How ‘Virtue Discovery’ Can Change Your Life

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When a client first meets with Grant Freeman, LMHC, they’re usually very focused on the problem for which they sought counseling. After an initial assessment, though, Freeman pivots the conversation in a surprising direction: “Tell me about some things you think you do well.”

His clients often resist this new direction—they keep wanting to circle back to the problem, but Freeman keeps redirecting them toward developing a list of things they do “well.” Not perfectly, necessarily, but passably—things like getting up in the morning, getting dressed, helping someone out.

Ultimately, the goal is to discover the virtues that the client already possesses, even if they are only as small as a seed, so that he or she can use those virtues to help solve their problem.

“You don’t talk about your problems, and they go away,” Freeman said in a recent interview. “You have to do something different.” Virtues are, in a nutshell, “behaving effectively” in a given situation, he said. “And if we behave effectively, then we solve our problems.”

For example, let’s say that you are at your wits’ end with your thirteen-year-old child; she doesn’t follow through on what you ask her to do, she’s argumentative and sassy, and lately, you’ve been getting in lots of fights.

Freeman might help you develop a plan for improving your child’s behavior, but in order to implement that plan, you are going to need to change your own behavior—namely, the way you typically respond to her provocations.

The virtue discovery process might help you identify virtues you’re already practicing in other contexts that would be useful to apply to this particular problem: restraint, perseverance, and gentle-firmness, for example.

But virtues do much more than help people solve problems, Freeman said; they are also the key to living a joyful, fulfilled life.

 

A Life Devoted to Virtue

You might call Freeman a “virtue evangelist.” Shortly after graduating from college, he gave up a promising career in an import/export business so that he could devote his life to sharing the joys of the virtuous life.

It was the all-boys Catholic boarding school that he attended in high school that first introduced him to that way of life. He and his classmates didn’t have CD players, television, or even radio—but they had lots of fun.

“They let us play very wildly and run rambunctiously,” he said. “We got to have a lot of fun, but it was governed. You didn’t have too many opportunities for getting way off the rails.”

After a few twists and turns in his life, he eventually decided to make it his life mission to share the “gift” he had received from his boarding school. That’s when he traded his role at the import/export company for a new role as a religion teacher at a Catholic high school.

To his delight, his students were very receptive to his message “that the good life, the beautiful life, is the life that is the most ethical, and that any fun that wasn’t virtuous was missing the mark of genuine fun.”

Eventually, he wound up at the Pastoral Solutions Institute, where he leads clients through the virtue discovery process—not only to help solve their problems, but to help them live a more joyful, satisfying life.

 

Discovering and Nurturing Your Virtues

The virtue discovery process isn’t difficult or complicated, Freeman said.

A good place to start is to realize that, as someone made in the image of God, you already possess the seed of all the virtues. All you need to grow them is the light of the Holy Spirit and some good soil—preferably, some rich rotted manure, which Freeman equates with the challenges and hardships we face on a daily basis.

“The virtues are all in there, because we’re made in the image and likeness of God,” Freeman said. “And they grow because of God’s grace, but also because they’re demanded of us. Whatever situations we’re in, we’re invited to grow in them. Now, to begin with, we perform poorly, and we will need to do some corrective work, but by hook or by crook, virtues can take root.”

To help identify and reinforce those virtues, Freeman advises clients to engage in a daily virtue inventory. The process resembles a simplified version of the Ignatian Examen. Here are the steps:

  1. Ask for the Help of the Holy Spirit: “This is not a ‘pull-yourself-up-by-your-own-bootstraps’ sort of process,” Freeman said. “We can’t do anything without grace.”

Your prayer may be very simple: “Lord, show me myself. When you look at me, what do you see? Tell me about myself. You know me better than I know me, so reveal me to myself.”

  1. Review the Day: Take a few minutes at the end of each day to reflect on what went well. Ideally, write it down in a journal. If you can’t think of anything, ask your spouse or children or a friend who has your best interests at heart.

 “Your children might say, ‘You made us a sandwich,’ or your spouse might say, ‘I’m really grateful that you went to work today and came home on time ready for dinner.’ It’s as simple as that.”

