Being Gracious...

Some days, like today, I wonder if there's been an erosion of overall good manners. And judging from reading a certain Seattlite's blog post from yesterday, I think I may not be the only one. The first thing I wonder is if technology has contributed to this erosion at all.

Cell phones and the internet come to mind right away when thinking of technology. I happen to think that too many people have bad cell phone manners. I put Brad at the top of this ill mannered list. But if I started to complain about the lack of cell phone manners and internet etiquette, I could fill a whole post about Brad's behavior alone!

So I'd rather talk about the flip side to bad manners and to me the ultimate in good manners is being gracious. Most of us probably simply think of good manners as saying please and thank you and those kinds of things...and you say these things because they're expected. But being gracious is, in my view, more than acting as you should, it's a way of life. What is it to be gracious?

Well the dictionary says the following regarding the word gracious:

1. Characterized by kindness and warm courtesy.
2. Characterized by tact and propriety: responded to the insult with gracious humor.
3. Of a merciful or compassionate nature.
4. Characterized by charm or beauty; graceful.
5. Characterized by elegance and good taste: gracious living.

So gracious people naturally practice good manners because it's part of their nature. Gracious people exude a warmth and kindness that affects all their behavior including their manners. And in my own experience, you can tell the difference between the folks that are polite because they think it's expected and those that are polite because they just are. Gracious people just are. Gracious people are the sorts of people that we like to be around. Hopefully, we've all been fortunate enough to have gracious people in our lives.

I know that I'm lucky to have as many gracious friends that I do, and I include many of my internet friends in that group. My friends, Sarah and Chad, are two of the most gracious people I've ever known. Although I've yet to meet my Seattlite internet friend, I have to say she's been nothing but warm and kind to me, and therefore, gracious. And I'd like to think that my own sons are well on their way to being gracious men. They both certainly have good manners, and maturity will determine if they take the next step to graciousness.

And recently I've been fortunate to witness public graciousness in action by another internet friend. She recently had to endure, in my opinion anyway, some inappropriate public criticism which ultimately was just downright rude behavior on the part of the commenters. How did she deal with this situation? Well many people would probably think that she would have been justified in lashing back at these people. I really don't think that anyone would or could have faulted her for responding in kind, but she did something else instead. She let her gracious nature take over. And although her feelings were probably hurt to some degree, she responded graciously. She actually thanked them for their comments and responded with both tact and propriety, and even humor. So when people say that adversity builds character, I would add that adversity also reveals character. And I think that my friend's true character was revealed in how she chose to respond. She's an extremely gracious individual, and I'm glad to count her among my friends.

So upon further reflection, I think I'm wrong about technology being responsible for bad manners. I think that technology perhaps just emphasizes the bad behavior of people with shakey manners to begin with like Brad. I've seen him display good manners on numerous occasions, but I've also seen him display bad manners like rudely interrupting a conversation and meal at a restaurant to engage in a non-urgent and/or unimportant cell phone call while those at the table eat.

So it's the people not the technology. But I still stick to my belief that there's been an erosion of good behavior and manners. I don't know what the solution is though...other than parents need to do a better job. But what if the parents have bad manners? Aye, that's the rub.

I've tried my best to ensure that my own boys have naturally good manners, and I think that I have been successful judging from the compliments about their behavior that I've received over the years. So I guess to stem the tide of bad manners, we each must try to affect and infect our own corner of the universe with graciousness. And really isn't that true about most things? All we can do is try our best and hope that it spreads to others by example.