Apologizing. This reminds of the of the man’s prayer (at 2:17 in the video) in the Red Green Show. It goes like this (if you didn’t watch): “I’m a man, but I can change, if I have to, I guess.” As men, we are not comfortable with admitting the mistakes we make. Apologies expose our flaws and vulnerabilities. It also reminds us of our tremendous power to hurt other people.
So we don’t apologize. We redirect. We blame shift. We lie. We cover our butt so that we still “look good” even if we did something awful.
Our self-image survives at the cost of someone else’s feelings. This is fine, if it is just some jerk in traffic, but less so if that person shares our bed.
Maybe you have a problem with empathy and wonder why she runs from the room in tears at times. “That’s odd, all I said was …”, this is what my wife (THE ONE) calls a “Stupid Guy Move”. I get it, you aren’t tuned in to your surroundings and just don’t notice your jerkish-ness. Eventually, you will be told, probably very directly, exactly what type of wiener you have been.
Either way you aren’t apologizing and that is keeping you in the Dog House.