  1. Identify the Virtue: Name the virtue that enabled you to do well in those situations. For example, if you helped a colleague with a difficult task, recognize the virtue of generosity or friendliness. It’s not crucial that you identify the traditional name of the virtue, Freeman said. 
  2. Look Ahead: Consider the challenges you might face the next day and determine which virtues you will need to employ to navigate those challenges effectively.

    “Once you’ve identified the virtues, then you take a little look into tomorrow and see where you might intentionally use one of those virtues in a particular place, with a particular person, in a small way, so as to become more and more familiar with that virtue,” Freeman said. “So, I exercised restraint with my kids when they were annoying me today. Now, where am I going to use that tomorrow?”

Practicing this daily virtue discovery process helps to make you familiar with the tools at your disposal to best navigate life’s challenges and opportunities.

In college, Freeman wrestled with how hard it can be to live a virtuous life, and he is still working on it. While acknowledging that reality, he advises clients that it is well worth the effort.

“The Lord tells us that if you found a sturdy friend, if you found a treasure, do everything within your power to preserve it or possess it,” Freeman said. “And virtue— your own possession of the image and likeness of God—is the greatest treasure you could possibly ever fathom. So take care of it, strengthen it, shine it up, work it out. You know, don’t leave it in the garage; take it out for a spin.”

For personalized help with the virtue discovery process, reach out to Freeman or another pastoral counselor at CatholicCounselors.com.

Good Without God: Part 3 in My Head-To-Head Debate with John Mark Reynolds

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This post is part of a feature from Patheos called Head to Head where our best minds debate the big questions of the day.

This week, I’m debating the Evangelical Channel’s John Mark N. Reynolds. The question: is a deity necessary for morality?

This week’s question was inspired by Patheos Atheist writer Peter Mosley’s story on Theism’s Morality Glitch.

This is part three in my Patheos Head-to-Head debate with Philosopher John Mark Reynolds of Eidos Blog.  I am responding to his post, Dear Doctor:  Is is not Ought.

In his latest response, John Mark Reynolds begins by saying that he isn’t a psychologist.  In turn, I must confess that I am not a philosopher.  That said, I have at least a passing familiarity with David Hume’s “Is-Ought Problem” that Reynolds refers to.  In short, where natural law reasoning says that most people ought to be able to determine what is moral by observing the way the world is–i.e., the way things work–Hume responds to this by observing, that, in fact, this is wishful thinking.  Left to their own devices, most people tend to find ways to justify as moral what they want to do rather than trying to conform themselves to the natural order of the world.  Current events clearly shows this to be the case.  (And this summary of the is-out fallacy probably demonstrates how little philosophy cred I actually have.)

At any rate,I actually agree, as I indicated in my last post.  The question we were asked to address was, “Is a deity necessary for morality?”  This sets the bar rather low and I still think the answer is “no.”  Even without God, people can create enough of a functional morality to get along with each other and create a basically functional society.  In fact, as research shows, most people–even believers–make moral decisions on simplistic grounds like, “will I get in trouble?” or “will my friends be mad?” if i do this.

That said a more interesting question, and the one John Mark Reynolds has focused on is, “Exactly HOW moral can we be without God?”  And I actually agree with him here.  I think most of the naturalistic attempts at morality are pretty pathetic.  They are functional, but they are certainly not transcendent in any way.  Staying out of trouble or trying not to annoy my social group doesn’t really challenge me to be a better person.  It just enables me to get along.

In the end, I think this is where the atheists and Christians struggle to understand each other, as I pointed out in my first post.  For the atheist, “being moral” is just about avoiding conflict with the people around them.  For the Christian “being moral” is about developing virtue and pursuing transcendence by conforming to something greater than oneself.

So, in the end, I would say that my position remains that people can be good without God.  They just can’t be very good.

 

Good Without God? (Part 1 in My Patheos Head-to-Head Debate with John Mark Reynolds of Eidos Blog.)

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This article is Part 1 in my Patheos Head to Head Debate with John Mark Reynolds of Eidos blog. The question: is a deity necessary for morality?

“Is a deity necessary for morality?”  At the risk of sounding Clintonesque, it really depends on how you define “morality.”  Even so, the answer is by and large, “no.”  To explain, I want to first look at why many Christians struggle with the idea that one can be moral without God but then I’ll reveal why it’s possible–at least to a reasonable extent.

