With temperance of our thoughts and subsequent actions, we will find the better course. If we know what is good for us, pursue it. If we know what is bad for us, avoid it. Seems simple enough, but we tend to falter in the balance of the control we assert to determine for ourselves the direction we will take.

For a sense of mastery with temperance, we would have to remain mindful at all times of the determination we set. Both to pursue and to abstain require a leveling with fortitude. “Not at all” is difficult, “All in for always” may even be too much. In the middle there is a balance for what is good for us and what is bad.

If you do not set a mindful course, one will simply happen to you as a meandering path. In controlling the temperance for yourself, you set the course and learn from it to a higher level. Hard decisions are often the best ones to make if you are in pursuit of higher outcomes. Set the course or allow it to be set for you.

“Temperance is simply a disposition of the mind which binds the passion.” — Thomas Acquinas —

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