by Anne Bogel
Truly knowing yourself is one of the hardest things you can do, but it’s also one of the most valuable. The sooner you begin, the sooner you’ll begin to see the payoff.
Today’s a great day to start the journey. If you haven’t already, pick a framework—any framework—from this book and dig in. Take the assessment. Make a plan to follow up. Check out one of the resources for further reading at the back of this book. And get ready to climb out of your box.
Acknowledgments
To my editor Rebekah Guzman and the wonderful team at Baker, I’m so fortunate to have landed with you. Thank you for partnering with me to bring these words to life.
To my wonderful agent, Bill Jensen, my deepest gratitude for you and your endless enthusiasm for new ideas. Thank you for partnering with me to bring this idea to life.
Liz Heaney, I still can’t believe my luck that I got to work with you. This book is inestimably better because of your great eye and sharp hatchet. It was a pleasure.
Catharine Eadens, I owe you big for reading the truly terrible early chapters.
Ed Cyzewski and Christie Purifoy, your first eyes were invaluable.
Seth Haines, I didn’t know an INFP could have such a keen eye for structure, which we both know is just what I needed. Thanks for helping me wrangle this book into shape.
Leigh Kramer, this book might be a chapter shorter were it not for your contagious enthusiasm for the Enneagram. I’m grateful for that, as well as for your fact-checking and your friendship, though maybe not in that order.
Erin Odom, you’re all the things a due date buddy should be. Thanks for being a sounding board, a cheerleader, and, sometimes, a commiserator.
Kim Vanslambrook, thanks for all the walking and talking, for teaching me there are many ways to read, and for being my MBTI guinea pig.
Myquillyn Smith, Tsh Oxenreider, Emily Freeman, and Emily Lex, thank you for your smarts and savvy and straight talk and kindness.
To the Grown-Ass Ladies: Lisa Patton, Laura Benedict, Joy Jordan-Lake, Marybeth Whalen, and Ariel Lawhon. I’m not sure how I would have pulled this off without you. How is it possible to get so much work done and have so much fun at the same time? You are the answer.
And Marybeth and Ariel, thanks for roping me in to your madcap adventures. I learn so much from you and have way too much fun doing it.
To Ginger, Katie, Melissa, and Brenna, thanks for keeping my plates spinning and doing it with style.
To Modern Mrs. Darcy readers everywhere, thank you for being the nicest readers on the internet, for your support and enthusiasm, for being the first readers of my fledgling ideas, the whole shebang. I’m so grateful for our community.
To What Should I Read Next listeners, it is so good to be among people who are reading. Thanks for listening, for inspiring me, and for ensuring I will die with a TBR list thousands of titles longer than I could ever finish.
To my parents, I’m so lucky to have you on my side, from when I was little right up till now. Thank you.
Finally, to Will, Jackson, Sarah, Lucy, and Silas. You are my favorites, forever and ever. On to the next.
Recommended Resources
Introversion/Extroversion
Cain, Susan. Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can’t Stop Talking. New York: Broadway Books, 2012.
McHugh, Adam. Introverts in the Church: Finding Our Place in an Extroverted Culture. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity, 2009.
Highly Sensitive People
Aron, Elaine N. The Highly Sensitive Child: Helping Our Children Thrive When the World Overwhelms Them. New York: Harmony, 2012.
———, The Highly Sensitive Person: How to Thrive When the World Overwhelms You. New York: Broadway Books, 1996.
———, The Highly Sensitive Person in Love: Understanding and Managing Relationships When the World Overwhelms You. New York: Harmony, 1996.
Crawford, Catherine. The Highly Intuitive Child: A Guide to Understanding and Parenting Unusually Sensitive and Empathic Children. Alameda, CA: Hunter House, 2008.
Keirsey’s Temperaments and the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator
Goldstein, David B., and Otto Kroeger. Creative You: Using Your Personality Type to Thrive. New York: Atria, 2013.
Keirsey, David. Please Understand Me II: Temperament, Character, Intelligence. Del Mar, CA: Prometheus Nemesis Book Company, 1998.
Myers, Isabel Briggs, with Peter B. Myers. Gifts Differing: Understanding Personality Type. Palo Alto, CA: Davies-Black Publishing, 1980.
