Nine Ways to Be a Gentleman

A friend of the family lost his father a little while back, and I have been thinking about him ever since.

I worked with him at a summer camp, years ago now. He was up before anybody else was moving. He made breakfast, and by the time the rest of us came stumbling out he had already put in an hour. He was a gentleman. And, I don't think anybody who worked with him would argue about that.

But he was not the kind of gentleman the word usually conjures. There was no suit. There was no polish. Nothing about him you would call refined, and he would have laughed at you for trying. He was a man of God, a hard worker who served the people around him.

That is what got me started thinking. If he was a gentleman, and the men I think of when I hear that word are also gentlemen, then the word is carrying more than one thing at a time. So how many different types of gentlemen are there?

I sat down and researched it and found more than I was expecting. Nine archetypes of the modern gentleman, and I have known men in most of them.

These are not nine boxes you get sorted into. Most men I know are two or three of these at once, and the one you lead with changes depending on whether you are at work, at church, or standing in your driveway at seven in the morning. And each one has their caveats if they let the qualities get the best of them.

Here is the first one, and you can probably guess why it is first.

1. The "I'm Third" Gentleman

God first. Others second. Self third.

The man I just told you about never said that phrase to me once. He didn't have to. Nobody had to be told he was in charge, because he never spent a minute establishing it. He just did the next thing that needed doing, and after about two days you found yourself wanting to be more like him. He was the kind of man you didn't want to disappoint because if he asked you to do something you knew it was something he was willing to do himself. Help cook the camp breakfast, wipe down the tables, clean the toilets were not the most pleasant tasks but you knew you were bringing excellence because that was the standard he set for himself.

The model behind it is Jesus, obviously. The man with the most authority in the room picks up the towel and washes everyone's feet. That is not a small gesture and it is not a soft one either. It takes more spine to serve than it does to be served.

What it looks like on a Tuesday:

• Start the day with prayer or Scripture before you start on your own goals. Before the inbox. The order matters, because whatever you feed first is the thing that runs the day.
• Let somebody else go first. The better seat, the shorter line, the last piece. Small enough that it costs almost nothing, repeated often enough that it rewires you.
• Help a coworker finish something and don't tell anybody you did it.

One caveat, because I have watched good men run themselves into the ground with this one. Third does not mean you empty your tank to exhaustion. You need to take time to recharge so you are ready to go again.

2. The James Bond Gentleman

Composure under pressure. Dressed for the room. Says less than he knows.

This is the one everybody pictures first, and it is the one most often misread. People see the tuxedo and think the archetype is about clothes. Others see the women or the physical fighting. But that's not what we are addressing. The suit, like the rest of Bond's gear is government issue. The discipline part is that he does not come apart when the situation does.

Watch him in a scene where everything has gone sideways. Bond maintains his composure. Paul Kyriazi wrote in his book How to Live the James Bond Lifestyle

The personality consists of three energies (your persona): 1. The Body - Very dense energy. 2. The Mind - Mental energy. 3. The Feelings - Emotional energy. This idea of the three energies of your personality will get you into the state of mind to start perfecting your personality, raising it to the level of perfection that your individuality is, raising up your personality to be cool like 007.

Bond controls his persona. His voice does not go up. He does not talk faster. He asks one question, takes in the answer, and decides. That is a learnable skill and it has nothing to do with tailoring. Most of us have been in a situation that started falling apart, and you can feel people looking around for whoever is still calm. Be that.

What it looks like on a Tuesday:

• Dress for where you are actually going, one notch above what is required rather than three.
• In a tense meeting, slow down, name the problem plainly, and say what happens next.
• Hold the door, or offer a genuine compliment about somebody's work, and then let it go without fishing for a reaction.

The caveat here is one people often assume you are to be an emotionless robot. And that is not the case. You can have emotions. But it is about controlling your body, your thoughts and feelings when the situation calls for it.

So raising up the vibrational rate of energy is your only job, to go from Barney Fife to James Bond, if you will, from an emotionally out of control person to one that is in control. And do not think that gaining control of your feelings will make you an unfeeling robot. On the contrary, when you free up your emotions, you can feel what you want to feel, when you want to feel it.

3. The Gentleman Cowboy

Do the work. Keep your word. Say what you mean.

