Values, Principles, Virtues

ELI5 Answer:

Values are subjective, personal, emotional, and arguable, while principles are objective, factual, impersonal, and self-evident because they are indisputable. Principles are universal truths based on natural laws. While values govern behaviors, principles govern the consequences of those behaviors.

1. Values are the things that you think are good, or better than others. E.g. “I value honesty more than comfort.” “I value original music compositions.” “I value cheeseburgers.”
2. Principles are rules for behavior, or maxims. E.g., “Never cheat.” or “When a friend asks to borrow money, do not agree unless you are prepared to lose the sum.”
3. Virtues are character traits or dispositions. In other words, a tendency to behave in a certain way given a particular situation. E.g. The virtue of courage is to respond appropriately when faced with danger–not too willing to engage the danger, and not too willing to flee.

So is ‘values’ a data set representing your ideal self? Which would make principles the actionable behaviors that then translate into a state of “virtues”. So if one lacks principle then you have great ideas about yourself but lack any discipline to enact a state change to translate those ideals into virtues. 

Or do you have a private set of “real” values that then flow into your actions, your “real” principles? Those define your actual virtues (or lack thereof, more accurately). 

Context:

I’m currently re-reading ‘7 Habits..’ for about the 10th time. The terms ‘values, principles, virtues’ get thrown around a lot in the book but they’re also words I’ve heard tossed around my entire life. How do you actually define them though if you are trying to compile a personal mission statement?