WHAT IS CHARACTER?
Classically, our character is the sum of all of our virtues and strengths. There are many human virtues such as: Judgment, Honesty, Courage, Persistence, Self-control, Loyalty, Compassion, Gratitude, Humility, Justice, and Patience. The key to using our virtues to be an excellent person is to avoid either excess or deficiency, but to be moderate in all things. Allowing ourselves to become too "extreme" in either direction (to have too much or too little of an otherwise valuable quality or attribute of character) might cause us to do the wrong thing and develop vices. For example; if we have too much confidence and not enough fear, we may act in a foolhardy manner and put ourselves and others in danger. Fearlessness and overconfidence are not true courage. If we have a deficit of courage (too much fear and not enough confidence), we will be cowardly. So we need to work on all of our virtues, and strive for the more moderate middle, or mean, in order to make good decisions. The other key to good character is practicing our virtues over and over until they become habits that we don't have to think about - we just naturally act in a moderate, virtuous way.
