The story of Hercules began with a choice.

Socrates tells us that the young Hercules was contemplating his future when two women visited him. Each represented a different path for his life. And each tried to convince him their way was best.

Kakia was the goddess of vice and immorality. She is depicted as plump and overly made up. She tried to tempt many men into a life of ease and hedonism.

Aretè was the goddess of excellence and virtue. She had a simple beauty shaped by hard work. The life she offered also had glorious rewards, but it came at a substantial cost. He would have to work and suffer for it.

It was later revealed that Arete was actually his stepmother, Hera. She is the one who seemingly tortured him throughout his life, and he hated her for it. That hardship, though, is what earned him his place among the gods.

In order to live with Arete, we must live with virtue. But what exactly are those virtues? Which ones do you identify with most? This is a vital step in defining your personal code. The point of this post is actually to talk some of this out for myself. Hopefully, it will turn out coherent and helpful to someone else.

Cardinal Virtues

In Plato’s Republic, He discussed 4 “Cardinal Virtues”. They are the virtues that all others come from. Prudence, Justice, Fortitude, and Temperance. We don’t use these words as much these days, so we will define them later.

In the Heroic program, Brian Johnson mapped these cardinal virtues to the cardinal directions of a compass. This is an excellent symbol that shows how these virtues guide our way. His model includes some intercardinal virtues from positive psychology that are the most helpful. And encourages us to find our own unique character strengths, and lean on them to guide us to success.

I just finished Jack Donovan’s “The Way of Men”. In it, he discusses the “martial virtues”. These are the virtues men look for in each other to determine who we can rely on in a tough situation. These virtues are strength, courage, honor, and mastery. He argues these are the base virtues of men, and they are necessary to stay alive long enough to philosophize on the higher virtues.

Language is important. While there is some overlap in meanings for many of these virtues, specificity is key. Each of us must define our own code and who we aspire to be. Nuances of wording and definition can change the meaning significantly for us.

The Tactical Virtues

Strength

Strength is our North Star. Strength can mean many things. In this context, we are talking about physical strength. Other kinds of strength will be defined later. In today’s world, there are those who try to convince us that strength is no longer necessary. Tools and technology have enabled us to outgrow our need for it. Nothing can be further from the truth. We live in a world full of ease and abundance. The hardships of life used to be enough to build and maintain our strength, but that is no longer the case. Training your strength is something we all must do just to maintain a baseline of health.

Mastery

To the South, we have mastery. Everyone has a certain skill set that makes them useful to the tribe. Or at least they should. We should always be honing and refining our skills. You can work on your weaknesses, but you will usually get farther by playing to your strengths.

Courage

Courage is a prime virtue in everyone’s system. It is important to note a courageous person is not someone who feels no fear, but someone who feels the fear and continues forward, anyway. The stoic virtues often labeled this fortitude. The majority of medals that soldiers receive are for acts of bravery. We are placing courage to the West in our system.

Honor

Back to the East is honor. Over and over, we hear that we shouldn’t care what others think of us. To some extent, that is true. Most of us probably care too much about what others think of us. It’s not all bad though. You should care about your reputation within your group. If you care about and respect them, how they see you matters.

The Stoic and Heroic Virtues

Prudence

Prudence stands for wisdom. Wisdom stands to the north above strength. These two traits are key to navigating life. Training your body and your mind daily will put you far ahead of everyone else.

Temperance

Temperance means self-restraint and moderation. In the heroic system, Self Mastery is what this virtue in the south position was called. Brian has a new book coming out in a few months and I’m pretty sure he has changed this to discipline. If you have read “Discipline Equals Freedom” by Jocko Wilnick you know how discipline impacts your life. I like having it here with mastery as well. You need discipline to practice your skills, and practicing your skills also develops your discipline.

Fortitude

We’ve covered fortitude. we are just going to call this one courage.

Justice

Justice is concerned with fairness or righteousness. The mean between selfishness and selflessness. In the Heroic system, this virtue is Love. That is good enough for me, for now. Love encompasses your interactions with everyone, not just your family. Your tribe and how you interact with others in it is too big a topic for this essay. But honor does fit well here.

Intercardinals

The intercardinal virtues are not as important, but still excellent additions to constantly keep in mind.

NW Confidence

Brian uses hope here but hope requires explanation. The way most people think of hope is more like wishing for an outcome. Hope means knowing your future is going to be better because of the conviction that you will do whatever it takes to make it so. I use confidence because it says that to me in one word. Confidence is built by celebrating all your small wins and building faith in yourself.

NE Gratitude / Appreciation

There is no shortage of information on how being grateful improves your overall outlook on life. The one thing I feel necessary to add is that I call it appreciation. The word grateful never sat right with me and I finally heard someone else say why. Grateful gives the impression of luck, or that things were just handed to you somehow. Sometimes that is the case, but sometimes you worked hard to get the thing you are grateful for. You made it happen. Appreciation in my mind is more reflective of both situations. Semantics, I know, but this is why I say you have to tailor this to the way your mind works.

SW Zest

Zest is the Heroic word, but you can use passion or drive. It’s the thing that keeps you moving forward. Your motivation and inspiration to get just a little bit better every day. To keep growing and building. Your overall love for life.

SE Curiosity

Curiosity is one of my strengths. Leonardo da Vinci was described as having “unquenchable curiosity”. In his journals he was always asking questions. This led to all his discoveries, creativity, and inventions. Curiosity is what drives a lifetime of learning. This adds to your wisdom, and collection of skills to master. You never know where curiosity will take you or how that will enhance your other virtues.

Make your choice

These are the virtues I’m striving to develop. I’m going to clean this up a little more and hang it on the wall to recommit to every day. I would encourage you to do so as well.

Choose to live with Aretè (Excellence and Virtue)

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