Hello! Welcome to episode 61 of I’d Rather Stay In. This week, we’re talking about apologies: how to avoid apologizing too much and how to apologize correctly when it’s needed.

Quick links

Article: How Women Can Stop Apologizing and Take Their Power Back

Gmail Plugin: Just Not Sorry

Article: This is the Recipe for the Absolute Perfect Apology

Article: 4 Steps to Take When You Need to Say “I’m Sorry”

Article: If You Use This One Word, You Will Ruin Your Apology

Article: The Anatomy of a Good Apology

Article: Hold Up. They Said Sorry – So Why Am I Still Angry?

Episode transcript

Welcome to I’d rather stay in with your hosts Megan Myers and Stephie Predmore. This week, we’re chatting about apologies. Stay tuned. Hi, Megan.

Hey.

So I saw my therapist last week. And we had a whole conversation about how I do too many things.

I feel like she might know you really well, already. Yeah,

we haven’t had that many sessions. To be fair, she said that she identifies some of the issues that I seem to have. Anyway, she has, she has very quickly pinpointed me on a number of things. And we were literally talked about Hi, I do too many things. And I take on too many things. And then, later that day, or maybe the next morning, I had up a question box on my Instagram, and was like, you know, how can I help you? What questions do you have about adoption stuff? And someone asked if I know of any bookclubs for adoptive parents, and I answered, and I said, I don’t really know of any off the top of my head that, you know, I did a book club, with my friends, Andy and Allison on the body keeps the score. But what that wasn’t really necessarily adoption specific. And I don’t, you know, I think they’re gonna do it again, but I don’t know. And if anyone knew of anything to let me know, and then I like, off the cuff was like, maybe I should do one. And I had so many people messaged me and be like, please, that would be amazing. So now I’m doing a book club.

Did you you don’t you didn’t see your therapist today. So

next week, you can tell her next time I see are gonna be like, guess what, but my, my compromise is that I’m only going to do it quarterly. And I’m going to make people pay like 10 bucks to participate. So for three reasons, a to, you know, potentially compensate some of my time be if I want to have like adoptees or birth moms or something like someone come on as sort of as like a guest speaker, I want to be able to compensate for them for their time. And see, I can’t remember if I was doing numbers or letters here, so maybe I just mixed that up. But the third thing is also so that the people who sign up actually have a have like something a little bit invested. So they actually show up and participate. And don’t just like show up and be like, Well, do you know what I mean? So that’s my compromises, I’m only gonna do it quarterly. And I’m gonna have people pay like 10 bucks to participate. So, and I’m not, and it’ll mostly be adoptive parents, but I’m going to leave it open in case you know, anyone outside of, you know, the immediate adoption triad wants to participate, or, you know, whatever. But anyway, I’ve had, I’ve been asking people questions, like, I’ve been putting up some polls in my Instagram stories to find out, like, what kind of content people are interested in what kind of books they’d like to read, you know, what kind of setup they would like, second kind of gear it to be, you know, off the bat, what people are kind of hoping that it would be and I’m really surprised at how many people have been answering the questions and seem really interested in doing it. So maybe I do it. And I only have like two people that come to it, but I’m gonna get at least gonna give it a try and see what happens. And you know, what’s the worst that happens? I read some books.

Right, like, dying.

Right. And like the first couple books, I think, will probably be ones that I’ve already read, and I’m familiar with. So, you know, the prep time for the first couple won’t be like, too, too crazy in that regard. But I already have a few more books on my list that I’m like, okay, we’ll add that to my to read list and kind of see if it might be a book we want to cover. But anyway, that’s my story about how I literally have a conversation with my therapist about how I do too many things. And

then the next day, I’ll turn it around. I’m gonna do this thing because I see a need in the community for

I mean, that’s the best reason to be doing it though.

Right? I mean, I saw need people were asking for it. It’s funny because one of my friends, she messaged me, and she was like, I love how when you, you decide you’re gonna do something, you just do it? And I was like, yeah, crazy. Sure I exhausted my husband. So there’s that.

It does not come back to bite you in the butt at all.

Oh, no, never never. It’s fine. How are you, Megan?

