I had an interaction this past weekend that I can’t get off my mind. Not necessarily for the interaction itself, but for the long reaching effects of the attitude involved.
I was sent by an umpire to address a mouthy group of fans at a softball game. They were from the opposing team. As you might imagine, it was a heated situation, but what I encountered blew my mind. As I approached the group of 10, a couple of them turned around to address me, one calmly, the other, not so calmly. The two gentlemen had a few things in common, including gender, team of choice, and age (they were watching a granddaughter play). What was dramatically different was their response.
One of the gentlemen calmly explained the situation to me. He took responsibility, said they shouldn’t have said what they said, apologized, and said they would do better. He even said, “we drove a long way to be here, we definitely don’t want to get kicked out.” I said well sir, I definitely don’t want to kick you out, I want you to enjoy watching your granddaughter, but we do need to be careful with our words. That was the end of the interaction with him.
The second was all together another story. He was hostile, unreasonable, but even more sadly, unwilling to take responsibility. Upon approach, he began to tell me how disrespectful my student section was and how embarrassed I should be that they were giving my school such a bad reputation. According to him, he has been through 15 years of travel ball and “never seen anything like it.” I’m not saying they were angels and behaving perfectly by any means, they definitely were not, but that isn’t what made me sad. What made me sad was his unwillingness to take responsibility and his commitment to blaming his behavior on 20 year olds.
I have seen a pattern of this lately, we have lost our ability to take responsibility, and immediately go on the defensive when approached about our behavior. It’s as if we think if we are not 100% perfect all the time we are somehow flawed. Friends, we are human, we are going to make mistakes. It’s not just expected, it’s guaranteed.It’s also 100% okay. Just own it, take responsibility and move on. It only defines you if you allow it to. Be the first guy in the story above, there’s much more grace in that response. Much love and grace through mistakes sweet friends.
