Myers Briggs Personality Types

What Is It?

One of my favorite things to do is analyze personality types. It's so interesting to me that there are different aspects of personality and that each person fits into a basic description of those categories. It's even more intriguing how accurate the descriptions are! The Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) is a test that analyzes which type you are. Myers and Briggs came up with four basic categories containing two options within each, yielding sixteen total personality types. 

Each type consists of four aspects, represented by a letter. You should be able to relate to each of these individually. For example, you are extraverted (E).  Knowing which category a person fits into for each is quite insightful. However, the amazing thing is the personality type that results from the combination of the four letters. There are sixteen separate personality types that describe the overall characteristics of a person with that type. For example, an ESTP is thrill-seeking, lives in the moment, and adventurous.

Whit and I often like to guess what we think people's personality types are. Knowing about each type really helps you know yourself better and understand people who are unlike you. Although every person does not fit their type perfectly, it certainly gives insight into the particular ways a person functions. It's nice to know that while someone does life differently than you, you are both still normal. Knowing the personality types of each member of my team in Venezuela helped us to all understand each other, and thus work better together. It is also an excellent resource to understand your spouse or significant other, as well as family members and friends.

One caveat is that although you were made to be a certain way, that doesn't warrant you permission to be stubborn in your ways. All of us have weaknesses in our personality (sin!) that we need to be aware of and work on to get along with others and glorify God. The MBTI is a great tool to help you find what areas you need to work on, and since there is a lot of research about each type, there are plenty of resources that can help others help you!

How Do I Know What I Am?

Now, here's how you do it! There are many free tests online that come close to finding your type but often fail at being completely accurate, especially if you only take it once. You can buy an official test, but that is expensive. The best way I've come up with is to learn about each type, guess what you are, and then take the test. Compare your results, and look up your answer to learn about that type (or both, if you got a different answer).  

This website is a great resource, but since not everyone wants to read a whole separate article, I will try to briefly help you understand each type (information below is based on that article and personal experience). However, I fully recommend spending some time on that page to really learn about each one and figure out what you are. After going through each letter, you'll have a guess of what your type might be, and at the bottom I'll include a link to a pretty good test you can take. If you already know your type and want to learn what it means, or learn about the other types, skip down to the bottom and check out the website listed there.

Where Do You Get Your Energy? Extraverts (E) vs. Introverts (I)

This category is often mis-interpreted; people think that they have to be super outgoing to be extraverted, or that introverts are boring wallflowers. While that may be true for some people, it's not the defining characteristic of this category. The question you want to answer is where you get your energy from. Are you energized by the outer world of people, activities, and things around you? Or is your mind the primary energy source, your inner world filled with thoughts, imagination, and ideas. 

Real life example: The extravert who is stuck in an office crunching numbers during the day comes home excited to work on a project outdoors or go out with his friends to talk and do more things. The introvert who is around people all day comes home and sits on the couch or closes the door to be alone before sharing the details about his day with his family.

A brief note on preferences:

This may be an easy one for you or you may feel split between the two worlds. For each category, including this first one, you have a dominant side. That's why each of these aspects are called preferences. You probably don't always function this way, but you do generally choose one side over the other. Which one do you do first? Maybe you can be extraverted, but only after many hours of quiet work alone. 

Everyone is born with a set of preferences. You may not have known what you were growing up because you were still under the impression that everyone is supposed to act a certain way (the same!). Take a look back at your life and see what the trends were. If you were mostly one way when you were 12, or when you entered college, that's your preference. 

It is possible to change your behavior, but you can't change your preferences. Even if you forced yourself out of your shell when you started 9th grade, you're still introverted, you are just a more wide-ranged person, and that's a good thing! If you're trying to guess your parents' type, it will probably be more difficult because they've learned how to act in society through their job, parenting, and living life. Or maybe you don't know which one you are because your job or friends have influenced you into being a certain way. Everyone has room to mature and expand their personality, but we still all have basic preferences. Okay, back to the test!

Which fits you better?

Extravert - act-er, big groups, want to be out in the world doing things and being with people

Introvert - thinker, one-on-one or small groups, need time alone

Here's a test you can give yourself (answers below - don't peek until you've done the exercise!! I'm serious!):

(Read first and then do it) Close your eyes for some period of time (less than a minute). Yep, that's the only instruction! Just do it and then check below. It may be fun to check the second hand on your watch and then see how long you had your eyes closed for. Okay, now you can check the answers below!

How Do You Perceive the World? Sensing (S) vs. Intuition (N)

This is how information enters your brain. Do you process all the details and see what's actually there? Or do you look past what's physically there and look beyond at the patterns and possibilities surrounding? Sensing is categorized by the five senses, details what is real, and what is based on information you know from the past. The intuitive brain interprets what's there in terms of overall patterns it fits into, is imaginative, thinks about possibilities beyond the actual facts, and looks into the future.

Real world example: The intuitive spouse excitedly shares an idea for a vacation with her spouse. They will go to Hawaii and experience the real island lifestyle, like on the TV show Lost. Or they could go to Africa and do a safari or take a helicopter ride. The sensing spouse is bogged down by the ideas. "They're never gonna happen!" he thinks. "Do we have enough money? How many vacation days do we have left? Let's look at the facts."

Which fits you better?