Well,

I’m good. My dog is very much enjoying all the drifted snow that we got. got like, I don’t know, five inches yesterday or something like that. And it but it was also blowy. Yes. So there’s like some parts of our backyard where like some of the patio sidewalk was empty of snow. And then other areas. The snow comes up, like to her chest.

Yes.

And she has so much fun bouncing around in the snow because she’s a weirdo. But I was with the boys were shoveling and I was sweeping off of our sweeping the snow off of our front porch. Because it’s wood. So I wanted to we wanted to get the snow off to try and like save it. Yes, obviously keep taking better care of it. And when I decided that I wanted a house with a wraparound porch. The snow did not really factor in that calculation. Because I didn’t think about the snow getting on the porch.

Yeah.

There was a lot of snow. I mean, it’s a big porch. But there was a lot of

work and a big porch. So that’s a oops, it’s fine. Everything is fine. Everything. There’s

just one one spot in the corner. Where I can’t I couldn’t get us a broom to get it off because it was too deep. But little spaces where I was like shoveling the snow out. It wasn’t going through so there’s still snow there. But the rest of it I was great, like melted now because it was sunny all day.

That’s pretty.

That’s pretty good.

Right and it was like a whole 13 degrees. Instead,

it was a heatwave zero degrees.

So

it’s been it’s been interesting this last last few days with the weather or our you know, our weather

has been so bitterly cold. And then the South has been pummeled by snow that they do not have the infrastructure to handle and now it’s been really bad. Yeah, it’s, it’s a hot mess. And 20 2021 is, is really pulling some 2020 fives. So

not so sensitive.

to knit know that on New Year’s Day, all the shenanigans are supposed to stop.

Right?

interesting how that’s not actually how it goes. So, okay, we’re going to talk about apologies today. Because I think that there are two problems with how people apologize in this world. I think the first problem is that some people apologize too much, especially women, especially women. And the second problem is that some people are really shitty apologizer. So we’re gonna actually talk about both things. Because I think that they’re both

apropos

when we’re talking about this topic. So Megan, talked to me about how women apologize too much. What do you as a woman?

Oh,

what do you see with your friends? I tend to be a chronic over apologize. I’m sure you notice it with me. But what do you see with your friends in terms of apologizing too much?

I would say in general, women apologize for everything. Things that are not within their control. But even if it’s stuff that’s in their control, it’s stuff that doesn’t matter. Right. For instance, if you are, you know, get a message from someone at work and you don’t respond right away.

Because you’re,

you know, meeting in a meeting or you’re in the bathroom, your your first instinct is to go, Oh, I’m sorry. I was I didn’t respond because of whatever you’re doing. And I granted I’m a woman, so I don’t actually know what men necessarily would say. But I feel like men do not apologize for things like that, where it’s just part of existing in life where things happen. And women just automatically apologize basically for taking up space, right? Or inconveniencing anyone in any single Iota.

Like, if I, if I asked Alex, like, oh, if you were in a meeting and couldn’t respond to an email within the first hour, would you apologize for the late response or apologize for not responding right away? Like, I can guarantee you, he’d be like, Fuck no. I found an article on Forbes. Unlike some other examples, and I think that this is extremely prevalent in the workplace. But I think that it happens just in life in general to where we say things like, if we’re sending an email, and we say, Oh, sorry, could you send me that report, or sorry, I won’t be able to make it that day. Like, you, you don’t have to preface either of those sentences with sorry.

Similarly, people say, I just wanted to touch base with you, I just wanted to check in, which is another form of apologizing, right,

