Author: Georgia McKee

My journey to moral perfection was not at all easy, but it was not too hard either. I faced some challenges but overcame those with successes. I think that the hardest virtue for me was tranquility. I find myself to be a very tense and anxious person, so when it comes to calming down and relaxing it can be hard for me. To overcome this, I set aside time for myself each day to do something that I had been worried or stressed about. Most of the time it was cleaning my room or doing a project or homework. Setting aside time that I knew I would be able to get these things done made me a lot less anxious. It helped me a lot knowing that I would be able to get something done and not be stressed about it.

Although, it was sometimes hard to stick with my virtues, when I did, it was very rewarding. I found that the virtue I stuck with the most was my Health virtue. I tried to go to a workout class almost every day, and when I did it felt great. I worked really hard on eating healthier foods, and that was the part that came less easily, but I still improved! It felt great to know that I was doing the best things for my body that I could, and I will really try to stick with it.

To bring this whole journey to an end, I am very glad I got to do this experiment. I was successful everyday, even when it was less than the previous day. I found this journey to be so helpful for myself, and relationships with people around me. I will continue to improve myself for days and weeks and even years to come, and I cannot wait to see where this takes me.

I had a great day today! I woke up energized, which is always a great start to my day. I was ready to go to school for my odd period day. I thought about focusing on forgiveness today. I felt like I had not been doing my best with my health virtue, because I was not eating very healthy the days previously, but I decided that it was okay to forgive myself and to not let that ruin my mindset or anything else. I found it was very helpful to do this, because it let me not feel guilty, and focus on other things throughout the day. I would say today was an 8/10!

Today I found myself focusing on tranquility. I felt very stressed and anxious for some reason, and I hated feeling that way. I decided that it would be good for me to try to relax and not stress about the little unimportant things. I got home from nannying and I was so tired, I usually never allow myself to sleep after school knowing that I won’t be able to sleep that night, but I knew my body needed it so I took a quick nap. Afterwards I found myself a lot less stressed and anxious, and I got all of my work done and even got to spend some time with my family later. We watched a movie and it was a great way to end the night.

Today was tiring. It was my first day back at school after a nice vacation, which always sucks. I was so tired when I woke up in the morning, and I was dreading going to school. Knowing I was super tired I thought focusing on temperance would be good for me. I decided to take all my classes hour by hour, and focus only on what I needed to do during that time. I found it helped me relax and not get so stressed out. I think that today could have been better, but I tried my best and that is all that matters!

Today was a pretty good day. My friends and I woke up and had to pack up our suitcases to head back to Kansas City. It sucks having to go home from a trip, but I decided to focus on sincerity again. I knew my mindset could not be the best knowing that I had to go home, but I turned it around and realized I was so grateful and thankful that I got to go on this great trip! We all got in a cab and headed to the airport. While we were waiting for our flight, it got delayed. Instead of getting upset, I focused on transquility knowing that this was not a big deal and there are many more problems that people have to deal with. Overall today was a 7/10.

Boy was today amazing! We got ready for the day and headed out to brunch. Afterwards we shopped all day long and walked all over the city. I was thinking about my virtues, and I thought about focusing on sincerity today. I wanted to focus on this because I thought about all of the people who do not get to have this opportunity, so I wanted to be as meaningful and sincere with my actions and words as possible. It really made me feel good, and proud of myself. I think I am going to start doing it more, not because I do not try to but I want to make more of a point of it!

Today was so fun! I woke up early and hopped on a plane to Chicago with a couple of my friends. We got to walk around the city and eat some great food. I was focused on my health today, because I always get antsy about sitting on a plane and eating a lot of food and not moving my body, but I thought about it and I decided to not let that mindset get in the way of my trip. I had a great time looking at all of the different shops in Chicago, and walking all around the pretty city. I focused on having a healthy mindset as well. I got to be with some of my best friends in such a cool place, so why not be happy!

Today was very good. I felt very at ease with everything going on, the only thing I was stressed out about was packing for my trip. I felt like I had no time because I was going to be at school all day, then I had to go home and get ready for a Friendsgiving. During that time of stress, I stepped back and focused on tranquility. I thought about how there is no reason to stress, if I kept stressing it would get in the way of my happiness, and I did not want that to happen. To help, I just took a couple of deep breaths and planned out what I was going to do and when I would do it. It ended up helping so much and I was able to have fun at Friendsgiving and not worry about packing!

