We are what we repeatedly do

"Excellence is an art won by training and habituation. We do not act rightly because we have virtue or excellence, but rather we have those because we have acted rightly. We are what we repeatedly do.

Excellence, then, is not an act but a habit."

Aristotle

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There are so many lessons in this short quote. That virtue and excellence are results rather than sources is an interesting idea...

But most profoundly Aristotle points out, in effect, that we aren't determined by our occasional actions but our consistent ones. One-off trips to the gym do not make us athletes; only occasionally telling the truth does not make us honest.

And, perhaps as fundamental, simply announcing that we are honest or caring or hard-working or whatever attribute we wish for ourselves does not make it ours. It is only in the doing that we experience the being.