5 Ways to Say ‘I’m Sorry’ by the man who brought us the 5 Love Languages

Premier’s Inspirational Breakfast host Esther Higham spoke to Dr Gary Chapman, author of the New York Times bestselling The 5 Love Languages® series, about his latest book The 5 Apology Languages.

EH: The title of your new book, The 5 Apology Languages (Moody Publishers), reminded me of an incident with my daughter when she was probably just about two. We started to say sorry for something and she said: “Not Sorry. Me.” There’s something very profound in that. It is difficult to say sorry – why is that?

GC: Most of us don’t like to admit that we’re wrong, or we’ve done something wrong or said something wrong. Because we want to be accepted. By nature, when we realise we’ve done wrong, we feel guilty. I think that’s a gift of God, because the guilt is designed to turn us to seek reconciliation.

The tragedy in our day is that we haven’t accepted the biblical concepts of what is right and what is wrong. And consequently, if you don’t have that, then whatever you want to do is what you do. But when we fracture a relationship, unless we deal with it, the relationship is not going to get better because it puts a barrier between us. And that’s why apology and forgiveness are necessary if we’re going to have a long-term relationship that’s healthy.

EH: How do we apologise well?

GC: There are different ways to apologise – and that’s what I deal with in the book. People have a different idea of what a sincere apology is.