Your personality

Our personality is said to refer to patterns of feelings, thoughts and the way in which you or someone else behaves. These patterns of personality are what create the individual human being, and that which makes up what is our basic personality traits and creates you, as a person.

In certain situations however we might not always behave and think and feel in the same way each time. Our basic personality traits will determine how we will react and behave, but it can alter and depends very much on the environment, the situation and the people you are with. For example you might be a person who is shy and likes to take a back seat, but then you might find yourself in a situation that requires that you act differently and almost temporary change your normal personality traits such as in an emergency situations.

What does it say about you

People will use certain descriptive words to describe their own personality and that of there parent child or an acquaintance. So people tend to be defined by their personality and a number of descriptive words will be used such as happy, organised, defiant, lazy shy and a number of other personality descriptions. From your personality description therefore you are most likely to behave in fairly predictable ways.

You will be able to find various tests to determine the personality that you have. Of course these tests rely on the answers that you give to the questions so it is best to be totally honest even if that is not how you would like to behave. This sort of information can tell you a lot of information about your personality and can be useful for example in determining the sort of career that you might be suited to. This is also useful for employers as well to know about your personality, particularly if you are requires to be working with others within a team situation.

Can you change it

Some people would say that a personality is determined from our genetic inheritance and is fixed from birth. Others say that personality is formed due to our life experiences that occur. Research suggests that our personalities do not change very much. Although personalities are said to develop through our life experiences that we come across and that can be considered to be challenging to us i.e. bereavement, divorce and other potentially difficult experiences through our lives. Having experienced these life events we then adapt our thoughts and feelings and behaviour so that when we experience similar events then we are able to adapt our personalities to coping with them.

I personally think that certain parts of our personality are fixed and are difficult to change. For example I am not a naturally organised or tidy person and struggle with this area of my life. No matter how hard I try and how much advice I read about this so called skill that can be taught, I still have difficulty. My son who obviously inherited his father’s very organised and tidy genes is exactly the same as him. He is tidy organised and has to have everything in its place. Even though I brought my son up and I have been his main role model, I believe that he has his fathers fixed organised personality traits.

I’m sure people will have their own view on where our personalities do originate from. For me it’s important that we are all different and have an individual skill that are related to our personality and that is what keeps us different and unique.