I think that today was one of my better days. It was late start Thursday which is already one of my favorite days of the week! I also had a very nice school day where I did not have a ton of overloading work, which let me focus more on my virtues. I chose to work on temperance today, because I was in the perfect environment for it. I was very relaxed, while also getting my work done. For the first time in a long time I got to go straight home from school and take a long nap in my bed, I never get to do that! I went to the dodgeball event later and it was so fun to see everyone play. I then came home and watched a show with my family, it was so nice to relax and not worry about anything for tomorrow. Overall I would rate today a 8/10.

Today was a great day! I really focused on sincerity, and making sure I did everything with a purpose. Today I sold ads in marketing and I made a lot of deep connections with people throughout the community. I went to a yoga class, and the instructor made a point of taking time out of your 24 hour day and spending just the 45 minutes of class time focusing on yourself. I really liked this because it made me think about all of the people I encounter throughout the day, all of the things I do, all of the smallest connections I made but that even within the midst of it all, I can still take time for myself.

I would say today was a good day. I worked really hard on my health virtue, and I even went to a workout class before school. I was mostly focused on that virtue, but when a situation came about, I was really working hard on temperance. I had a math test that I needed to make up, but I was so stressed and I felt like I knew nothing, when I was asking for help I broke down and cried. I went to the bathroom and realized that this was nothing to get worked up about, knowing there were so many other problems or things that are ten times worse than what I was going through. After calming down, I got more help and took my test. I did really well on it, and I really think it was because I calmed myself down when I got to a situation that was not good.

To me, the process of writing a blog holding me accountable for the virtues I have picked out is very important. There were several motivating factors behind this, including wanting to better myself, not only for myself but for the community around me. This blog will allow me to keep track of my progress, and make sure that I am doing my best to carry out these virtues. My relationship with Ben Franklin is mostly just my admiration for him. Franklin had a very busy life filled with new inventions and opportunities and people and whatever else you could possibly think of, but he was also able to achieve the life he wanted by sticking to his virtues. I believe that his motto of doing everything little by little is so great because it is so reasonable. 

The five virtues I have chosen to work on myself are temperance, sincerity, health, tranquility, and forgiveness. For temperance, I will try my best to be more laid back, and not get so worked up all of the time. I will try to stay calm when I would usually freak out, it will take time but I believe that I can do this. For sincerity, I will do my very best to be the most sincere I can. I tend to find myself not meaning things when I say them, or doing something that I know is not right, so I will really be focusing on this one. For health, I really want to work on this. I have been a pretty healthy person starting this school year, I go to workouts 4-5 times a week, walk whenever I can, eat healthy (when I can get myself to), but sometimes I think that my mental health is the one I need to work on. I tend to be a very happy person, but most of the time I am beyond stressed out. To work on this I will take 30 minutes each day to really focus on myself and doing something that makes me happy, and takes my mind off of whatever it is that is stressing me out. For tranquility, I find myself to be very laid back, most of the time. I like to stay out of drama and not have anything to do with it. Sometimes though, I will stand up for my friends when I know they won’t stand up for themselves. I find that to sometimes get myself involved in drama that is completely unnecessary, so I will do my best to help my friends but also know my worth and not become involved in the unnecessary drama. Lastly, I will really work on forgiveness. I tend to hold grudges where they are not needed, and I find it to get in the way of my happiness. I believe that everyone deserves a second chance, and knowing that everyone makes mistakes including myself, I think it is unfair to not forgive. It does suck having to let something go that has really bothered you, but in the end it is so much better.

My hopes for this experience are to improve myself and my mindset. I hope that by having this blog I will be able to keep myself accountable, and continue to better myself. All of my virtues are very simple, but very important to life, and I believe that I will really be able to improve myself with them. I hope this will help make my life a little brighter, and everyone else’s around me. My prediction for this is that I will be able to improve, but I do not think that I will be able to reach the ideal sense of perfection, just because of the short two-week period we have to do this. Overall though, I think I will see a lot of improvement and growth within myself even if it is just two weeks.