I do it all the time. I’m so guilty of that one, Oh, my gosh, I am the most guilty of that one. And I have really been trying to not do both of those things to not use sorry, or not be like, Oh, I just wanted to check in. And sometimes I use it as I was gonna use, I was gonna use the term conversational lubricant, but I don’t I hate myself for that. But like, if I think someone is going to be a little prickly, sometimes I will throw those things in on purpose, to help get a not so prickly response back. So sometimes I am using them purposefully and mindfully because I don’t want to deal with someone being prickly. Um, but in general, I’ve been trying to be a lot better about saying, you know, like, Can you send me XYZ? Not Sorry, could you send me that? Or not saying sorry, I can’t make it but just saying, unfortunately, it looks like I’m not going to be able to make that day or that call time doesn’t work for me? How about XYZ instead? So like, I’m trying to be more mindful of that. And I’m certainly not perfect at it at all. But it’s definitely it’s definitely a thing. And I think, again, this is one of those things that having a daughter has raised my awareness of and like, even seen Eden’s older sister who’s two, and she’s extremely verbose for a two year old, I will preface with that, but she will, like, bump into the table and be like, sorry. And so like, I and I, and I see Taylor being like, you don’t even need to apologize to the table like it’s like there’s there’s just there’s a line of figuring out as as a female in particular, when is an apology actually necessary? Like when do you actually need to say I’m sorry?

Yeah, and I think it’s interesting that you mentioned the one of the reasons why you might do a little bit of a pre apologizing is to tamp down anyone’s possibly prickly feelings. And I think that is also something that women out automatically look out for. And in the age of everything being online, it is so hard to read people’s attitudes, whether it’s a via text message or work slack or over email, it’s it’s so hard to know, the thought process that is going on in that other person’s mind as they’re writing the email response.

Right? I mean, we live in a We live in a time where if you send a text that says okay, that’s fine. If you text us it, send a text that says okay, period, oh my god, this person is so angry.

I will say that it’s weird to put a period after okay, because okay is a word, like it’s just okay. But but the whole thing where you’re not supposed to put periods in general is super weird. To me, and I don’t like it.

Sometimes I just like punctuation,

right? But when I write emails especially I just want to get to the point of why I’m writing the email. And sometimes I you know, I’m writing, pleasantry emails like to my dad or to my friends stuff, which is different. But if I’m writing a business email after like a very quick Hi, I want to get down to business. Right? My time is valuable. Your time is valuable. Let’s not waste any time kissing each other’s butts essentially,

right?

Yeah, but I still am the same person who’s like, I’m just popping in.

I’m not gonna do too many pleasantries. But I will just say, I’m just popping in to get that thing that I need from you. So if you could do that, that’d be great. Thanks. Yeah, it’s definitely I don’t know that. I think that we just have to be. It’s one of those things you have to practice self awareness with. Like, once you are aware of that you do it. And you realize how many times a day you apologize. And how many times a day, you didn’t actually need to apologize for something. Like, yeah, there are times where you really should say you’re sorry for something. But there’s certainly times where you say it, and it’s just not necessary. And I think that that maybe it just starts with becoming aware of it. And then that awareness leading to Okay, what can I say instead?

Yeah, I think it’s a muscle like anything else. So you have to learn the behavior. And I think it’s just such a reflex for so many people. You’re not even necessarily paying attention to what you’re saying. She’s like, Oh, sorry. Oh, sorry. Yeah. Oh, sorry. Oh, my

goodness,

there is a

plug in on the GMAT Gmail plugin. I’m discovering this as as I was looking through this article. And it’s called, just not sorry. And it warns you when you write emails using words, which which undermines your message, I love it, like it underlines it, and then it’ll tell you why that might not be the best thing

to use.

It’s like a topology Clippy.

It is.

I see you’re trying to apologize again.

Let me tell you that maybe you should just not. Okay. I will. We’ll link to that and our quick links on the blog with the transcript for this, because that’s actually pretty cool. So again, like there are in an age of technology, there are tools that can actually help you become more cognizant of these things. So instead of the lions that tell you and your misspelling your own name, because sometimes they don’t like my my name. Saying that I’ll put a line if you are saying things that may be perceived in not the most assertive way, not the way that you want them to be.

I love that.

So Stephie while we are not apologizing? What are some reasons and ways that we actually should be apologizing? Oh, my gosh.

So I think somewhere along the way, somewhere between women apologizing too often for things that they don’t even know dies for. We like also forgot how to actually make apologies. Here’s what an apology is not. I’m sorry, that offended you. That is not an apology. That is what we will call a non apology.

Or how about I don’t agree with that.

