There's a time and a place for a good, well-thought-out apology. Sometimes the things we do hurt people and if that's the case, apologize away. If you've cheated on your girlfriend, or ruined your best friend's shirt, or opened a door too quickly and hit the man walking with his carry-out tray of hot coffees, causing a slur of curse words to come out of his mouth as well as a massive spill on the ground, then by all means admit your mistakes and grovel at these people's feet in hopes that they'll forgive you. (Just watch out for the coffee you just spilled, yikes.)

These clear-cut situations aren't what I want to talk about, though. Recently, more than ever, I've noticed that a lot of people feel the need to apologize before they do anything, myself included.
"I'm sorry, but my paper really sucks."
"I'm sorry, I just really don't want to go out."
"I'm sorry, I'm not interested."

I think part of it comes from a fear of being impolite, but there's a point where instead of apologizing for something that you've done, you begin apologizing for who you are. Saying "sorry" is so ingrained into my nature that I've often apologized when someone has accidentally stepped on my foot, or ran into me. In those situations, I'm literally apologizing for existing. I'm saying "Hey, I don't actually matter, I'm sorry for standing where you were walking." and that's pretty fucked up.

I guess the point I'm trying to make is that you matter. If you wrote a paper, and it's basically trash, but that's the only thing you could produce at that moment, please do not apologize. If you need to take care of yourself by eating pizza and watching netflix by yourself instead of going out, my god, do not apologize for that. If the same dude has asked you out 50 times, do not apologize for rejecting him, You are aloud to exist, and make choices, and have opinions. Post seven selfies a day, and don't say you're sorry in any of the captions (I see you people, and your first selfie is awesome as your seventh and I'm glad you feel beautiful enough to post them). Don't start off any sentence with "I'm sorry, but...". Just speak. Be unapologetically you in everything that you do.

All that said, I'd like to take back some apologies I've made in the past.

I'm not sorry for taking up a lot of space.
I'm not sorry for being a feminist.
I'm not sorry for giving my opinions in class.
I'm not sorry for getting angry when someone has done me wrong.
I'm not sorry I said "no".


Okay, so there's my thoughts for the day. Hope it was worth the read.