forgiveness. I can't fix this situation. The damage is done and can't be undone. I screwed up. I shouldn't have said what I did in the way I did. It might have been the truth, but it shouldn't have come out in the way it did. While she may not be willing to hear my apology, God is. While she may not be willing to forgive me, He has.
There is great comfort in knowing that. However, being forgiven doesn't mean the consequences of my actions disappear like smoke, more's the pity. And so I am left replaying these situations in my mind, over and over, trying to find a way to change the outcome, and constantly failing.
At least we have a long weekend now. Hopefully, by Monday, we will have both moved on. Maybe, by Monday, she will have replayed her confrontation of me over in her head enough times to have heard my apology, and maybe she will have cooled off enough to accept it. Maybe, by Monday, I'll have been sufficiently distracted by other things to be able to let go of this. One can hope.
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