Question & Answer With Anonymous - Asking Forgiveness Before Yom Kippur

A Simple Jew asks:

Have you ever had the occasion before Yom Kippur to overcome your natural inhibitions and ask forgiveness from a person you had wronged? Have you ever had the occasion to grant forgiveness to a person you felt had significantly wronged you?

Anonymous answers:

Regarding the first issue of overcoming "natural inhibitions" and asking forgiveness, I will admit something that until now only my wife knows. Since I've been married (B"H over 11 years) I have kept a list of every major argument, disagreement, misunderstanding, and general compromise in our Shalom Bayis that we have on a monthly basis. I try to find common detonators (usually it's me speaking before actually thinking) in an attempt to avoid such problems in the future. Every year before Yom Kippur I bring my list to my wife.

Now, I don't go through every issue, but I try to bring up the big ones that came up during the past year and ask her for me'chilah. This processes sometimes makes us laugh about silly arguments, but it sometimes rehashes some memories that we had tried forget about. You wrote at the end of your first question the words "you had wronged". There is much wisdom in such phrasing. It's very easy to say, "I'm sorry", but much harder to actually admit that "I am wrong".

In regards to your second question about forgiving someone else...boy I wish that was the case. I can think of two specific times in my life when I have been "significantly wronged". For a long time I felt that I was entitled to both an apology and the opportunity to forgive those involved. As time has gone on, I have come the realization that it was really arrogance and ultimately a tactic of the Yetzer Hora that made me think that I needed an apology. I'm not discrediting the personal value and the Halachic obligation of asking forgiveness to someone, but I think that there is a difference between wanting an apology and needing an apology.