How is virtue acquired?

Have you ever wondered how someone becomes really kind or patient or generous? Becoming virtuous is just like learning a skill. It takes people modelling and guiding and it also requires practise.

Here's what Aristotle says, 

Virtues ... we acquire just as we acquire crafts, by having previously activated them. For we learn a craft by producing the same product that we must produce when we have learned it, becoming builders, for instance, by building and temperate by doing temperate actions, brace by doing brave actions. (Nicomachean Ethics Book II)

David N. James, in his article "The Acquisition of Virtue" describes the importance of "experiences of personal relationship and shared activities" in learning character virtues. There's something about being with others that helps us learn how to be better people. Of course, that is not always the case. Sometimes, people bring out the worst in others. When that happens, consider it another opportunity to practise becoming a person of depth and character.