Tom Doniphon: "I know those law books mean a lot to you, but not out here. Out here a man settles his own problems." from The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance

If the Bond gentleman is judged by how he looks in the room, this one is judged by what is still standing after he leaves. He shows up early. He finishes the job the same way whether somebody is watching or not. When he says he will be there Saturday, he is there Saturday.

John Wayne's westerns are where most of us picked this up, and the best example is not the shootout. It is Tom Doniphon in The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, who does the hard, necessary thing and then lets another man take the credit for the rest of his life. That is the whole archetype in one scene. The work mattered. The billing did not.

I have never worked on a ranch, but I witness plenty of examples like this working in a paint store. You can tell they have been working hard, tired, dirty, but still respectful. I like this one because it cannot be faked. You cannot dress like a man who keeps his promises.

What it looks like on a Tuesday:

• Show up early and finish the unglamorous part of the job thoroughly, especially when nobody will ever check.
• Speak plainly, and treat a casual promise as a real one.
• Help a neighbor with something physical before he has to ask you.

The caveat is that self-reliance quietly turns into refusing help, and plain speech quietly turns into an excuse for being blunt with people. When that happens it begins to tarnish the character.

4. The Chivalric Gentleman

Courage, pointed at somebody else's problem.

This is the knight, and the useful part of him survived the armor. He notices when someone is being treated badly and he steps in while it is still happening, which is much rarer than people admit. I don't know any modern day knights but I am sure there are real examples.

Aragorn is the version I keep coming back to, because he is powerful and reluctant at the same time. He protects the smallest people in the party. He takes the job nobody else can carry. He never once makes it about how heroic he is being. That last part is what separates courage from a performance.

The everyday version is unglamorous. Following through on a commitment after it has become inconvenient is a form of courage. So is telling a friend the truth he does not want.

What it looks like on a Tuesday:

• Speak up calmly when somebody is being treated unfairly, in the moment rather than afterward.
• Keep the commitment that has gotten expensive since you made it.
• Walk somebody to their car. Offer the ride. Stay until they are actually inside and the door has closed.

The caveat is that protecting people can slide into deciding for them. Too many times I have seen this at family gatherings or other social interactions. If you step in and take the whole situation over, you have not defended somebody, you have replaced them. Quietly ask them what they want. Then help with that.

5. The Southern Gentleman

Hospitality as a discipline, not a decoration.

I live in Texas, so I have seen this one done extremely well and extremely badly, sometimes at the same table. Done well, it means nobody in the room is left standing alone. He learns your name and uses it. He notices the person nobody is talking to and goes over there. He hosts in a way that makes the guests comfortable instead of impressed.

My wife's favorite book is To Kill a Mockingbird and she agreed that Atticus Finch is the usual example, and he earns it, but not for the courtroom scene people quote. He earns it for how he speaks to everyone in Maycomb the same way, regardless of what they can do for him. That is the test of manners. Not how you treat the guest of honor, how you treat the person who cannot help you.

Measured speech belongs here too. The ability to not say the thing or bite your tongue is sometimes worth more than saying it.

What it looks like on a Tuesday:

• Greet people warmly and by name, and learn the name if you do not have it yet. (There is a great memorization technique to this I need to blog about.)
• Stand up when somebody comes in. Give up the better seat.
• When you host, ask what people need beforehand instead of guessing well.

The caveat is that politeness makes an excellent hiding place. Manners can be used to avoid saying the honest thing, and warmth that only extends to your own kind of people is not hospitality, it is a club. Dave Ramsey, financial radio show host said once, "To be unclear is to be unkind."

6. The Military Gentleman

Discipline in service of other people's plans.

This one is about being the fixed point. That person has to be on point or people might be injured or killed. Somebody has to be the man the others can build a schedule around. Angela's uncle was this man. He was a Viet Nam vet and helicopter pilot. People's lives were in his hands. He prepared more than he needed to. He owned the failure in public and sorted out the cause in private.

"The first duty of every Starfleet officer is to the truth, whether it's scientific truth or historical truth or personal truth!" - Season 5, Episode 19 of Star Trek: The Next Generation, titled "The First Duty".