Right. Right. So I think and it’s interesting because, again, living in the age of social media, which we do. I think that we’ve actually seen a number of both good and really bad apology examples in the greater public, right? We see celebrities and politicians getting called out for their actions. And then we see how they respond to that. We see that either they own up and they make a acceptable apology. And then they make the actions to show that that was a real apology. Or they give a non apology and don’t change their actions and demonstrate that whatever statement they issued was truly just a PR ploy. Because I think that that happens a lot. I think that a lot of times when people get called out and their actions come into question, and they’re, they get their publicist on it, and their PR team is like, here we go. We’re gonna put this out, but the person isn’t actually sorry for

Yeah, I said they said, I think one of the one of the key ways you can spot that is when the apology includes the phrase, it wasn’t my intention to blah, blah, blah,

yes.

Unless you’re a truly horrible person. Of course, it’s not your intention.

Right.

But you said what you said.

Right, yeah. And, and I think that that also comes back to something that we learned a lot about in 2020, which was intent versus impact. Mm hmm.

Like,

I think when people say things like, Oh, well, that’s not my intention. Just because it wasn’t your intention doesn’t mean that your words or actions didn’t have a negative impact.

So right, if you could, you can translate it to other scenarios where like, it wasn’t my intention to poison the food. But who happened to get sick? It’s not my fault, because I didn’t intend like, that’s not No. But like, that’s an extreme example. Obviously, it

is an extreme example, but I think that it’s it’s a, it’s a useful analogy, because, like, that’s something very obvious where people will be like, oh, what you did was really bad. Mm hmm. And it wasn’t my intention to, you know, get someone sick, but I did. But then, when your words hurt someone, the words that you’re using hurt someone. It’s so much easier for people to be like, Well, that wasn’t my intention, and brush it off. Right? Like if the harm is not, if there’s no like physical harm. I think that people feel much more like they can be like, Well, it wasn’t my intention or hurt you I didn’t I didn’t intend for my words to hurt you. And no, you probably didn’t intend for your words to hurt someone. But that doesn’t mean that they didn’t have an impact that you weren’t anticipating and that you can’t apologize. And also implement changes moving forward. So I looked up some articles and there’s a lot of articles about apologies and sort of the anatomy of a good apology. And the thing I think is kind of funny is that most of these say the first step is to literally say I am sorry, or I apologize. But which is you know, it’s funny because we were just literally just saying don’t say you’re sorry so often but when it’s necessary, start off with it.

It’s a very tippy scale. You have to balance precariously,

right the another thing that these articles are saying is that keep like to keep in mind that your apology should not be immediately followed by however or and then be giving an excuse like if you’re following your apology with an excuse, you’re undermining your apology. And your

mind you’re undermining how they feel right? You’re,

you’re simply say like, I’m sorry, I did that but and here’s my lame ass excuse. And you’re making it very clear that you don’t actually mean it. So if you’re if you’re if you’re gonna follow up an apology with a but or however maybe just like don’t just don’t apologize, because you don’t actually you don’t actually care. Another thing that they’re talking about in some of these articles is also

think about the timing of your apology. Which is interesting, right? Because it totally depends on the situation. Like, the person and the person, and just all the things like,

sometimes you need to apologize immediately. Sometimes you might need them, they might need some time to cool off to even be able to, like, hear your apology.

Yeah.

And it might be a case where you might, you might have to, even if you try to apologize right away, you might have to come back to it again, later. And

exactly breasts

Express maybe in a different way.

Right, exactly. So I think there’s a there’s a fine balance between you know, if you need to wait, waiting, the right amount of time, but not waiting, forever.

Like,

and because they and I think that we see this, we see this on social media in with politicians and celebrities a lot to like, they get called out on something. And or there’s a stirring that their followers or their constituents are unhappy about something. And then they like wait too long to make the apology, where then it’s clear again, they’re just doing it because they’re afraid that they’re gonna be canceled.

Yeah, I would say a really good example of that last year was Alison Roman, who made some mistakes, and took quite a long time to properly address it. Right. And then when she did, it was very early, very obviously, written by a publicist and not herself.

And if she had apologized for it right away, that I think that the outcome for her would have been a lot different. But because she waited so long, like she ended up having some some career ramifications.

Yeah, and she made a mistake. And then she defended the mistake. And then she waited a really long time to properly address it. And now she is out of her job. So

and we’re actually seeing that right now for any of my fellow bachelor fans.

