Even a newborn baby responds to love, kindness, gentleness and the generosity that flows from parent to child. A pure heart can recognize these virtues intuitively. But… to be able to consciously work on practicing them, it helps to know their names and understand their definitions. While raising our children, it is easy to fall into the habit of describing all of their positive behaviors using just a handful of names – that was good; that was nice; great job, etc. Generic positive words like this don’t help children discern exactly what it is that they are doing right or wrong. What they did made them feel good and made you happy, but how do they repeat it, or improve on it?
Developing our vocabulary of virtues helps us identify the specific behaviors that make us successful in life. “You put a lot of effort into that, you were really focused; I like the way you really empathized with that child, you seemed to really understand what he was feeling; your room is not only clean, but well organized so you can find things more easily.” This kind of specific feedback – that is focused on virtues, what they look like and the advantages of practicing them – will serve your children well for the rest of their lives.
Of course, to use the vocabulary of virtues in your praise of your children, you need to learn it yourself. Many of us, when asked to name a list of virtues, get stuck after about half a dozen (patient, kind, uh, generous? forgiving?).
That’s why we’re here! We have a list of over 600 virtues, and we will be sharing our thoughts on them through this blog, and with our products.