In fiction, Captain Jean Luc Picard from Star Trek: The Next Generation is the clean example. I think people have actually done leadership studies based on this character. What makes him worth copying is not the uniform or the voice, it is the sequence. He asks what is actually known, listens to the person who knows it, decides, and then carries the consequence himself. He never once solves a problem by finding somebody to blame.

Making your bed first thing in the morning belongs in here. It is not about the bed. It is about being the sort of man who does the small ordered thing before anybody asks.

What it looks like on a Tuesday:

• Keep your own space in order so nobody else inherits your mess.
• When the team gets it wrong, say "that was mine" first and work out the details after.
• Over-prepare, so the people counting on you can plan around you instead of around your surprises.

The caveat is that discipline hardens. Order can turn into rigidity, and "mission first" can quietly mean the people doing the mission come somewhere further down the list.

7. The Scholarly Gentleman

Curiosity that makes other people more interesting to talk to.

Reading widely is only half of it, and it is the easy half. The part that makes it a gentlemanly trait is what you do with it: whether your learning shows up as generosity or as a scoreboard. My uncle was this man. He was knowledgable about archeology and geology. He wanted to connect you to the things that were happening around you.

Professor Henry Jones: "I suddenly remembered my Charlemagne. Let my armies be the rocks and the trees and the birds in the sky..." - Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade

In the movies, Professor Henry Jones Senior is the example, and he is a warning at the same time, which is why I like him for this. The man is genuinely learned and genuinely devoted, and his own son tells him to his face that he mattered less to his father than people who had been dead five hundred years.

Professor Henry Jones: "You left just as you were becoming interesting."

You can be impressive and absent at once. Knowing things is not the same as paying attention to the people in front of you.

So the test I use is simple. Do people understand more after interacting with them or me?

What it looks like on a Tuesday:

• Read something substantial, and pass on one useful piece of it to somebody who would actually want it.
• Listen all the way to the end before you answer, including the part where they repeat themselves.
• Introduce somebody to a book, an album, or an idea, then let them have their own opinion about it.

The caveat is that taste turns into hierarchy fast. The moment your reading becomes a way of sorting people into sophisticated and basic, you have stopped learning and started decorating.

8. The Everyday Gentleman

The one that actually holds everything up.

No costume, no reference character, no story about the war. He arrives when he said he would. He does the boring part of the job properly. He is the same man to the waiter as he is to the boss, which is the single fastest way to read somebody I know of. And when he is wrong he says so specifically, names the thing he did, and changes it.

This one was my father. He took out the trash, cleaned the kitchen, changed the light bulb. Why? Because it needed to be done.

If I had to keep one of the nine, it would be this one. Every other archetype is better with it and worthless without it.

What it looks like on a Tuesday:

• Be on time, and do the unglamorous part of the work as carefully as the visible part.
• Speak to service workers the way you speak to people who can do something for you.
• Apologize fast and specifically. "I interrupted you and dismissed your point" beats "sorry you felt that way."

The caveat is that the dependable man becomes everybody's shock absorber. Quiet reliability without limits does not make a saint, it makes a resentful man with a very good reputation.

9. The Modern Gentleman

Old standards, current room.

This is the one that adapts. He can move between a job site, a boardroom, a church potluck and a wedding without changing who he is, only how he does it. He asks instead of assuming. He puts the phone away and actually looks at you, which in the age we are living in is close to a radical act.

In television, Ted Lasso is the reference, and he is useful precisely because he is not perfect at it. He is warm, curious and genuinely interested in people, and he is also underqualified early on and inclined to solve things with kindness that needed competence instead. That combination is the lesson. Warmth is not a substitute for knowing your job.

The trick of this one is knowing what adapts and what does not.

What it looks like on a Tuesday:

• Ask the clarifying question instead of assuming you already know what they meant.
• Phone face down, out of reach, for the length of the conversation.
• Adjust your manners to the room without adjusting your standards to the room.

The caveat is shapeshifting. Adapting to everybody is how a gentleman ends up with no fixed shape at all.

Conclusion

All told, the nine archetypes of the modern gentleman have many overlaps. There might be more. But I think it's important to find elements of each that resonate and apply them to your life one at a time as you mature and grow.

“Anyone can be heroic from time to time, but a gentleman is something which you have to be all the time. Which isn’t easy.” - Luigi Pirandello, The Pleasure of Honesty (1917), trans. William Murray