Just hearing about this, yeah. So we’re seeing that right now. So

one of the finalists, I guess, on this current season, which was filmed months ago, of the bachelor, some pictures of her recently surfaced at a plantation themed party in 2018. And the interesting thing, actually, is that now the controversy is less about her. And it’s actually become about Chris Harrison, because he was doing an interview with Rachel Lindsay, who was the first black Bachelorette on extra, I believe, and she brought this up and he basically proceeded to defend this girl. And it was in a way of, and again, like, I think his original intention was basically to not speak for her. But in doing that, he said some really stupid things like well, 2018 was so long ago, I thought about race in such a different way and like, essentially defended, racist things. And then initially, his statement was like, after the interview was not the best. And then, a few days later, then he came back With like an actual apology, and is he stepping away as his role as a host for an undisclosed amount of time, it may only be for like the after the final rose episode, who really knows that no one actually really knows how long he will be stepping away from his role as host of the franchise. But like that’s an that’s an example where if he had just immediately been like, Oh, dude, I

fucked up. Hmm.

It might have gone over different. But like his first, the first statement that I saw him put out after the interview with Rachel Lindsay. I was like, I don’t think that’s a real apology. So

I feel like it’s some it’s like a self preservation instinct, because people really don’t want to admit to themselves that they might be wrong about something, right. Like, look, I’m a taurus. And an enneagram five. If there’s anyone more stubborn in the universe, I don’t know them. But sometimes, you have to admit when you’re wrong, right? Because you can’t be no one can be right 100% of the time, right. And you have to admit when you made people feel like shit, right. So it’s, it’s hard for everyone, but it’s something that that we need to work on. Right. I think it’s interesting. I was just looking at this article, where people, I think a lot of people think that when they apologize that everything will automatically go back to a normal, whatever, whatever relationship you have with the person will just go back to the way it was prior to whatever happened. Unfortunately, it doesn’t work that

way.

But it would this article said that one of the reasons why when we get offended, why we get angry, is that we’re part of being angry allows us to protect ourselves from being hurt again. super interesting.

Oh, boy,

there’s a stuff to unpack there.

Oh, yeah.

Because nobody wants to feel that pain.

Hey.

So you got to put up those walls to kind of box it in and protect yourself. So if you having trouble accepting an apology, that that could be one of the reasons because you don’t want to get hurt again? No. And you’re afraid of, of letting yourself feel your feelings, basically.

Yeah, and I think vulnerable. And I think it is hard to like as someone that might be in an apologizer role, to recognize that just because you’re issuing an apology, no matter how heartfelt and sincere it is, doesn’t mean that the person has to forgive you or accept your apology. Like, right, I

think it’s interesting. Actually, you can you can accept someone’s apology without agreement. Like, I accept your apology, but I don’t forgive you. kind of situation. Yeah, I have been trying to I’ve been teaching my kids out a little bit where they, they make each other mad or something. And I’m like, you guys have to apologize to each other. You don’t have to. You don’t have to, you know, take it you don’t have to forgive him for apologizing to you, but you need to apologize. Anyway.

So that brings up another interesting point that I’ve been trying to be more mindful of. Because I think our instinct when someone apologizes is to say, Oh, it’s okay. Mm hmm. And it might not actually be okay. And so what are you know, what are things that we can say instead, like, thank you for apologizing? If you actually do forgive them, like, I forgive you, or, you know, I appreciate I appreciate you apologizing and I’m gonna really think about what you said or whatever it might be. But just like off the cuff being like, Oh, it’s okay. It actually might not really not be okay. And, and that’s okay.

I think it’s a knee jerk reaction to basically apologize to the apologizer.

Mm hmm. Yeah.

If like you might feel like, you automatically need to accept it, and you don’t?