Quenk, Naomi. Was That Really Me? How Everyday Stress Brings Out Our Hidden Personality. Boston: Nicholas Brealey, 2002.
Clifton StrengthsFinder
Gallup Youth Development Specialists. StrengthsExplorer for Ages 10 to 14. New York: Gallup, 2007.
Rath, Tom. StrengthsFinder 2.0. New York: Gallup, 2007.
Reckmeyer, Mary. Strengths Based Parenting: Developing Your Child’s Innate Talents. New York: Gallup, 2016.
Enneagram
Baron, Renee, and Elizabeth Wagele. The Enneagram Made Easy: Discover the 9 Types of People. San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco, 1994.
Cron, Ian Morgan, and Suzanne Stabile. The Road Back to You: An Enneagram Journey to Self-Discovery. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity, 2016.
Daniels, David, and Virginia Price. The Essential Enneagram: The Definitive Personality Test and Self-Discovery Guide. New York: HarperOne, 2000.
Palmer, Helen. The Enneagram in Love and Work: Understanding Your Intimate and Business Relationships. New York: HarperOne, 1995.
Riso, Don Richard, and Russ Hudson. The Wisdom of the Enneagram: The Complete Guide to Psychological and Spiritual Growth for the Nine Personality Types. New York: Bantam, 1999.
Rohr, Richard, and Andreas Ebert. The Enneagram: A Christian Perspective. New York: Crossroad Publishing Company, 2001.
Wagele, Elizabeth. The Enneagram of Parenting: The 9 Types of Children and How to Raise Them Successfully. New York: HarperOne, 1997.
The Five Love Languages
Chapman, Gary. The 5 Love Languages: The Secret to Love That Lasts. Chicago: Northfield Publishing, 1992.
Chapman, Gary, and Paul White. The 5 Languages of Appreciation in the Workplace: Empowering Organizations by Encouraging People. Chicago: Northfield Publishing, 2011.
Additional Resources
Dweck, Carol. Mindset: The New Psychology of Success. New York: Random House, 2006.
Gallagher, Winifred. Rapt: Attention and the Focused Life. New York: Penguin, 2009.
Gawande, Atul. Being Mortal: Medicine and What Matters in the End. New York: Metropolitan Books, 2014.
Rubin, Gretchen. Better Than Before: Mastering the Habits of Our Everyday Lives. New York: Crown Publishers, 2015.
Willard, Dallas. Renovation of the Heart: Putting on the Character of Christ. Colorado Springs: NavPress, 2002.
Notes
Introduction
1. Brent W. Roberts and Wendy F. DelVecchio, “The Rank-Order Consistency of Personality Traits from Childhood to Old Age: A Quantitative Review of Longitudinal Studies,” Psychological Bulletin 126, no. 1 (January 2000): 3–25.
2. Baffled? It’s “sleepy” + “angry.”
Chapter 1 My Aha! Moment
1. The book is Florence Littauer’s Personality Plus: How to Understand Others by Understanding Yourself (Grand Rapids: Revell, 1992), which has been reprinted numerous times since its initial printing in 1983.
2. Originally attributed to Miguel de Cervantes, Don Quixote, vol. 2, chap. VI. From Spanish “de todos ha de haber en el mundo,” which literally translates to “there must be of all [types] in the world.” Thomas Shelton, Don Quixote’s first translator, wrote this in 1620 as “In the world there must surely be all sorts.” It has appeared in various forms since.
3. Henry Southgate, Many Thoughts of Many Minds: A Treasury of Reference (London: Griffin, Bohn, and Company, 1862), 338.
4. Christopher Alexander, The Luminous Ground: The Nature of Order (Berkeley, CA: Center fo
r Environmental Structure, 2002), 297.
5. David Keirsey, Please Understand Me II: Temperament, Character, Intelligence (Del Mar, CA: Prometheus Nemesis Book Company, 1998), 250.
Chapter 2 Communication Breakdown
1. Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can’t Stop Talking (New York: Broadway Books, 2012).
2. Maia Szalavitz, “Q&A with Susan Cain on the Power of Introverts,” Time, January 27, 2012, healthland.time.com/2012/01/27/mind-reading-qa-with-susan-cain-on-the-power-of-introverts/.
3. Isabel Briggs Myers with Peter B. Myers, Gifts Differing: Understanding Personality Type (Palo Alto, CA: Davies-Black Publishing, 1980), 7.
