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iQuestions Faculty, Dr. Gary Smalley 
 
 
Question: 
 
I have hurt my husband’s feeling so many times. How do I get him to 
open back up? 
 
Answer:  
  
So, you’ve hurt your husband’s feelings. You do it regularly. I mean, 
husbands hurt their wives’ feelings, parents hurt their friends’ feelings, 
friends hurt each other every day.  
 
Here’s what I’ve learned is the most effective way to restore a 
relationship, to regain an emotional connection: renew your friendship 
with somebody you’ve offended. I’ve done it, I’m sure, thousands of 
times with my kids throughout their lives, and with my own mate and 
friends.  
 
But I always go through a series of things, and I learned it years ago, 
and I encourage you to write these down and say them to yourself 
over and over and over again, even for several days, until they really 
make sense to you. Here’s what I do. I always humble myself when I 
know I’ve offended someone, and I humble myself in the sense of 
realizing, “Okay, I did this, and I understand I did it, and now I need 
to get into the process of repairing the damage that I’ve done.”  
 
So, I just humble myself, and in my own heart, I admit it.  
 
Then, number two, what I seek to do is understand what I’ve actually 
done. So, I go to my kids or my wife or my friends, and I say, “I see 
that I’ve really offended you. Tell me exactly what you’re feeling?” or, 
“What did I do? What specifically am I wrong at?”  
 
 
 
This is all part of humbling yourself. It’s not easy to do, but I can do it 
today so much easier because I’ve done it so many times. At first, it’s 
a little more awkward, it’s a little uncomfortable—I understand that—
but it repairs the damage. Sometimes that’s all you have to do, is 
humble yourself and seek to understand.  
 
When you understand, and you repeat it back to them, and say, “Oh, 
so when I broke that promise yesterday, you’ve been holding that 
inside of you, and that really made you feel like you’re not worth 
anything to me—and that really offended you, right?” Sometimes, 
that’s all people want.   
 
But when you move to the next one, when you admit, “Oh, you know 
what? I understand. That really makes sense to me. You’re way to 
valuable to me to treat like this, so I get it. I really admit this,” and 
this all can be done in seconds, to do all five of these things. 
 
But four, oh, that’s important. Four is action. Four is requiring a 
response from the other person. Four is, “Would you forgive me?”  
 
If you say, “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t be doing this,” then you don’t get a 
response from them. “I’m sorry” doesn’t really do it. You could say, 
“I’m sorry. Would you forgive me?” but you want to elicit some kind of 
response from them. And if they say, “I’m not ready to forgive you. 
You do this all the time. It’s not just that easy, like, ‘Oh, I’m sorry. 
Would you forgive me?’ No, it doesn’t work that way.” What I do with 
that point, number four, is I say, “If you’re not ready to forgive me 
right now, that makes sense because, you’re right, I have done this a 
lot of times. Hey, I want you to know, I would love to get your 
forgiveness one of these days, so whenever it comes, whenever you 
feel like doing it, I would appreciate you giving it to me.” 
 
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And then, number five, if they’ll let you, and they actually say, “Yes, I 
forgive you,” touch them. If you can hold them, gently, tenderly, and 
you just hold them—sometimes I’m in tears. Sometimes they’re in 
tears. When I offended my son when he was young, Greg, and I 
bawled him out and spanked him, which I should not have done in that 
circumstance he was in, and when I actually got on my knees and said 
to him how wrong Daddy had been to him today, “You’re way too 
valuable. Will you forgive me?” and when he saw that I was really 
understanding, then what he did was, he forgave me, and he just 
threw his arms around me. 
 
And so, when you touch people, after you’ve sought forgiveness, it 
seals the deal. That begins to restore the relationship with people, 
whether it’s your mate or your friend, and watch how powerful it is. 
 
 
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