What is an "I'm sorry" worth?

        I was going to say, I'm sorry, I'm using the dictionary again, but I won't. I'm not sorry because I really don't have every definition of all English words memorized. And I shouldn't be sorry for wanting to be accurate.
     Wow. Webster's defines sorry as:
             1.  Full of sorrow, pity and sympathy.
             2.  Also used in apologizing or in showing mild regret.
      Could they be any further apart? Now I have to look up apology.

               Apology:
                  1. A formal spoken or written defense of some idea, doctrine etc.
                  2. An acknowledgement of some fault, wrong, etc. with and expression of
                      regret.

    I am one of those people who was raised to be polite. That meant saying, please and thank you. Holding doors for people behind you, and of course, saying "I'm sorry" if I had made an error of some sort.

    Also, being raised to believe that everything was my fault, and that I was responsible for it all, I became a chronic apologizer. Until , well, recently.

    It came to my attention that I said "I'm sorry", frequently, but then continued to do the things I was sorry for, repeatedly. Or I would say I was sorry for something over which I had no control.
        
            "I'm sorry you didn't get your package in the mail today"
            "I'm sorry the restaurant is so crowded, noisy, lousy, closed etc."  (only if I chose it)
             To customer service. "I'm sorry I'm yelling at you because I'm angry that I didn't get my
             delivery and I'm not angry at you, so please don't take it personally."

    I'm sure you get the picture. I had a friend, years ago who told me that he was so used to apologizing, that he could walk into a dark room, walk into a chair and apologize to the chair for bumping it.
    
        So. What is it worth when we say we're sorry?  According to me, not much. I've learned that if I did actually have control over what I did, and there are times I do, that saying I'm sorry doesn't cut it.
       What I need to do is change the behavior. Then, I won't need to say I'm sorry and the other person/persons won't feel I'm lying. Which I'm not, at least, not when I say it.
      
        Why do people apologize? Theory. We've been taught to be polite. We don't want to hurt someone's feelings. (read that as we don't want someone not to like us).  We don't want to get hit, yelled at, blamed etc.
     I suppose in some way it's a self-defense move that will hopefully keep the "other" from either thinking, or doing bad, back to us. So, it is really a very selfish thing to do. 

        A couple of days ago my husband quoted Egret, a character from the Game of Thrones series. The girl who loved John Snow. She said and this isn't exact, "Words. All words are is air".

        So an apology without change, is just air. We do it so often that it has lost any meaning.
I know a few people who never say they are sorry. If an "I'm sorry" came from one of them, It would be an  honor to hear it. 
         But I won't hold my breath because they don't say it for a reason.

        As for the rest of us, myself included,  we say it way too often. Really, it's become an excuse for behaving badly; expressing feeling bad for someone else, even if you had nothing to do with it, even it you mean it, is just air.  Expressing that you're sorry for doing something to someone else, even if you mean it, is also just air. Try behaving better. That's the real apology.

        And so, I have decided that I will no longer apologize to anyone for anything. I'm sorry.