The word virtue suggests something strong, but also difficult. Virtue is a good habit that makes you good. It also makes your life easier, because, just like any habit, as you grow in it, you do it more easily, almost unconsciously. Contrary to the modern view, something doesn’t have to be difficult for it to be moral. Indeed, the more virtuous you are, the easier it is to act virtuously.
Virtues don’t just make life easier for you. They also make you happier and healthier. The ancients taught this, and modern psychological science is proving it. Each virtue is like a superpower habit, that anyone can acquire, through daily practice, and that makes life easier, happier, healthier, and more effective. I call them “superhabits.”
Growing In Virtue
You can grow in any superhabit/virtue just like you would develop any habit, by practicing small steps each day. We tend to label ourselves and others by saying things like “he’s very fearful,” or “she’s disorganized,” or “they’re not very creative,” as if these things were immutable characteristics. This is a false view of things, because anyone can cultivate any virtue, through practice. If you tend to be ruled by your fears it’s because you lack the virtue of courage. Through practicing small, daily steps, you can grow in the virtue, the superhabit, of courage. You will still feel fear, but that fear will have less of a grip on you. If you tend to be disorganized, you can grow the superhabit of orderliness, through daily practice. If you think you’re not very creative, you can grow in the virtue of creativity. Anyone can grow in any virtue, through daily practice.
St. Thomas Aquinas provides a comprehensive system to organize all the virtues. He offers us what I call the Anatomy of Virtue, showing how every aspect of life has its own particular virtue. So whatever problem you face, there’s a virtue to help you address it.
His system divides up the virtues as follows. For our spiritual life, there are the theological virtues of faith, hope, and charity. For the intellectual life, there are the intellectual virtues of wisdom, science and understanding. For everything else, for our everyday practical lives, there are the cardinal virtues, which cover our thoughts, actions, and feelings.
Prudence, or practical wisdom, is the superhabit for making wise decisions, and manages our thoughts, particularly our decision-making. Justice is the superhabit of treating others fairly and with respect, and manages our actions — specifically our interactions with others.
The Cardinal Virtues
There are two cardinal virtues for dealing with our feelings. Temperance, or self discipline, manages feelings that attract us towards things, our desires, and is the superhabit for following our desires only when it makes sense to do so. Fortitude, or courage, manages the feelings that repel us from things, our fears, and is the superhabit for moving forward even though we might be afraid.
According to Aquinas, each of the four cardinal virtues has several other allied virtues that pivot around it (the word cardinal comes from the Latin cardo, which means pivot or hinge). For example, self-discipline has the virtues of restraint, humility, and diligence allied to it, among others. These three virtues in particular address desires to do trivial things, to do great things, and to know things, respectively.
The key to growing in virtue is first to identify which specific virtue you struggle with most right now, which will be the one which will give you the biggest improvement in your life at this point. For example, if you struggle with wasting time due to easily giving in to distractions and temptations, then the virtue of restraint is the one you should be working on. It is the superhabit of only giving in to impulses when it makes sense to do so.
Not A Matter Of Willpower
It is not a matter of using willpower to restrain yourself. You don’t grow in the virtue of restraint by clenching your teeth and bearing down against any impulse that comes to you. What you should do, and psychological research confirms this, is to try to distract yourself and redirect the impluse towards something more productive.
You should also pray for the grace to grow in that particular virtue. The philosopher John of St. Thomas provides a helpful analogy about the role of grace in building virtue. He says growing in virtue is like rowing a boat. The more you row, the stronger you get, and the boat moves forward, faster, and more surely. When grace enters in, it’s as if you hoisted a sail. The boat moves faster, still in the same direction, but now you’re putting in less effort. It’s the Holy Spirit that is moving now, you not just your own efforts. That’s the role of grace in any particular virtue.
So if ever you’re doing something and you wonder, “Wow, that was so much better than I normally do; I was exceptionally courageous,” for example, or exceptionally wise — that’s the Holy Spirit giving you the grace for that particular virtue.
Superhabits: The Universal System for a Successful Life
Image: Photo by Emma Simpson on Unsplash
