Virtue Based Identity : Project Overview

Project Status: Planning Date: 1/07/2013
Proposer : Admin
Sponsor(s): POSE Ltd

Proposal Summary

Our ideas about ourselves are often based on the jobs we do, the amount of money we make, the roles we undertake, or the status symbols we have amassed. During times of high unemployment and economic uncertainty many of these things are gone or seriously undermined. But why do we define ourselves this way? We can choose to define ourselves anyway we wish. Why should what we have or how much money we make, be the yardstick by which so many of us measure ourselves? Does this make us happy? If we have more than those around us we might say, ‘yes’, but how reliable is wealth as a measure?

If the recent recessions can teach us anything may be it is that money is not a good indicator of a persons’ worth. If we could use a different set of criteria to evaluate ourselves, ones that have been linked with overall human happiness perhaps, would we not be better off on many levels? Virtue based identity is about creating an identity which we choose and that is based on the virtues we wish to embody, rather then by material indicators of success.