{"id":28476,"date":"2022-04-06T23:33:25","date_gmt":"2022-04-07T06:33:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/?p=28476"},"modified":"2022-04-06T23:33:25","modified_gmt":"2022-04-07T06:33:25","slug":"a-personality-to-call-our-own","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/a-personality-to-call-our-own\/","title":{"rendered":"A Personality to Call Our own"},"content":{"rendered":"

In Daniel Nettle\u2019s 2007 book, Personality: What Makes You the Way You Are<\/em>, human personalities are examined and explored to better understand each other and ourselves. I took the author\u2019s advice and after reading the introduction and before starting chapter one, I took the Newcastle Personality Assessor test in the Appendix of the back. It was helpful to do this step first before proceeding with the rest of the book. The assumption for this analysis is stated on page 53, \u201cFive broad trait families \u2013the big five\u2014emerge and can be usefully studied.\u201d Nettle breaks down human traits into five categories and he uses these categories throughout the rest of the book. \u201cThere are (at least) five broad personality dimensions along which we all differ, and which cause us to behave in certain ways rather than other ways\u201d (p. 235). These five categories are: Extroversion, Neuroticism, Conscientiousness, Agreeableness, Openness (250).<\/p>\n

There are a lot of different personality tests and methods of analysis that have spring up the past fifty years. Nettle\u2019s approach is simple yet effective. It is a short book and very accessible to anyone who wants to know more about their own personality. Because everyone is inherently interested in themselves, this book has generated a lot of interest in readership for many years. The conclusion of the matter is stated on page 244, \u201cThe positive message of this book is that there is no reason to wish one\u2019s basic personality dispositions to be anything other than what they are.\u201d It is a reassuring message and good news to all of us that recognize in ourselves shortcomings of our own personalities. This book was lighter fare compared to the previous several books that came before, such as Vincent Miller\u2019s 2008 book, \u201cConsuming Religion,\u201d Peter G. Northouse\u2019s 1997 book, \u201cLeadership: Theory and Practice,\u201d and Pragya Agarwal\u2019s book, \u201cSway: Unravelling Unconscious Bias.\u201d<\/p>\n

I found many connections between Nettle\u2019s book and others we have read this semester. First is Daniel Lieberman\u2019s, The Molecule of More. <\/em>Both of these books provide a scientific underpinning for the research on what drives human behavior. Lieberman\u2019s book furthers the debate between nature versus nurture and emphasizes the nature part of the equation. Nettle\u2019s book also emphasizes the nature part of our being but with a different approach. It is less about the molecular and chemical make-up of our brains, but still has a lot to say about evolutionary biology and genetics. There is a practical side to Nettle\u2019s book and that is human behavior. For all his deep analysis, he remains interested in why humans behave the way we do.<\/p>\n

There is a connection also with Steven Pressfield\u2019s, The War of Art.<\/em> We have to wrestle with ourselves in order to create something new and original that reflects who we are. Anyone who has this creative bent of mind will benefit from Nettle\u2019s book as much as from Pressfield\u2019s offering. The journey is to better understand ourselves and then live that out in our relationships and professional endeavors.<\/p>\n

Furthermore, Kathryn Schulz\u2019s, Being Wrong<\/em> teaches us that to err is human but not to be ashamed of it. It is an inescapable part of being human and critical to our learning process. The same can be said about learning about our personality type. We should not be ashamed of our personality but embrace who we are. At the same time, we can and should strive to improve and mature. That is an important difference in our approach to growing and maturing into who God created us to be. A is often said, \u201cGod loves us too much to let us stay where we are.\u201d Or as Paul says in Philippians 3:13, \u201cForgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead.\u201d And what lies ahead for us? \u00a0Revelation 2:17 tell us: “I will also give that person a white stone with a new name written on it, known only to the one who receives it.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In Daniel Nettle\u2019s 2007 book, Personality: What Makes You the Way You Are, human personalities are examined and explored to better understand each other and ourselves. I took the author\u2019s advice and after reading the introduction and before starting chapter one, I took the Newcastle Personality Assessor test in the Appendix of the back. It […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":150,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[2268],"class_list":["post-28476","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-nettle","cohort-lgp11"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28476","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/150"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=28476"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28476\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":28477,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28476\/revisions\/28477"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=28476"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=28476"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=28476"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}