18 Oct 2018  |   05:36am IST

Being gracious

Arlette Azavedo

A gracious person is a charming person, someone who at least attempts to not hurt others' feelings with clumsy words or thoughtless deeds.

Do we ever find such people? Of course, gracious people very much exist fortunately, and probably you may be one of them who makes other’s life easier to live. Well, being gracious takes you far in life as often people don’t necessarily remember your mistakes or your triumphs but they remember your attitude. Consider the ways in which you can graciously serve others today. Remember that it isn’t the nature of the task that matters, rather, what matters is our attitude when doing it.

Often, we don’t have common courtesy towards others feeling as we don’t have the time or energy to extend ourselves to others with small gestures. Yet, when someone extends this kind of courtesy to us, we always feel touched, for example those who lend a helping hand when we are struggling with our groceries, makes an impression because many people just walk right by. Even someone who simply makes the effort to look at us in the eye, smile, and greet us properly when entering a room, stands out of the crowd. It seems these people carry with them the elegance and grace of another time, and we are always thankful for our contact with them. Common courtesy is a small gesture yet makes a big difference. It’s through these small actions; we make this world a better place in which to live.

I thoroughly believe that the world is too hard sometimes and you never know what to expect from life. The only thing that you can really depend on is, one another. So, small gestures of love during the difficult patches of life make a big difference as I for one have gone to a sad patch in my life when I lost my husband and if not for my family and friends I would have been totally finished, as I was extremely shattered. So it was my family and friends who had a truly profound impact on my life who were like a healing therapy, because of they being gracious and courteous towards me, my healing was a little lesser grief. Courteous gestures towards others leave a great impact which ideally in return it makes one happy. Therefore, if every person in the world did one small good deed for another person every day, then the world would be a better place to live in, isn’t? Yes, indeed when we are gracious towards others we tend to have a very strong sense of how people ought to be treated, and how to treat everyone with kindness, generosity and genuine interest in them.  

Perhaps, those who are rude and arrogant are despised in society nobody loves or respects them and thus they are left alone and helpless. Life without the feeling of love is hell therefore; let our hearts be filled with human kindness, so that this earthly planet may one day become an earthly paradise.

End with an apt quote by Sir Francis Bacon: “If a man be gracious and courteous to strangers, it shows he is a citizen of the world, and that his heart is no island cut off from other lands, but a continent that joins to them.”

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