The Moral Christian: Not (Mainly) About “Getting Along”

As I note in my book, Broken Gods: Hope, Healing, and the Seven Longings of the Human Heart, Christians tend to think that people can’t be moral without God because, for Christians, (SURPRISE!) morality isn’t primarily concerned with regulating our relationship with ourselves, our community, and creation.  These are essential, but secondary, considerations.

Rather, for a Christian, being moral is really about conversion and transformation; that is,  conforming my inner longings and outward actions to the divine order so that I can fulfill my ultimate destiny in Christ. Christianity believes in God -given, objective, constant, immutable, moral laws by which the universe is governed.  We call this, Natural Law, “the law written on human hearts and minds” (Heb 10:16).  Christians believe we must learn to conform to these laws, not out of slavish devotion to a taskmaster God, but out of the belief that following the Natural Law leads to both earthly and eternal fulfillment. Christians often struggle to conceive of a morality without God because, for us,  the actual goal of the moral life is not just getting along with others, but ultimately,  becoming “divine” (c.f., 2Ptr 1:4) ourselves. (As  St. Thomas Aquinas put it, “The son of God became man so that men might become gods.”)   People can’t achieve divinization (aka, deification/theosis) by practicing an earth-bound morality that is interested merely in going along to get along.

Theory vs. Reality

That said, believing in an objective morality that leads to divinization is one thing.  Actually making moral decisions according to this process is another.  In fact, research shows that most people–theists or no–rely on more mundane modes moral reasoning that, practically-speaking, have little, if anything to do with God.  Most moral decision making–even for theists–is almost universally non-theistic.

Morality without God:  2 Approaches.

Psychologists who study moral development note at least two general, non-theistic approaches to moral reasoning; emotionally-based morality and socially-based morality.

Emotionally-Based Morality (e.g., “Eww…Gross!” & “Tit for Tat” Morality)  —For people who have a more reaction-based morality, anything that seems disgusting,  strange, threatening to my development, or hindering of my goals is considered morally “bad” while things that seem palatable,  familiar, encouraging of my development, and supportive of my goals is considered morally “good.” Developmental psychologist, Lawrence Kohlberg, called this,  “Pre-conventional morality.”  At its root, it is childish (literally), selfish, and narcissistic, but it still enables people to be at least basically pro-social, because it benefits them to do so.

Socially-Based Morality (e.g, “Coffee Klatch” & “Legal Eagle Morality”)  —Those who display more socially-based morality are willing to sacrifice what their reactions tell them is good or bad based on what their social circle (friends and family) consider “good” or what the law says is “right.”  Kohlberg considered this “conventional” morality because this person considers social conventions (e.g., social mores and laws) to be at least as important, if not more so, than his or her own personal feelings.

While social morality is a somewhat more reliable moral guide than reaction-based morality, it too, can change on a dime and tends to be somewhat rootless.  You can see what might be called “coffee klatch morality” reflected in a person’s instantaneous reversal of her opinion on the morality of, say,  abortion or gay marriage because she suddenly discovers that her best friend had an abortion or her cousin is gay.  Similarly, a good example of “legal eagle morality” might be when a community that previously opposed gambling suddenly polls more favorably toward it once an ordinance allowing a casino to open in town is passed.  In either case, the morality of the thing, itself, hasn’t changed, but the view of whether supporting it or opposing such an act is “sociable” or “lawful” has changed.  People want to be considered agreeable or lawful,  so they adjust their opinions to correspond with the circles in which they run.

Mercy Me

These are, by far, the most common approaches to moral decision making for all people–theists and non-theists–and neither has anything to do with God except that, perhaps God, in his mercy, recognizing that many people will struggle to find him, gives humanity a way to at least somewhat peaceably get along without him in the meantime.

As I mentioned at the beginning, there are certainly more complicated approaches to moral reasoning that may, arguably require belief in God.  But that isn’t the question I was asked to debate.  Based on the data, the fact is, people can be at least basically moral without having any sense of a deity at all because the vast majority of moral decisions are rooted not in our sense of transcendence, but in our reactive and social consciousness.

This week’s question was inspired by Patheos Atheist blogger Peter Mosley’s story on Theism’s Morality Glitch.