Mm hmm. Yeah, if

someone has truly wrong Do you? Like, if someone bumps into you at the grocery store, I think clearly didn’t mean to like, being an ass about it is probably not the best use of your time, right? But if someone has truly wronged you and really hurt you, Mm hmm. Like, there’s, you do not have to accept their apology, you do not have to forgive them you do not like your relationship does not have to go back the way it was before. And because i think that i think that oftentimes in manipulative and abusive relationships, like not just physical abuse, but emotional abuse, you’ll see that the abuser is often like, well, I apologized. Mm hmm. Like, what? Everything should be fine. And that’s not necessarily like that. That’s not necessarily a thing that should happen. Like just saying like, okay, yeah, it’s fine when everything’s gonna go back to normal. Well, I

think there’s a guilt factor involved where people make you feel bad for feeling bad. Yeah.

Michael is a really

yeah,

shitty cycle. Because people are like, you should just get over it like, well, I there’s reasons why that person might not be able to like abuser, obviously, it’s like a very extreme right,

is this example sample? But I mean, I think there are just like toxic relationships. Where Yeah, I have to just acknowledge, like, this is not a healthy person for me to have in my life for any given reason. And even if they recognize that they’ve not been a healthy person in your life, and what maybe how they treated you was wrong. Like, that still doesn’t mean that you have to have a relationship with them moving forward.

Yeah, I think we talked about in our friendship episode a little bit how, you know, friendships can change, and you can break up with a friend. And if, if something happened, where this kind of situation related to an apology means that you end up breaking up with a friend, then that is something that might need to happen. And it doesn’t mean that you have to be like ending on terrible terms with them. They could apologize, you could, you know, thank them for their apology, and,

you know, welcome that apology and still decide, you know, what, like, it’s fine. If we’re, you know, the same party and we, what are parties anymore? Who knows? If you’re at the same party, and you run into each other, you can make pleasantries, like, if but that they’re not somebody that you’re going to be texting every day anymore, or turning to for advice anymore like that your relationship might change, and it doesn’t mean that you’re going to harbor any hatred towards that person. It just means that your relationship has changed moving forward. And that’s okay.

Yeah.

There’s a there’s an interesting article, I can’t I came across. That said, it’s titled, if you use this one word, you will ruin your apology. And the word is if

Oh, interesting, and what context?

It says an apology that begins with the phrase I’m sorry if Oh,

could come I’m sorry, if you feel that way. Mm

hmm.

Yes. So it’s not a very long article, I’ll link to it but I think that that’s an interesting thing. to point out that like it’s a it sort of falls into that like not apology category of Well, I’m sorry if that hurt your feelings, or I’m sorry, if you misunderstood my meaning.

Yeah, I think if you’re expressing frustration or anger with the person then it’s not an if you feel that way. And the person should not be waffling about on an apology. Right. I think, I don’t know this, this article that I have, it’s on greatest and we’ll link to that one too. It talks about how basically, you can Like, you can kind of hope for people to be better. But like, all you can do is hope that everyone is like trying their best. But you can’t expect anyone to be perfect. So like, we’re gonna make mistakes that we will need to apologize for. And we have to be accepting of that. But also it goes the other way. So as a especially in thinking about in the context of, you know, in a marriage, where people automatically assume all the things that their spouse should be doing for them. Mm hmm. And I know that I’m guilty of this, especially certain things that my husband does, and I’m just like, why can’t he understand? Right? You need to close the shower curtain. Please close the bathroom door when you’re paying, though, I mean, those are tiny things, but it’s kind of the same thing. He is trying his best to navigate life. I am also trying my best to navigate life. And sometimes those things are at odds. Right. And that’s just the way humans are. Right?

I you know what, I think about this a lot too. Just in general, like we don’t know. We don’t always know what someone else’s trauma is. And so and even like, in our marriages, I think we’ve talked about this before, like, you don’t come into a marriage or any relationship at a blank slate, like you, you have a past before you met that person they have a past before they met you. And sometimes we forget to like take into account, things that happened before they met us, and how that might be impacting their actions or how they view the world and how they’re navigating the world. And all of those things like if your spouse or even a really good friend has certain, like, traumatic things that they experienced before you met them. Like that might not always be like the top of your own mind. But it’s totally impacting so much of how they are trying to navigate the world and just do their damn best. Absolutely.

So I want to I want to mention this one quote that’s in there too, ties into it really well. This woman, Amy doramas, a doctor of psychology, she says, If nothing else, let them know that they can. They can only count on you if you can count on them. And you might not be there to help them next time they need you. Then don’t talk about it anymore. Just do it. Save your time for people who respect it.