4. Scott Barry Kaufman, “Can Personality Be Changed?” Atlantic, July 26, 2016, www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2016/07/can-personality-be-changed/492956/.
5. Cain, Quiet, 3; Cain is citing research by Rowan Bayne, Isabel Myers, the Center for Applications of Psychological Type Research Services, and Jean M. Twenge.
6. Szalavitz, “Q&A with Susan Cain.”
7. Winifred Gallagher, quoting J. D. Higley, “How We Become What We Are,” Atlantic 274, no. 3 (September 1994): 48.
8. William Revelle, Michael S. Humphreys, Lisa Simon, and Kirby Gilliland, “The Interactive Effect of Personality, Time of Day, and Caffeine: A Test of the Arousal Model,” Journal of Experimental Psychology: General 109, no. 1 (March 1980): 1.
9. Ibid.
10. Carl Jung, as quoted by Susan Cain, “The Power of Introverts,” TED video, 7:22, filmed February 2012, posted March 2012, www.ted.com/talks/susan_cain_the_power_of_introverts?language=en.
11. Does Jung have the last word on this aspect of personality? Of course not. But it’s important to understand his beliefs on introversion and extroversion now or the Myers-Briggs chapters won’t make sense later.
12. I like the Quiet Revolution Personality Test found at www.quietrev.com/the-introvert-test, even though it will categorize you as an introvert, extrovert, or ambivert.
13. Adam McHugh, Introverts in the Church: Finding Our Place in an Extroverted Culture (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity, 2009).
14. Cain, Quiet, 19–33.
Chapter 3 Too Hot to Handle
1. Elaine N. Aron, The Highly Sensitive Person: How to Thrive When the World Overwhelms You (New York: Broadway Books, 1996), 98.
2. Ibid.
3. Elaine N. Aron, The Highly Sensitive Child: Helping Our Children Thrive When the World Overwhelms Them (New York: Broadway Books, 2002), 7–8.
4. Take the self-test for highly sensitive people in The Highly Sensitive Person. A similar self-test for highly sensitive children is in her book The Highly Sensitive Child. Both self-tests are also available online at hsperson.com/test.
5. Elaine Aron, “Coping Corner: Noise!” The Highly Sensitive Person Comfort Zone Newsletter II, issue 1 (February 1997).
Chapter 4 Love and Other Acts of Blindness
1. Gary Chapman, The 5 Love Languages: The Secret to Love That Lasts (Chicago: Northfield Publishing, 1992).
2. Ibid., 19–24.
3. Gary Chapman and Paul White, The 5 Languages of Appreciation in the Workplace: Empowering Organizations by Encouraging People (Chicago: Northfield Publishing, 2011).
Chapter 5 You’re Not Crazy, You’re Just Not Me
1. This is a real site, available at www.randombabynames.com.
2. Keirsey, Please Understand Me II, 282.
3. Ibid., 22–26.
4. William Shakespeare, Hamlet, act 1, scene 2, line 68.
5. Keirsey, Please Understand Me II, 4–11; see also www.keirsey.com/sorter/register.aspx.
6. I’m including the corresponding Myers-Briggs shorthand because Keirsey did, and it will ultimately help the reader see how the two systems fit together. If you’re unfamiliar with Myers-Briggs and find these notations confusing, don’t worry about it now. We unpack that in the next chapter.
7. “Portrait of the Artisan,” Keirsey.com, accessed February 28, 2017, www.keirsey.com/4temps/artisan_overview.asp.
8. Keirsey, Please Understand Me II, 62.
9. “Portrait of the Guardian,” Keirsey.com, accessed February 28, 2017, www.keirsey.com/4temps/guardian_overview.asp.
10. Keirsey, Please Understand Me II, 103.
11. Keirsey, Please Understand Me II, 100. Keirsey says, “Indeed, nearly half of the forty-one Presidents of the United States have been Guardians, their attitude toward the office summed up in the words of Jimmy Carter: ‘The President of the United States is the steward of the nation’s destiny.’”
