weyes' wisdom of the day - 2/9/06

[weyes]

insulting with the intent to apologize afterwards is no more honorable than hurting without thinking about the aftermath.

tune in tomorrow.

[sancib]

This wisdom kinda makes me feel bad, because I work in a very high stress job (literally life and death), and I know that there have been times that my tone has been strong or I have snapped at my co-workers. Of course when I actually have a moment to reflect and realize I've been a turd, I always appologize and feel bad. I hope that is not how my co-workers feel

[weyes]

This wisdom kinda makes me feel bad, because I work in a very high stress job (literally life and death), and I know that there have been times that my tone has been strong or I have snapped at my co-workers. Of course when I actually have a moment to reflect and realize I've been a turd, I always appologize and feel bad. I hope that is not how my co-workers feel

o, no, sancib - don't feel bad; you misinterpreted.

i said "insulting with the intention of apologizing afterwards," which means a couple of things that you're not doing .

first of all, we all can get short with other people in moments of stress, but intentionally insulting someone is something else entirely.

and when i say "intention of apologizing afterwards," i mean when people say bad things thinking ahead of time that they can just apologize the next second and the insult will be erased. kind of like when lawyers say things in court that they "withdraw" a second later after the other lawyer objects. the damage is done.

the difference is all about the goal, and your goal isn't to hurt people, so the column doesn't apply to you .