I would like to point out something I don’t think we stressed during the workshop. On the video, did you notice that there was a significant issue regarding the Sensing/Intuiting preference? The attorneys were totally surprised at the reaction they got from the tenants when they announced their plans to convert the building. While they did give is some consideration (intuitive) they completely missed what the reaction turned out to be. Much more important though was the position of the tenants. They never considered or perhaps even saw the possibility that they would lose everything. To a certain extent, I can appreciate that the value they were fighting for was bigger than themselves – they could honestly take the perspective that they were fighting for all people in like and similar circumstances. However, a solution that provided protection for existing tenants during transition would have had far-ranging implications and applications. Instead, they lost it all – not is a way any of them anticipated, I am sure. But they lost not only their self interests but also any hope of establishing a precedent for other transitional property use issues. I see a very significant sensor/intuitive issue that I am not sure could have been overcome. But if someone could overcome it, it had to be approached earlier than it was.

Your comments on this issue would be welcomed.

I hope each of you had a wonderful Thanksgiving. And I wanted to thank you for attending the workshop – you were a great group and I enjoyed it!

I’ve had one email so far on the presentation. Remember the Christmas Basket hypothetical. One attendee who played the role of the person who worked on the project insisted that it was “her” basket. I then started asking her if she realized what she was doing to the relationships in the office. Someone commented that she thought that line of argument was having an effect. I hope you noticed what I was doing. I did not get into a logical argument about who it was intended for. I went right to the feeling/value argument based on relationships. I ignored the logic/reasoning aspect. This is what I meant when I said you should be prepared to have a feeling/value argument in every conflict mediation or negotiation. Please feel free to post a comment on your own reaction to the argument.

For those of you who would like to have a copy of the last Power Point presentation I made Friday morning, “Approaching Conflict”, please send me an email to robert@kubacki.com and I’d be happy to forward a copy.

Thanks once again for taking the workshop and have a great Thanksgiving weekend!

7 Key Steps to Living a Beautiful Life

by Belinda Munoz

“Be what you are. This is the first step toward becoming better than you are.” ~ Julius Charles Hare

I admit, I have a beautiful life.  I don’t mean to brag, but I love the life I have and there is no other life I’d rather live. But this wasn’t always my truth.

Many years ago, I didn’t think I would one day have a beautiful life.  I had a terrible attitude, a soul-sucking job that I occasionally enjoyed superficially at best, and I pursued things that would always leave me feeling empty.  It took me a long time and a lot of work to get to where I am.

Today, like everyone, I have my own struggles. I have personal deficits that I’m aware need fine-tuning (or major overhaul). I’m susceptible to sadness, negative energy from others, and occasional feelings of helplessness about the troubles of the world.  But I focus more on laughter, celebration and the depths of life.  Overall, life is beautiful.

I’m not talking about aesthetic beauty, although a beautiful environment can contribute to a beautiful life.  I’m talking about a deeper kind of beauty.  One that you can’t buy from a store.  One that makes you feel excited about being alive, that allows you to be inspired and be an inspiration, that shows your connectedness to other human beings.

I would imagine that many of you who are already living a beautiful life have your own formula for getting there.  But for those who are curious, here are my 7 key steps:


1. Know thyself.

It sounds simple.  In reality, it’s challenging to do.  It requires focused introspection which can be difficult as most of us have built layers of denial about ourselves.  I suggest having a really honest assessment of yourself.

Explore all areas:  your passions, your deepest desires and fears, what makes you proud, insecure, ashamed, what work you’d love to do even without getting paid, etc.  Learning about yourself can be a hugely emotional process, but if you approach it with honesty, you will find it cleansing and therapeutic.  A good place to start is the Myers-Briggs test.

I would also suggest engaging someone you trust to help with this process.  This person needs to be someone who knows you well, who understands your strengths and weaknesses and whose opinion you respect.

This person can help you determine whether what you believe to be true about yourself comes through to the outside world.  Maybe you love connecting with others, but others find you aloof.  This exercise will help point to truths about yourself that aren’t readily visible to the outside world as well as universal truths you may not be ready to accept.

2. *Define what “beautiful life” means to you.

Let’s assume we all know it’s not material things that will lead us to a beautiful life.  This is the part where you ask yourself what’s missing in your life.  Is it love?  Is it happiness?  Is it inspiration?

Here are some other suggested questions:  What am I filling my life with that I’d rather replace with other things?  What is preventing me from taking action?  Is it fear?  Do I think I don’t deserve it?  Are these reasons good enough to get in the way of building a beautiful life?  If you’re being honest with yourself, your answer will be a resounding “no.”

3. Start working toward living a beautiful life.

Think about ways to attain what’s missing, or to eliminate what’s unnecessary.  This is where all the adventures take place.  It will take some work as you step out of your comfort zone, but it can be a lot more fun than you ever imagined.  Adventures are exhilarating.  If you commit to this step, you will no doubt feel how exciting life can be.

For example, if you’re looking for love, perhaps you’ll let a trusted friend know that you would love to meet someone incredible.  Maybe you’ll consider online dating.  Maybe you’ll go out on blind dates or try speed-dating.  It can be scary at first, but most likely, it will get easier with practice.