12. L. M. Montgomery, Anne of Green Gables (Boston: L. C. Page & Co, 1908), 68.
13. Anne Shirley is, of course, L. M. Montgomery’s character from the eponymous novel Anne of Green Gables (Boston: L. C. Page & Co, 1908), but this exchange is from the 1985 movie, also called Anne of Green Gables, directed by Kevin Sullivan (Toronto, ON: Sullivan Entertainment, 1985).
14. “Portrait of the Idealist,” Keirsey.com, accessed February 28, 2017, www.keirsey.com/4temps/idealist_overview.asp.
15. Keirsey, Please Understand Me II, 148.
16. You’ve Got Mail, directed by Nora Ephron (Burbank, CA: Warner Bros., 1998), DVD.
17. “Portrait of the Rational,” Keirsey.com, accessed February 28, 2017, www.keirsey.com/4temps/rational_overview.asp.
18. Keirsey, Please Understand Me II, 195.
19. Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice (London: Thomas Egerton, 1813).
20. Lyle W. Dorsett, ed., The Essential C. S. Lewis (New York: Touchstone, 1996), 369.
Chapter 6 Type Talk
1. Myers with Myers, Gifts Differing, xi–xv.
2. You’ll often see the word intuition written as “iNtuition” when MBTI is involved. This is to differentiate the Introversion and Intuition preferences, which both begin with the letter i. In MBTI shorthand, I is for Introversion and N is for iNtuition.
3. Charles R. Martin, Looking at Type: The Fundamentals (Gainesville, FL: Center for Applications of Psychological Type, 2001).
4. “Estimated Frequencies of the Types in the United States Population,” Center for Applications of Psychological Type, accessed March 1, 2017, www.capt.org/mbti-assessment/estimated-frequencies.htm?bhcp=1.
5. Martin, Looking at Type.
6. Check out the books in the Recommended Resources section pertaining to the Myers-Briggs Type Index and Keirsey’s temperaments. Of the MBTI personality descriptions available online, I especially like those at www.personalitypage.com.
7. Brian Kolodiejchuk, Mother Teresa: Come Be My Light (New York: Doubleday, 2007), 34.
8. David B. Goldstein and Otto Kroeger, Creative You: Using Your Personality Type to Thrive (New York: Atria, 2013), 131.
9. Ibid., 154.
10. “Quick Facts,” CPP, accessed March 1, 2017, www.cpp.com/products/mbti/index.aspx.
11. John M. Gottman, The Seven Principles for Making Marriage Work: A Practical Guide from the Country’s Foremost Relationship Expert (New York: Harmony, 1999), 129–30.
12. “Take the MBTI® Instrument,” The Myers & Briggs Foundation, accessed March 1, 2017, www.myersbriggs.org/my-mbti-personality-type/take-the-mbti-instrument/.
13. The official MBTI assessment is exclusively administered by CPP and can be taken at www.mbtionline.com/TaketheMBTI. The cost at time of publication was $49.95, plus tax.
14. Found at www.16personalities.com/free-personality-test.
15. Go to www.personalitypage.com/html/portraits.html to access Personality Page Type Portraits for each of the sixteen types.
16. Goldstein and Kroeger, Creative You, 131.
Chapter 8 Play to Your Strengths
1. Tom Rath, StrengthsFinder 2.0 (New York: Gallup, 2007), i.
2. Ibid., 20.
3. The Gallup Strengths Center Store can be found at www.gallupstrengthscenter.com/purchase/en-US/Product?Path=Clifton%20StrengthsFinder. The cost at time of publication was $15.00.
4. “Frequently Asked Questions,” Gallup
Strengths Center, accessed March 2, 2017, strengths.gallup.com/help/general/125483/retake-Clifton-StrengthsFinder-assessment-taking-Clifton-StrengthsFinder-once-af-aspx.
5. These ideas for action were included in my personalized Strengths Insight and Action-Planning Guide; however, ideas for action for all thirty-four themes can be found in StrengthsFinder 2.0.
6. Ibid.
Chapter 9 Confront Your Junk
1. Richard Rohr and Andreas Ebert, The Enneagram: A Christian Perspective (New York: Crossroad Publishing Company, 2001), 8–11.
2. Don Richard Riso and Russ Hudson, The Wisdom of the Enneagram, (New York: Bantam, 1999), 22.
3. Ibid., 22–25.
4. The name Enneagram comes from the Greek words ennea, meaning nine, and gram, meaning something written or drawn.