Social Healing

This isn’t some profound essay about running a marathon or overcoming my greatest fear. No, it’s about doing something for the first time that I should’ve done a long while ago: mustering up the courage to take accountability and apologize for my greatest mistake. “How hard could it possibly be to just say sorry?”, you may be asking yourself right now, but there’s so much more to it than that. What I had at stake was the preservation of the greatest friendship I’ve ever had and for the longest time, that was something my mind couldn’t grasp.

The first grade was when my best friend and I met. We'd connected over shared interests in bands, books, and movies. Throughout the following years, we would do everything together– have sleepovers, play online games, and…share secrets. I was one of the only people in my friend’s life that knew some of the most intimate details of his existence and I took that for granted. About a year ago now, during the first week of school, as my friend and I sat in our school’s cafeteria, I made a joke at his expense, accidentally exposing a rather embarrassing piece of information about him. In an instant, I had shattered my friend’s faith in me. Unsurprisingly, he got really angry, but I was blinded by my overinflated ego. “It’s not that serious,” I said, not wanting to admit my wrongdoing. “If you’re willing to tell me your secret, then surely you’d have told others as well; surely it would’ve gotten out at some point”. Deep down, I knew what I had done was terrible, but I thought admitting my blunder would make me look like a bumbling idiot. Things continued to go south from there. We exchanged some bitter words, I continued to blame him, and we ultimately went our separate ways.

I thought the whole incident had been left behind me, and didn’t think much of it until two Mondays ago when I was prompted to go out over the weekend and try something new for an upcoming assignment. I sat pondering this task, my mind racing with countless ideas. For days, I struggled to come up with a realistic goal. Friday approached and I had nothing. The thought of writing an “adventure essay” without an adventure to talk about ate away at me like a parasite, leeching off all my positive thoughts and replacing them with reminders of a seemingly impossible mission. In a fortunate twist of fate, as I was doom scrolling through instagram for the thousandth time that week, I accidentally opened the photos app, and was greeted with a flashback photo of myself and my ex-best friend at the town fair, sitting on a bench and smiling. Seeing that image finally got me to reflect, and everything clicked into place. The one thing I’ve never done in my life is say the word “sorry” and truly mean it. In all honesty, burning bridges with my greatest pal broke me, and looking back on the whole ordeal, I used to be a jerk. I finally had the chance to right my wrong, but the only question now was how.

I knew that I had to go in with a plan, so I started my approach by researching the psychology of trust and betrayal. To understand the depth of what I had done, I needed to figure out just how damaging my actions were. I read countless articles and watched more videos than I’d like to admit, and I learned one key thing: trust is built over time through consistent positive interaction, but betrayal, especially when it involves personal secrets, can shatter that trust in an instant. When it comes to rebuilding trust, a common thread is the importance of sincere apology and the willingness to make amends.

Armed with this new-found knowledge, I made quick work of trying to get a hold of my friend. I removed his number from my blocklist. I sent him three texts and four calls that Saturday. No answer. “Maybe he’s busy; I’ll come back later,” I said to myself. Sunday rolled around. One more text and five more calls. No answer. You may be expecting to hear me say that I persevered and kept trying, but no, I gave up. It really was over. My hopes of trying to get back into contact with my oldest friend were ready to be put to bed, and so was I. As my eyes closed that night and I began drifting off to dreamland, my peaceful rest was disturbed by the buzzing of my phone. I forced my eyes open and glanced over at my nightstand and there I saw it! In bolded white text was my friend’s contact name and the “slide to pick up” indicator. I shot up out of bed and picked up the phone. We got to talking, and I apologized for everything I said and did that fateful September day. I made a promise to him to think before I say and be more responsible when it comes to what we share about each other. Three hours were spent catching up and rekindling the flame that was our friendship and in the end, we made a pact to keep moving forward. We have plans to meet up next weekend and bond over some video games. We’re taking small steps, but at least they’re in the right direction.

I now know that I have to make a more conscious effort when it comes to being a better friend. Rebuilding the trust of the one closest to me will take time, but I’m dedicated to forging a new bond, one that’s stronger than ever before. Trust is a valuable thing, I can truly grasp that now. It’s through trust that we fully find ourselves and the ability to build deeper, more meaningful connections. Shattering that trust can have undesirable consequences of unimaginable proportions.