PERSONALITY TYPING PERSONALITY TYPING
THE SEARCH TO find consistent paths of development among different groups of human beings has been underway for thousands of years. Even 2500 years ago, Hippocrates attempted to divide people into four general groups, based on the body fluids that seemed to rule the personality.
Today, many people -- at least, Americans -- groan inwardly when attempts are made to squeeze them into a particular framework of personality. Perhaps that's part of the individual, self-determinate streak that the United States has fostered among its citizens. After all, we are ruled by no one but ourselves. Every individual should be free of restraint, whether that restraint results from social norms that curtail speech and action, or some scientific theory that suggests that our actions and outlooks can actually be predicted to some degree. A sensible personality theory can be threatening to our sense of autonomy.
However, personality typing is not meant for the purposes of confining the behaviors of other people -- the pigeonholing we are all acquainted with -- but is to be directed towards personal growth and understanding those around you in order to improve relationships. Don Richard Riso, in his book Personality Types, says it quite well:
Knowledge alone is not enough to change us... Knowing more about ourselves is but a means toward a goal of being happy and leading a good life... [In addition] psychologists who try to describe human nature are themselves human beings subject to all the distortions and self-deceptions of which humans are capable. That is why there will always be an element of faith to psychology... [and] why attaining some kind of final objective truth about ourselves is probably impossible. What may be more important than arriving at ultimate answers is being searchers on the quest. Through the process of honestly seeking the truth about ourselves, we gradually liberate ourselves from many painful and limiting behaviors and beliefs about who we are. Thus, gradually, and in ways we do not expect, we are transformed into persons who are fuller, more life-affirming, and self-transcending. [Personality Types, Riso, p.10]
Personality theory also combats the strange notion that we are all ultimately alike in how we perceive and how we think. America has long fostered the concept of every person being on the same track, upholding the type A personality (outgoing, aggressive, optimistic, and ultimately successful) as something we could all be equally well as long as we put our minds to it. Yet many of us have felt incapable of achieving this image.
Despite the fact that humanity shares a common pool of aspirations and fears, personality dictates how each person ranks these things. Some of us fear powerlessness more than being unloved. Others desire control more than freedom to act. Most strife springs from assumptions we make about others, based on we ourselves desire or fear. Personality theories bequeath a knowledge that can then be applied to enable us to better understand ourselves and those in our lives.
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