What the Personality Assessments Don’t Tell You

Success can be examined as a process, or activity of moving from one state to another based on the intention. 

Example: if the goal is to jog once per day in the afternoon, one can perform a self-assessment to discover the reason why this is a challenge. One can also do the inner investigation to understand which qualities are needed in order to accomplish the goal, or to be “successful.” 

Some qualities for jogging daily include:

1. Discipline
2. Focus
3. Energy
4. Motivation
5. A Plan, a Schedule
6. Clothing
7. Location
8. Measurement for what success looks like
9. An idea of what to do once the goal is accomplished
10. Intention
11. Resilience, to withstand the occasion that one doesn’t jog
12. Persistence

These skills and abilities form the matrix of being that empowers a person to set a new goal, envision it and execute with consistency.

Character Strengths Exist Synergistically 

When “unsuccessful,” that is, being unable to express this reality is an indication of a combination of these capacities being dormant or dull. 

Lack of motivation can impede a person’s ability to apply the well-thought-out schedule created. 

High motivation and lack of a concrete plan to follow creates an energetic individual ready to take action but may do so in a scattered way. Scattering that energy. 

Having an intention to run is but the first step, while lack of focus on that intention would render the intent impotent. 

Having strong focus but lacking an intent could cause the person to concentrate on things other than the actual run goal.

Mixing these skills shows how they integrate and need each other. This is similar to how the personality assessments work. 

There is a time to exert extroversion energy while there are times to be more contemplative or introverted. 

There’s a time to use the leadership energy, stepping to the front to act as example or steward to a team; there are also other times when it’s best step aside and hear someone else’s example. 

When we become skillful at recognizing this internal flow, knowing our abilities, the environment and what’s needed in the moment, we become more “successful,” more effective at realizing our intention. 

Personality Assessments Can Bind or Release Potential

Instead of being bound by the personality assessment code, strive to cultivate all of the codes so they can be harnessed at the necessary time. A common term for this is whole-brain thinking or whole-brain learning.

This means a person can amplify his ability to successfully execute on this goal if he focuses on developing the appropriate capacities needed for it. And he will fail if he is deficient in a combination of these capacities.

I invested time during undergrad to take many of these self-assessments, out of curiosity and part of my self-knowledge path. Some were better than others if I compare their descriptions, but overall found them to be useful for the language precision provided. 

I also realized that these patterns described were capabilities that could be developed from within, and would serve a person no matter their “code” or “type.” 

My Myers-Briggs is predominantly INTJ, but I can also access ENTJ. I can also access the other codes, and that’s the point I’m getting at: the more capabilities or expressions or “codes” a person can access, the more abilities are available for expression for a given situation. 

If you’re curious about taking some of the personality assessments out there, download my checklist below.