One of the things that sets Chick-Fil-A apart is the way they take your order. Employees never (rarely) say “you’re welcome.” When they take your order, and whenever they help you, employees are trained to say “my pleasure.” And sometimes you suspect they mean it. And, honestly, it warms the heart. Even cynical people look forward to hearing that with their Chick-Fil-A sandwich. It makes some people pick that chicken sandwich over others.
The employees at Chick-Fil-A are typically altogether charming and everyone kind of loves it. In contrast to the world inside of a Chick-Fil-A, in the outside world, I recently heard someone called out for not being charming retort that he is charming, “only when I want to be!” This raises a question: why would you not want to be charming all the time? We know how it makes us feel when people are pleasant and we see how others light up when we are pleasant, but we often opt out. Why?
One mistaken reason for choosing not to be charming is the belief that it is fake. Easy exchanges, pleasant words, small smiles, and general courtesy are not a sign of falseness. The harsh truths of the world do not require that we scowl at strangers or speak curtly with acquaintances. What about expressing “how we really feel?” Outward expression of our emotions is not a requirement for having an authentic experience of feelings. Charm is only fake when it is employed to get something, what we might suspect is behind the “when I want to be!” approach.
Being charming is an act of kindness. When someone is polite and pleasant and lightly interested in our existence, it is a respite from the cold corners of the world. When someone is courteous, life is easier. When we are courteous and kind, we make life easier for others. We sometimes mistakenly think that being charming is just about appearance of manners. A big part of being perceived as charming is being generally agreeable. The world is disagreeable enough, it does not need any assistance.
We have real and fictional examples of this agreeableness. We can think of Cary Grant in almost any movie. Yes, he is attractive, but he also opens doors and lifts his hat to people and assists with anything and tells a decent joke and can take a joke and shakes hands well and knows how to serve a good cocktail. A charming person is easy to get along with, not just easy to look at. Jerry Seinfeld is considered very charming and in his show Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee, he shares that he achieves this by generally agreeing with people, especially his wife. He tries to avoid argument and disagreement as much as he can. He would rather get along. The result is not winning a lot of arguments, but it makes him very winning. This may seem like weakness, but it may well be deep wisdom.
Some people choose not to be charming because it is “too much work.” That can be indicative of a problem, because in some ways being charming is a sign of character. When someone is not charming, they tend to be impolite, rude, dismissive, self-centered, unhelpful, uninterested and uninteresting, sometimes angry and argumentative. Many of these traits are sign of a self which is not under control. If the post office will send you into an angry outburst, if a “stolen” parking space can send you into a downward spiral which makes it impossible to smile for the rest of the day, if your sense of justice is best fulfilled by letting a door slam rather than holding it open for someone else—you lack mental equanimity. You are not letting the world “have it,” you are showing us that you have no control over yourself.
Far from being servile, being charming can be a sign of confidence. When we are afraid, we act self-interestedly. We withhold—affection, attention, eye contact, courtesies, kindnesses. We get too big or too small. One of the most charming things anyone can do is to be interested in others. When we are charming, we extend ourselves, not fearing slights or suspecting ill will. No wonder charm is said to be “disarming.”
There is a time and a place for everything, but there are few times that truly require rudeness. Even in challenging circumstances, we can be men and women of good cheer. This is one of the lessons of A Christmas Carol. Ebenezer Scrooge has a challenging backstory, but that’s not just cause for his economic and relational stinginess. Scrooge realizes that despite his hard times, he has no good reason not to be the kind of man Mr. Fezziwig was and Bob Cratchit is.
Ebenezer Scrooge also brings us to another reason for being charming, you are not just more pleasant for others, your life becomes more pleasant overall. At the end of the story, Scrooge is embraced by friends and family, who warm to him and welcome him. He laughs with people. He enjoys himself. Why? How? It’s not just because he has become more generous, though he has. He has become a more charming version of himself, because he is determined to behave as humanely as possible. Doing that honors the human dignity of others and it creates the space to enjoy warm, human fellowship even on cold winter days. It is a pleasure for all involved.
Well, to answer the question, because it sounds a bit unrealistic. Even Jesus could get slightly snippy at times (with his mother at the wedding, with a gentile woman, with a fig tree, with Peter). I’m not assuming those events are meant to be normative, but they do show that Jesus was “truly man,” as Chalcedon puts it. We also have evidence from Paul (“be angry”) and James (“be slow to anger”) that, while bounded and encrusted with warnings, anger is one of the emotions that Christians are allowed to experience. The Bible takes a very realistic approach to human nature, one that doesn’t quite align at every moment with the professional courtesies employees are expected to show or the qualities exhibited by actors playing roles in fictive narratives. I strive to avoid rudeness and self-absorption, but I can imagine that for many people less fortunate or privileged than myself an expectation of “being charming all the time” would add to their suffering.