Dr. Jaime Lee: How understanding your personality type can help you thrive

Not sure where to start when it comes to personality types? Allow AIA Vitality Ambassador Dr. Jaime Lee to explain everything you’ll need to embark on an exciting journey of self-discovery.

Wouldn’t it be nice if we could all understand each other a little better? Imagine if, when out in public, people had little indicators above their head that let you know what type of person they were – if they were introverted or extroverted, creative or academic, a reliable project manager or a chaotic visionary. Just imagine how much time and effort we’d all save, and how much easier our daily interactions would become.

As farfetched as it may sound, it is actually possible to tap into this kind of knowledge, and better understand yourself and others, if you’re willing to do a little work for it. And those who do may well find that they’re better equipped to handle interpersonal relationships, working with other people, and even deal with their own feelings, emotions and ideas about themselves.  

So, where do our personalities actually come from? They’re essentially a mixture of inherited characteristics, early childhood experiences, learned experiences and ongoing life experiences. It’s a combination of both nature and nurture, and there’s no one-size fits all. The influence of your childhood, your environment, the experiences you go through in life – all of this plays a part in forming a personality.

Early childhood experiences are particularly formative (and interesting) when it comes to our personalities, because we are the way we are today (at least, a sizeable part of us) because of things that we experienced when we were incredibly young. It could be something as simple as crying out for milk as a baby and not getting it immediately – from that experience, you may have learned a survival pattern, and over time these patterns become a strategy for coping, and can eventually embed themselves within our personalities. 

The idea of personality types isn’t new. It goes back a long time, to the likes of Sigmund Freud, Wilhelm Reich and Carl Jung. Jung, in particular, talked a lot about archetypical psychology, which is essentially the process of divvying up personality traits into different ‘types’, with a view to giving us a bit of a road map to help us navigate ourselves and other people. Wilhelm Reich’s therapeutic ‘orgone’ method was based on “character analysis” and “character structures” which included observations of patterns of chronic muscle tension.

Perhaps the most popular personality test, and one you might have heard of, is the Myers-Briggs test, which offers up 16 different ‘types’ of personality. But there are plenty of modern variations too – like the Mentemia personality test, which you can access via the Mentemia app, and is currently free to all Australians. 

Every method of personality testing has different outcomes or ‘types’. The Myers-Briggs personality types include four major ‘buckets’ (analysts, diplomats, sentinels and explorers) with four ‘types’ in each: the architect, the logician, the commander, the debater (analysts), the advocate, the mediator, the protagonist, the campaigner (diplomats), the logistician, the defender, the executive, the consul (sentinels), the virtuoso, the adventurer, the entrepreneur and the entertainer (explorers).

All of these personality tests are simply maps. Whichever method of testing you use, it’s important to keep in mind that you are not your personality type: you are Self, with a capital S. The map provides insights and guidance to discover more of yourself, but how you use that map is entirely up to you. 

Now, the fun part: as mentioned above, understanding your personality type can yield all kinds of benefits, from better personal and working relationships, to giving you the foresight to better respond to certain situations from a place of centredness, as opposed to reactivity.

A firm understanding of personality types enables you to get a feel for people’s triggers, and what makes them tick, so you’ll be better at avoiding conflict and better-equipped to recruit and collaborate with people on whatever cause or project you’re working on.

In a professional environment, you can see how useful this could be. But even on a personal level, when it comes to gaining a better understanding of yourself, the benefits are almost endless. By developing your self-awareness, you’ll be more tuned-in to the coping strategies you can employ to tackle stressful situations.

Not only that, but by taking the time to understand your personality a little better, you’re also actively developing your emotional maturity, which helps you gain a clearer picture of your triggers and how you might respond to those triggers in future.

It’s also a brilliant exercise in fostering empathy – if you’re able to get an idea for the type of person someone is, and where they’re coming from in terms of their life experience, then you’re better placed to put yourself in their shoes and see things from their perspective.

No matter whether you’re dealing with your boss, a colleague, your family or friends, or even yourself – learning more about your personality type is a useful way to help you navigate those often murky emotional waters a little more clearly. 

Dr. Jaime Lee is the Founder and CEO of Health Quotient, a company dedicated to transforming workplaces around the world by inspiring individual health and whole organisational renewal through leadership keynotes, workshops and mentoring. With experience as a medical doctor, public health specialist, corporate strategist, speaker and facilitator, Dr. Jaime works with global companies to help them sustain high performance teams in an integrated and healthy way.

Disclaimer:
Copyright © 2020 AIA Australia Limited (ABN 79 004 837 861 AFSL 230043). This is general information only, without taking into account factors like the objectives, financial situation, needs or personal circumstances of any individual and is not intended to be financial, legal, tax, medical, nutritional, health, fitness or other advice.