Dodging asteroids and circumnavigating the solar system, I successfully completed my mission to Pluto and back with help from my co-pilot Jay. Our six year old imaginations took us across galaxies and throughout the small playground. Standing on the upper level of the colorful play structure, I was steering a wheel, navigating our spaceship through the depths of space, while Jay gave commands. Although Jay and I weren’t really friends; he was quite outspoken for a first grader and a real schoolyard bully. I thought playing with him would get me on his good side. We were just discussing improvements for our next mission when a girl approached me, asking to use the steering wheel I was using. I was going to let her, until Jay intervened and told her to get off the playground or else. Prone to peer pressure, I went along and said “yeah!” Little did I know, ____
Moments later, an yard duty wearing a bright orange vest walked towards us, told us to come down from the playground, and requested for our names and classroom. After a long lecture, which included something along the lines of treating others nicely, I teared up and apologized many times. Feeling as guilty and embarrassed as a six year old could, I returned back to the playground with no intent to continue playing. I thought that lecture from the yard duty would be the end of it, but after recess, the yard duty tattled to my teacher, Miss Mak, about the incident and my teacher yanked me out of class to have a talk. Tears stinging my eyes, I sniffled out a regretful “I’m sorry” when Miss Mak was done scolding me. For a child, when one person says, “I’m sorry” or “I won’t do it again,” the other usually says, “it’s okay” or “I forgive you” and all is well and done. However, in this particular instance, Miss Mak told me, “sorry doesn’t fix everything.” What do you mean sorry doesn’t fix everything, I thought. I’ll apologize to the girl from the playground and everything will be fine again. At the moment, I didn’t understand what my teacher meant and wanted to get out of the situation as fast as possible. I never gave it a second thought until Miss Mak said those words again later that year to another misbehaving student. The words, “sorry doesn’t fix everything,” echoed throughout my head as I began to really think about what apologies meant. Do I still need to apologize for my mistakes? Can I still fix my mistakes? Like many children, I grew up with the mentality that problems and mistakes were easily solved. My six-year-old self could not grasp the idea that saying sorry was not a solution. Only experience and time would change my mind.
In middle school, I loved to try cooking or baking new foods. However, I always left the kitchen in an absolute mess: sugar on the floor, chocolate coated whisks dripping on the counter, and unwashed bowls in the sink. Time after time, my mom would yell at me me, reminding me how making a mess is easy, but cleaning up is a lot harder. I couldn’t get away by just apologizing anymore so cleaned up my mess until the next cooking fiasco. I finally understood my teacher’s words. Apologies are simply acknowledgements of one’s misdeeds and just like any other words, they cannot affect past actions. For instance, a broken vase cannot return to its original state over an apology. Words cannot undo the hardship and suffering of the oppressed. We often make apologies with promises of change without the intention of following through with them because it requires far less effort to say something than to see your actions through. I’m not implying that apologizing should not be done; however, it is the first step in the healing process where we take caution in our actions and understand the heavy consequence of reversibility. More importantly, apologies should be associated with real promises: promises that guarantee change in actions, not just calls to action.
As I got older, experienced life, and made mistakes, the world became complicated. I learned that some actions, whether intentional or accidental, are irreversible. Whether you don’t let someone play on a playground, don’t throw your trash away, or are affiliated with a group that inflicts harm on others, the consequences of these actions may be irreversible. A crumpled sheet of paper will never fully return to normal. This idea can be viewed from multiple levels. On a personal level, verbal, physical, and psychological attacks can leave deep, long lasting trauma. Even from a global standpoint, decades of deforestation, air pollution, and extreme consumption of our earth’s natural resources without regard to our future is causing irreversible damage. As I learned, no amount of words or apologies can repair the world’s simplest or complicated problems. However, despite certain things being beyond repair, we should harness the power of actions rather than words to create change for the better.
Actions reflect more on your genuine beliefs because actions, although cliché, speak louder than words. Working towards not making the same mistakes and positively changing your actions is the most crucial step. For instance, after several baking disasters, I had to keep my workspace clean and be more careful while pouring out ingredients so I could be more considerate and tidy. We can expand this idea from events that directly affect you to larger world affairs. From an environmental perspective, we should be conscious about our carbon footprint and incorporate more eco-friendly actions into our daily lives. Knowing that the aftermath of wars and similar conflicts are detrimental to society and life, we should take a step back and be critical and attentive of our treatment of other groups to avoid repeating costly mistakes of the past. Mistakes are allowed, of course, but be mindful of your actions so you don’t fall down the same path after promising to change.
Sorry may not fix everything. Solutions may be complex. Some problems may not even have solutions. However, we can fix and control our attitude and actions. I may not have understood this in first grade, but now I see that our actions are more powerful than words. Change comes slowly, but powerfully in the end. Rather than apologizing with false words, let’s vow to carry out real change, even if it means going the extra mile. If we can take a step back from our lives and find ways to see the bigger picture of our actions, we change our lives, other’s lives, and the world for better.