Personality Profiling

Over winter break, I went to Zoe's house where she was waiting with an yellowed Psychology book. She quickly encouraged me to take a Myers-Briggs personality test. After I finished, I announced that I was an ENFJ and she yelled, "I KNEW IT!" I assumed that since she had been one of my closest friends for almost ten years, she would naturally be able to pick my personality out of a list of profiles. I didn't dwell on the results much longer and admittedly forgot my four-letter combination until this week, when I had to take the test again, this time for Susan's class. After taking this iteration of the test, I found myself with the same profile: ENFJ (I double-checked with Zoe for accuracy). This time through, however, I read the full explanation of the personality type. And then Googled it to find more explanations, and read those too. Because I was shocked to find that although it wasn't perfect, ENFJ described me pretty damn well. The personality type was labeled as the "Teacher" or the "Giver."

Belief in my students? Check.

Look for the best in my students? Definitely.

Warmly outgoing? I try to be!

Expressive? Check

Dramatic flourishes? Often asked to take on a leadership role? Yes, and yes.

Settled, organized, scheduled, tolerate, able to pick up the characteristics, emotions, and beliefs of those around them...avoid being along, tendency to be hard on themselves and turn to dark thoughts when alone, refrain from expressing themselves sometimes...the list went on and on.

But better than all of that, I found that the personality description that had been assigned to me portrayed a person that I had always wanted to be. Caring, compassionate, with love as my strongest weapon. I was elated to discover that maybe what I have wanted to be all along really is just who I am. But did I create this person because these were characteristics I observed and valued in others? Or was this the person I was always destined to be, that would unavoidably, eventually, develop as it did? I don't know which I prefer. After taking the Myers-Briggs last week, Zoe and I talked at length about these subjects, over a 3000 mile phone connection. In the end, I decided that I would like to think that I was born this way. That in the Mariana Trench of my psyche, I am a good person who loves and cares for others above all else. 

I don't believe that this test works for everyone. Zoe pointed out that having her friends take this test helped her to understand them a little bit better, and ascribe to them a (albeit tenuous) basis from which she could understand them. After having a number of my friends take the test over the past week, I found several instances in which the results of the Myers-Briggs conflicted dramatically with what I knew of the person. In some cases, the two did not match up in the slightest. I'm interested to know the drawbacks and failings of a test such as this.

Because in the end, no personality test can understand us completely. We are who we are, whether created or born as such. I am glad, though, that I have a personality strong enough that it can be guessed by my closest friends. Perhaps that means that this really is who I am, and that my perception of myself the perception of those who know me well are one and the same.