Oh,

yeah,

I want you to read that again. Because that was really good. I like that again to like sink it for it to sink in for people again. Okay, well,

actually, I’ll start I’ll I’ll have the context is processing like processing the apology and moving on. And I think I’ll include the, the paragraph ahead of that, okay, because that quotes really good too. She says, if it’s someone else’s problem, set your boundaries, thank them for the apology, and let them know what action you need from them. If they don’t do it and pose some consequences. If nothing else, let them know that they can only count on you if you can count on them. And you might not be there to help them next time they need you. Then don’t talk about it anymore. Just do it. Save your time for people who respect it.

I like want to like stand up and like applaud that right? Oh my god.

Please come to a my psychology psychologist.

motherfucking Mike. Oh, that’s fantastic.

Yeah, I think that’s it. Like just to say again, back to the the friendship episode. I think we we attach so much to the people that we know. And it’s totally fine to not be friends with everyone to not, you know, you can be friendly with people, but you don’t have to give up your life for people that aren’t giving that up for you. Yeah,

absolutely.

I think a lot of people will put a lot of stock into having a lot of friends. But what are you really getting out of every single one of those friendships like you might if you’re in fifth, there are some people who can have lots and lots and lots of friends and do really well. But are those people who have your back? Are they people who When they fuck up, they admit they fucked up. They apologize. Yeah, I know. I just, I just read that and I was like, Oh

my God. That’s amazing. Yeah, I feel like that’s what I feel like that’s a great place to leave this topic. Yeah, that was a good that was a good wrap up. Good job.

Can I print that out and put it on my mirror?

Put it on my mirror, put it next to my computer monitor. Put it Yeah. Oh, my back on my phone case put it everywhere. That’s fantastic.

I would also like to add to that I know we were gonna end but I’d also like to add respect your own time and apologize to yourself when you need to apologize to yourself. Oh, because sometimes we are really shitty to ourselves.

Wow. Oh, my goodness. That’s like a whole nother episode.

Yeah, I mean, we could just really dive in deep there. But shit. I will just getting really introspective on this Tuesday night. But har,

man.

Love yourself, man.

Love yourself. Oh, my goodness. Okay. Well, we will come back to that topic, because that’s that law. I think that actually like really is another episode in and of itself. But everyone can ponder on that. In the meantime, think about it. Think about it. All right, Megan, what is bringing you joy.

What’s bringing us joy?

So Reese is doing a project for art class. He has art this semester. And they are doing stop motion wishes the coolest. I’m so jealous. He also they get to do it on their phones and everything. They have a little app that they use. But he is almost done. He’s been doing his little setup in my office because I have like backdrops and stuff. And he has found a phone tripod among all my supplies that he’s been using. And it’s really fun. He is doing a really good job he’s doing like a is really fast and furious right now. Cuz he’s a 13 year old boy. Right, exactly. And so he did a little car scene. And everything’s like Lego cars. Because you have 10,000 Legos. We have Lego fire. So he made like the far like have fire come out the thing. And then like, we had some polyfill he used that for exhaust. And it’s like, it looks really cool. And I’m really proud of him. So I can’t wait to see the final version of it. And I kind of hope that that’s kind of the thing that he’ll be like, Oh, I really like doing that. I actually, like want to pursue something like that, because I’m starting to worry that he’s not interested in literally at all. But he seemed to have a lot of fun making this motion. So

that’s good. That’s I I’m excited to see it. There’s so much fun.

Yeah, it’s so are you gonna I’m gonna share it do some things for like, Hi, my it looks really cool. He has to make like 500 pictures though to make like a 32nd maybe not even 30 seconds like super short short video. Yeah. So it would take forever to make an actual like movie situation.

Oh my gosh, I can’t like I the people that do it for a living. I can’t imagine it’s bananas. It completely blows my mind. I am always impressed with this establishment stuff.

Right? Like we have attention to detail, but we do not have that attention.

But I also have ADD so attention part just goes out the window and I just can’t anymore. Right? But also, I mean if that was the thing I was gonna hyper focus on for a day then yes, I could probably crank out a stop motion video but it would have to be like it would have to align with my add of like that’s the thing I would have hyper focus on bless my heart but

also you would do it for like a day and then you’d be like that’s enough of that.

