Moment With Betty

What Is Fortitude?  Fortitude is one of the four classical cardinal virtues, alongside prudence, justice, and temperance. It is often defined as courage in the face of pain or adversity, but it also encompasses perseverance, endurance, and moral strength. For children, this means developing the ability, for the courage to stand up for what is right, even at the most difficult situation. Fortitude also helps us to persist through failure and disappointment, be able to control emotional desires and uphold hope in the face of challenges.

In an age of rapid change, uncertainty, and increasing mental health challenges, the importance of cultivating fortitude, which is the inner strength and resilience, cannot be overstated.  However, fortitude is not simply about enduring hardship; it is the moral courage to confront fear, pain, difficulty, and hardship with integrity and purpose. Therefore, educating children in fortitude is vital to prepare them not only for academic success but for life’s unavoidable trials. We are vulnerable from the very moment that we are conceived therefore, we are prone to wounds but, that does not imply that we are incapable of resisting and overcoming them. No, it only means that we need to make our children to develop the virtue of fortitude from an early age and start putting it in practice.

In early childhood education, fortitude can be established by parents because at that stage, the child is smaller and has fewer resources and could be more vulnerable therefore, needs the virtue of fortitude to overcome difficulties. Nonetheless, the truth is that, the style of education we have today, where today’s families are dominated by a style of education that is over- protective, is very worrisome.  A situation where children are characterized by the desire to avoid any type of effort and suffering, is for sure having a negative impact on the development of the virtue of fortitude in the children. Nowadays, to talk about or educate the children about the virtue of fortitude in schools is a big challenge since, the parents themselves find it difficult to talk about it to their children at home. However, for the correct growth and development of the child, it is necessary that schools and families, work hand – in- hand to ensure that children grow with fortitude at an early age. This is very important, as this helps their mental and emotional resilience.Children who are equipped with fortitude are better able to manage stress, cope with setbacks, and bounce back from failures and this builds a healthy self-image and promotes their long-term mental well-being.

Fortitude also empowers children to do what is right even when it is unpopular or difficult. It builds the children’s moral courage and helps them to stand up to peer pressure and be able to resist unethical behavior. Apart from all these, it helps them also in their personal and academic growth. They get to learn to push through frustration or boredom and focus on achieving success in their academics and skills. But for this to happen, parents and teachers, even the house keepers/ nannies, must show good examples because as the saying goes, children learn more from example than instruction.  We need to share stories of personal struggle and challenges with our children and how we overcame them rather than telling them only success stories that portrays us as superman or heroes.  Consequently,, we should praise the children when they achieve great things due to their determination, hard work and resilience and we should occasionally allow them to face challenges without rescuing them because over protection stunts the development of resilience.