Too little
Social performance
We must do everything together!
You promise a closeness you do not intend.
Sincerity
A truthful small welcome is enough.
Readiness to express one's actual convictions and intentions without pretense.
Sincerity expresses your actual convictions and intentions without pretense. Among neighbors, a greeting can be warm without promising friendship, and an offer can be modest without being cold. Sincerity does not make every feeling a public announcement or make a sincerely held prejudice admirable.
Sincerity gives goodwill a believable shape
You hear yourself say, “Come over absolutely any time!” Your expression is generous; your calendar has quietly fainted. What you meant was that you would be glad to say hello, and perhaps have tea one afternoon. Sincerity lets the invitation shrink to a size that can stand up.
Finding the balance in Sincerity
An illustrative everyday situation
A new neighbor asks whether you would like to get to know each other.
A fitting response
Truthful warmth
I would enjoy a short chat when we both have time.
The welcome fits the intention.
Pursued too far
Unfiltered confession
Here is everything I dislike about meeting people.
Candor about every feeling burdens an ordinary greeting.
A truthful invitation does not need to be a large invitation.
When the situation changes
You may prefer privacy or have no capacity for another arrangement. A considerate refusal can be sincere without explaining your private circumstances.
What Sincerity makes possible
Other people have a clearer sense of what you are actually offering. Sincerity reduces the gap between a sweeping welcome and repeated avoidance, although it cannot guarantee a welcome response.
Sincerity in ordinary life
The real offer
You offer to receive a parcel on one named afternoon rather than promising permanent availability.
The quiet preference
You say that you prefer a smaller gathering instead of inventing contempt for the larger one.
Nearby virtues, different work
Courtesy
Courtesy gives consideration a usable manner; sincerity keeps that manner from disguising a false intention.
Generosity
Generosity concerns what you freely give; sincerity makes the scope of the offer truthful.
Sincerity and its counterfeits
Counterfeit: Brutal authenticity
“That is just how I feel” does not excuse needless hurt or remove the need to examine a belief.
Counterfeit: Borrowed enthusiasm
A performance of delight can create an expectation you intend to evade. Warmth need not be extravagant.
How to cultivate Sincerity
Notice words such as always, anything and anytime in your offers.
Say what you can genuinely mean now.
Correct an overstatement promptly instead of maintaining a performance.
Try it today
In an ordinary greeting or invitation, choose one sentence you can mean without qualification. You do not need to disclose private feelings or initiate contact you do not want.
With neighbors
Offer the goodwill you mean, without promising closeness.
Questions worth returning to
What expectation would my words reasonably create?
Which part of my warmth is real, and which part is stage scenery?
Keep the practice proportionate
Sincerity is compatible with privacy and a refusal. Do not use authenticity as permission for insults or unwanted disclosure.
About these practices · DisclaimerQuotations and further reading
Seven selections to return to through the week. Follow a source link to read the surrounding passage.
Never was a sincere word utterly lost.
Ralph Waldo Emerson · Essays, First Series · English original, 1841 · IV, Spiritual Laws · excerpt
In Spiritual Laws, Emerson argues that character has effects beyond immediate recognition. State the invitation you actually mean, even if a larger promise would sound more impressive.
But the truth is one; it has first to be discovered, then justly and exactly uttered.
Truth of Intercourse treats truthful expression as work. Before offering unlimited availability, find the smaller promise you can honestly make.
Begin by prescribing to yourself some character and demeanor, such as you may preserve both alone and in company.
Epictetus asks for consistency between private and public conduct. An invitation should survive contact with the actual calendar.
Robert Martin’s manners have sense, sincerity, and good-humour to recommend them;
Knightley defends a neighbor whom Emma judges by social polish. Plain sincerity can matter more than an elaborate performance of welcome.
Use no hurtful deceit; think innocently and justly, and, if you speak, speak accordingly.
Benjamin Franklin · Autobiography · Part II, plan of moral perfection; Sincerity · excerpt
Franklin's Sincerity precept connects speech with just thought and rejects hurtful deceit; sincerity is not a license to wound.
I cannot boast of much success in acquiring the reality of this virtue, but I had a good deal with regard to the appearance of it.
Benjamin Franklin · Autobiography · Part II, plan of moral perfection; Humility discussion · excerpt
Franklin distinguishes the appearance of virtue from its reality, exposing the temptation to perform warmth rather than mean it.
He acts before he speaks, and afterwards speaks according to his actions.
Confucius · Analects · II.13; Confucius speaking · James Legge translation · excerpt
An intention grounded in action gives speech a firmer basis than a promise made for its social effect.
Continue exploring
Take these ideas into everyday life
Choose a catalog program in its fixed sequence, or create My Virtues with your own selection and order before starting. Reading and trying the exercises never requires an account.