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Personality tests are my jam. I will gladly take anything and everything that has to do with personalities. My favorite tests are Myers Briggs, Enneagram, and the four temperaments test. I actually have my bachelors in Psychology, so to no surprise, I also love knowing others’ personality traits and descriptions. I find it so fascinating how different every person is, yet there are only so many categories we each fall under.
Understanding someone else’s personality is so important for any relationship. Lord knew that I needed to major in psychology, because it has given me so much grace for others.
So why are personality tests so important? Well, I already briefly mentioned it. If you can understand your personality and your spouses personality…well then you will have much more grace for them than you would have before. Understanding someone else’s personality truly helps you comprehend why they may say or do the things they do. It can help get into their mind just a little. You can learn about how your personalities work together and how they really, really contradict each other. My gosh. If I didn’t understand my husbands personality, I would probably go insane. Skim through and read what we scored and then Ill briefly talk about the importance of this!
Real quick, before I talk about results – lets talk about these tests :
Myers Briggs was one of the first tests I took while still in college. I have never found a better description of them than the one that my professor handed out. So I am going to list those down below. It is fun to read these descriptions prior to tests to guess which one you think you and your spouse are! (Typically girls are better at figuring the guys out than the other way around!)
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I am an ISFJ and Kris happens to be ESFJ. (So basically he is the extroverted version of myself) LOL! And even though the only difference in this test seems to be that he is extroverted while I am introverted, his extroverted-ness makes the SFJ completely different, too. (See why I love personality tests)
Next is the beloved Enneagram. If you have never taken this test, it is an easy 60 question test and you can take it HERE! I am type 3 (THE ACHIEVER The Success-Oriented, Pragmatic Type: Adaptive, Excelling, Driven, and Image-Conscious) Which explains why I run a business. I actually happen to be type 3 but tied with type 1 (the perfectionist). And tied for second is type 8 (the challenger) and type 6 (the loyalist).
SO to sum it all up : In order to survive, I must be orderly/planned, impressive and attractive, secure and safe, strong and in control. Yeah…I know, my poor husband.
Kris, on the other hand, is a type 9 (THE PEACEMAKER The Easygoing, Self-Effacing Type: Receptive, Reassuring, Agreeable, and Complacent) and his second being only one point lower as type 7 (the enthusiast). So basically… if you read my blog, “For the Workaholic”, this all is really making sense.
The Meyers briggs test doesn’t do a good job and pinpointing how our personalities contradict one another. But I still love the paragraphs. So while I am not going to really talk too much more about the Meyers Briggs, I still recommend guessing which one you and your spouse are and then taking the test to see! You can take that test HERE! And for the “Four Temperaments”, I have an entire blog I will be writing about that one that will be titled, “When a Melancholy Marries a Sanguine” so be sure to check that out when posted!
Back to the enneagram.
I really do love to have fun, but it certainly comes much more natural to Kris than it does to me. I don’t like doing things that Im not great at – and if fun consists of anything too risky, count me out. Oh, and I love meeting deadlines, running a business, and learning new things.
Kris on the other hand is definitely the risk-taker, easy-going, down for whatever and whenever, and incredibly adventurous.
And I wouldn’t have it any other way.
Kris has helped me become more adventurous and easy-going. While I have helped Kris become more adult-like. (I know…BORING!) But really, we do even each other out. And if we didn’t look at it that way, we would butt heads constantly. I could easily focus on finding Kris too easy-going and not serious enough. While he could easily focus on me being uptight instead of care-free.
Earlier in our relationship, this did bring friction. Neither of us were willing to recognize the good in one another’s personalty and constantly focused on the negative. Several years, and one or two personality tests later, we realized that we can actually learn from one another instead of constantly trying to change one another.
And by doing exactly that, we have seen our personalities slightly change. I am able to still operate when plans get changed, and Kris can turn down an opportunity to have fun (aka play basketball or football) when something around the house needs done.
I probably have lost many of you while reading this, but I hope you at least skimmed to the conclusion.
Spending your life with the same person can be either really awful or really wonderful. I like to view it as really wonderful (obviously). It is two people who can be really different, way too similar, or somewhere in between, that are trying to do life together. And it can either grow you apart or strengthen you together. So I will leave you with this – learn your spouse’s personality, love their differences, and always extend grace where they need it.
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With Love, Kayla