Guidelines: Some Rules of Conduct

Sometimes those who pass on to whatever is to come, leave behind wise words of guidance. I remember one such remarkable woman. Ethel lived into her nineties and left behind a “Rules of Conduct” in her notebooks. Her daughters discovered them, written in her own handwriting.

The question is whether the rules were generated by Ethel, or perhaps passed along from her mother, or another family member. It really doesn’t matter, because Ethel truly made the rules her own; she persistently sought over the years to live by them.

I offer them to you, with the family’s permission. If nothing else, these rules bespeak an earlier time, a more civilized and polite period of American history, a time of gentlemen and gentlewomen. In our anything goes culture, crude and lewd, the following represent manners we need to cultivate or re-cultivate. Here are Ethel’s personal “Rules of Conduct”:

“1. On the street avoid being conspicuous in dress, voice or manners.

2. On entering your home hold open the door for your guest.

3. Thank anyone who performs a service for you.

4. Control your voice that it may be pleasing, gentle and deferential.

5. Avoid contradicting another. Listen politely to her opinion even if you do not agree with it.

6. Cultivate dignity, grace, and self-control in posture and bearing.

7. Be a good listener.

8. Use the name of the person with whom you are talking deferentially.

9. Avoid interrupting anyone. When interruption is unavoidable, ask pardon always.

10. Do not fail to say “thank you” to another for any act of service, or “I beg your pardon” for any act of rudeness you may have wittingly or unwittingly committed.

11. Do not resent correction or reproof. Accept it with courteous appreciation of another’s wish to help you, and profit by it.

12. When you have visitors, express to them in acts of gracious service, a genial spirit and true hospitality.

13. Do not work “Just because you have to work” – that other people may be happier because your work. Work to make your life complete.

14. Ability is made up of strength, intelligence, pure-thinking, clean-living, ambition, determination, perseverance and energy. Cultivate your abilities.

15. Your vision of life must be large and generous, with a splendid carelessness about the little things that do not count.

16. Do not wait for your happiness until others hand it to you on a silver platter.

17. Whoever you are, be noble; whatever you do, do well; whenever you speak, speak kindly; give joy wherever you dwell.”

Of the rules, what strikes me the most is the phrase “splendid carelessness.” We tend to take everything so seriously, get upset or riled about that which in the end does not really matter. Imagine cultivating a splendid carelessness about the little things that do not count, which, of course, are most things.

In hindsight, whenever I visited Ethel, she seemed to be living by these rules. She was one of the persons that I always felt better having seen. She would quickly become fully present to me, listen carefully, comment just as carefully, and say my name deferentially. She made me feel important, that my thoughts mattered.

Living by these rules of conduct might give you a sense of connection to your ancestors, who just might be rooting for you from the other side.