Right? Cuz again, you hyperfocus fine, that’s fine. Go sleep for a week now, huh? Pretty much.

So what is bringing you joy?

Well, so I actually I have two things. One is we can say what we want about 2020 but it was the year that I finally decided to just give up on wearing underwire bras. And this realization that I just sort of stopped caring about it just really has been bringing me joy lately and I ordered a couple more like non underwire bras from Soma this week. And I am just very grateful that companies Now are actually making like sports bras and bralettes or whatever the fuck they call them for bigger boobs that actually like, have some support but also don’t have underwire. So technology is great bras are getting better. It’s making me very happy. The second thing is today work. So folks were talking about stuff that they were going to grow this year and someone brought up this topic of lemon trees, which then someone else said that they used to have a variegated pink lemon tree that they just like kept in their house and I fell down the rabbit hole and long story short, I have ordered myself a variegated pink lemon tree, it will be delivered in April, there’s 100% chance that by the time it is delivered in April, I will have forgotten I even ordered it so it will be like Christmas morning when it arrives. But I am going to have a variegated pink lemon tree that I will attempt to keep alive.

This is very exciting.

It is very exciting. It’s so cute. I like it. Here it is. It’s so cute. And then the website that I found the one that I ordered on also had like kumquat trees I I did not order a kumquat tree, although it was extremely tempting. So we’re gonna try the pink lemon tree First, it might, it might actually have to live in the baby’s room because it gets the best light in the house. So during the cold months, it might have to live in Eden’s room. Which is totally normal to just like keep 11 tree, your child’s room

totally fine.

It’s totally fine. It can live. It could live outside in the wind, like during the summer. Yeah, but anyway, that is bringing me joy and I’m certain will bring me joy and April when it is finally delivered.

Every time we leave a house that we have by I leave the lemon tree behind. Oh, like granted, it’s only been two houses but on purpose or just know like they’re in the ground. Oh, like I’ve planted a lemon tree when I move into the house and I’m like, I’m gonna grow lemons. And then for however many years later, you move just when the tree starts to start producing, we sell the house and move away.

Oops. Well,

and now we can’t grow lemon shoes here.

You cannot grow them outside but apparently you could because apparently this like little pink lemon tree like it will produce fruit indoors. It’s not usually like very big fruit but it will produce fruit. I think it I think it does maybe produces bigger fruit if you put it outside during the summer. So I guess that you

live in a warmer climate probably

right. Yeah. So I guess that could be your lemon tree happy medium for.

I guess I’ll have to pick a new fruit. So I could grow raspberries here. Oh, so I could just plant I could just plant raspberry bushes all over the yard. And then by the time they’re ready to produce a lot of raspberries will sell the house and I’m sure that’s what’s gonna happen.

Man. Yeah. grow some raspberries or blackberries or both.

I think I’m gonna do actually raspberries and then Black raspberries. Yeah, I love black raspberries. And they’re so hard to get, huh?

Yeah. Oh my god. I want summer. I’m excited. So I was literally thinking yesterday, I was just so tired of winter food. I’m just really I’ve hit that point in the season. Oh, yeah. The novelty of comfort food has worn off and I just want like a big ass salad of full of produce from the farmers market. Mm hmm. And we’re a few months off from that yet. So it’s fine.

Like a lot of months off like some really good strawberries.

Yeah, yeah. We’re a lot of months off from that. So it’s fine. Everything is

fine. We will really appreciate it when summer comes. So that is the benefit of living in the Midwest.

So true.

You love that shit out of summer.

Is this true?

Well,

Next week’s episode

next week, we are going to be talking about divorce. That’s right. We’ve

talked about marriage. We’ve talked about relationships, but a part of some of those relationships is divorce and so we’re gonna be unpacking some of the stigma around that. Until then, be sure to leave us a review on Apple podcasts and listen to us on your favorite platform. You can also follow us on social media at irsipodcast or send us an email at idratherstayinpodcast@gmail.com we love to hear from our listeners. By

Transcribed by https://otter.ai