Sensing - live in the here and now, common sense, comfortable with familiarity, practical solutions, remember lots of facts (probably a good story-teller), like concrete information

Intuition - dream about the future, create new possibilities and come up with new ideas, like change, memory is made of connections and summaries (it felt this way, it was like this other thing we did), theoretical, okay with ambiguous information

Test yourself - 

Choose a random object in the room (doesn't matter - choose fast!). Now, write down what you see. Okay, check below!

How Do You Make Choices? Thinking (T) vs. Feeling (F)

If the second letter governs how information comes into your brain, the third letter governs what you do with that information when it goes out. For each letter there is a huge difference between how your brain works depending on which preference you have, but this might have the biggest dichotomy between the two letters. Basically, the two options here are if you think about facts or people when you make decisions. That's about it.

Which Fits You Better?

Thinker - objective, logical, look at the facts when making decisions, naturally spot tasks to be accomplished, accept conflict

Feeler - subjective, values, weigh the effects on people when making decisions, sensitive to people, seek consensus, uncomfortable with conflict

Test Yourself -

Answer this question. Imagine you are the coach of a sports team (you choose what sport. if you can't think of any, go with basketball). You find out your team has made it to state championships! Congratulations! You may choose 5 people from your team to go. However, you have 10 people on your team. How do you decide which 5 people to bring?

Which Process Governs Your Relationship with the World Around You? Judging (J) vs. Perceiving (P)

This shows whether your relationship with the outer world is governed by the second letter (sensing/intuition) or third (thinking/feeling). One will be more dominant. The other will govern your inner world. Basically, this shows you whether you generally make decisions (thinking/feeling) or take in information (sensing/intuition). 

Which Fits You Better?

Judging - have a plan, make decisions, follow through to completion, prepared, plan before taking action, work ahead of deadlines, use of routines and schedules to manage and organize life, work first then play

Perceiving - take life as it comes, adaptive, flexible, open-ended, able to change the plan, plan not necessary, spontaneous, multi-task, work well close to deadlines, avoid commitments that get in the way of your spontaneity and that lack variation, work and play throughout the day

Test Yourself - 

You are going on vacation. What does this look like?

What's Your Personality Type?

Now that you have a better understanding of each letter, what are your four preferences? (eg. ENFJ, ISTP)

To be certain of your type, visit the website I previously referenced or take a free online test. Since you already know what they're testing for, keep the eight preferences in mind while answering the questions. I believe this will help you get more accurate results because you will understand what the questions are trying to ask you instead of answering them with no context (I am an N ;)). 

The next step is to read about your type. The description should be extremely accurate. If it isn't, you might want to re-check your type. The description won't be completely accurate, and it might be more extreme than you actually are, but it should give you a very close description of yourself. Everyone fits into one of the sixteen types! If you don't agree with your type, you might have chosen answers wrong because you didn't understand the questions quite well enough. 

Finally, once you are sure of your type, re-read the description and find other resources that will help you understand your strengths and weaknesses so you can work on those, and so that others (spouse, co-workers, friends) can understand you better.

What is your type???

Leave a comment letting me know what you are! I'm an INTP.

Test Answers!

First Test (E/I): How did you feel? What did you think about? How long were your eyes closed?

Extraverts - felt pressured/constrained, mind racing, could only think about the challenge, wanted to talk or do something, you probably couldn't keep your eyes closed for long! (maybe 5-15 seconds)

Introverts - felt relaxed, like a pressure was taken off you so you could enter into your inner world and just think, thought about other things or ideas, maybe you kept your eyes closed longer (30 seconds)

Second Test (S/N): What did you write down? 

Sensing - you wrote down facts about the object using your five senses (big, blue, covered in fabric, has a quilt on it, two arms, old, 4 feet tall)

Intuition - you wrote down what it reminded you of or connected it to other things (comfy, grandpa, love, soft, cozy, make phone calls from there)

Two totally different descriptions of the same chair! Crazy how different we perceive things! This is the biggest killer for communication, in my opinion. It is also the most common area of difference between married couples, or so I have observed. How unfortunate! We're already starting out perceiving the world completely differently! What effect will that have on communication?? It helps tremendously if you learn how the other person interprets the words you're saying.

Third Test (T/F): How did you decide?

Thinker - you picked the best 5 people, duh. maybe you came up with a test to determine who the best 5 were, and you picked the 5 people with the best scores

Feeler - you thought about how it would affect the players. it was probably tough for you to decide because you wanted to be able to bring all 5 players. you didn't want to hurt any feelings. maybe you came up with some system to figure out who wanted to go the most, and you would take those 5 people. you may not have even come up with an answer!

Fourth Test (J/P): What was your plan? What would happen if it didn't work out?

Judging - you came up with a plan with details. you might have specified a date and length of time you'd be gone, determined where you'd be going and who would go with you, figured out what you would do while you're there. maybe you didn't come up with a plan because you don't want to have a plan because your normal life is too structured. if your plans got changed on vacation you would be thrown off and wouldn't be able to relax

Perceiving - you might not have come up with a plan. you would be open to changing the variables (what you're doing, when you're going, where you're going). maybe you came up with a plan, but on the actual vacation you wouldn't be upset if you didn't get to do everything you had planned; if you saw something better while you were there or something didn't work out you'd be willing to do that instead