Another example, say, your life is filled with way too much activity. You’d like to scale back and have some breathing room.   Start by saying “no” a little bit at a time.  If you’d rather go to a yoga class, you should do so instead of going out for drinks with co-workers.

4. Appreciate where you are in this process.

Building a beautiful life can be a tough process at first.  There will be starts, stops and lots of tension along the way.  But, as with anything, beginning is half the battle.  If you’ve gone this far, you have made progress.

Go ahead and allow yourself to feel good about being at the halfway point to living a beautiful life!

5. Adjust your expectations.

The funny thing about being an active participant in building your beautiful life is it is full of surprises.  You may find that things you’ve determined to be true about steps 1, 2, 3 and 4 have evolved.  By this time, you’ve likely gotten a taste of how beautiful life can be through adventures and new experiences.

If you find that this process is leading you somewhere different from what you envisioned, ask yourself if you want to refocus or continue down this path.  Whatever you decide to do at this point, it’s likely that you have learned a lot about what living a beautiful life means to you.

6. Count your blessings and be thankful for what you have.

This is a step that can be inserted at any part in this process. Chances are, if you remember to count your blessings, you’re already living a beautiful life.  What’s also true is, once you count your blessings, you’ll realize that life is, indeed, beautiful.


7. Live your beautiful life.

Go ahead.  You deserve it.

*Disclaimer: There are countless people who lack basic material needs such as food, shelter and clothing, and I believe that every human being should have their basics met before they can seize their chance to live a beautiful life.  I also believe that helping them is an integral part of living a beautiful life.

Belinda Munoz is a mother, wife and a social change activist living in San Francisco.  She’s a foundation director and political advisor who maintains balance through yoga.  Visit her blog about choosing positivity at thehalfwaypoint.net and follow her on Twitter @belindavmunoz.

From http://tinybuddha.com/blog/7-key-steps-to-living-a-beautiful-life/

Have you ever met a person who rubbed you the wrong way, but you couldn’t figure out why? Have you ever had a boss or coworker you didn’t know how to deal with? Did you ever wonder how two siblings raised by the same parents could be so different (like my own boys)?

It’s all in the personality.

Understanding your personality style can be valuable for determining career choices and understanding why you act the way you do. Recognizing others’ personality styles can help you get along better with the people you deal with every day.

But as a writer, you can use an understanding of personality styles to craft complex characters who act in a consistent and believable way. Besides knowing your character’s goals and motivation, choosing a personality style for her will help you create a believable reaction when she meets an obstacle.

Using The Platinum Rule™ Behavioral Styles developed by Dr. Tony Alessandra, here are four potential responses for your character when she’s faced with an obstacle:

• The Thinker might gather information, make a list of pros and cons, and plan a response, finally acting when she has as much information as possible. Her response will probably be timely, but not immediate.
• The Socializer would probably make a decision based on impulse. Leap then look.
• The Relater would worry about the problem, try to avoid it, ask for other’s opinions, and hope that someone else would take care of it. Head in the sand.
• The Director would quickly size up the options, make a decision, and execute it, even if others think it’s the wrong choice.

It should be clear that the type of character you choose can have a great effect on your story. Each of the four options above could take the same story in a different direction.

If you’d like to find out more, here are some of the popular personality assessments you might want to check out. Take a quiz as yourself, and then take a quiz as your character. You might be surprised what you learn.

• The Platinum Rule™ Behavioral Styles quiz on Brian Tracy’s website
• The Shapes Personality Test created by Dr. Susan E. Dellinger – includes a 5th style, for people in transition
• The Jung Typology Test based on the work by Dr. Carl Jung (a.k.a. the Myers Briggs test)

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The Daily Squirrel: acrobat

In her dreams, she was an acrobat, flying high above the circus floor while the audience looked on with awe. The gasps of the crowd filled her ears, the wind ruffled her hair and cooled her face as she flew from swing to swing. She could smell the popcorn and cotton candy mingled with the scent of hay and animals. With a sudden bang on her bedroom door, the dream vanished, slipping through her fingers like sand. She stared at the loose drywall tape on the ceiling of her ordinary bedroom, in an ordinary house, where her boring, ordinary life took place.

I really dig personality typing.  Since finding out I am an INFJ, so much has fallen into place for me in my life; my way of being in the world, my relationship with my husband, and the way I relate with my friends and family.  Even liking personality testing is part of being an INFJ!  It has opened a new world for me that always existed, but I just wasn’t cognizant of it. 

I didn’t realize I was an introvert (I), because I get along so well with, and love people; I am very close to my good friends.  Yet I need a lot of mental space, and some physical space, and don’t like to be around  people all the time.  I know to avoid too many obligations in my attempt to help people as I just don’t have that kind of energy to expend, because being an introvert I like to conserve my energy.  I like to use my energy to go deeply with a few people, not stay more superficial and engage with a lot of people, which is the hallmark of extraverts.

Being an intuitive (N) is no surprise.  I’ve always lived in my head, although I’ve never been aware of it before.  I just thought everyone perceived the world intuitively.  I used to incessantly ask my husband, who is an ISTP–’S’ standing for sensor, who lives in the present reality, “Whatcha thinking about?” all the time when he was quiet, because I judged by the contemplation in his character that he must be thinking quite abstract thoughts.  He always answered, “Nothing really,” and now I know it was absolutely true!  Except instead of ’nothing,’ he’s really just thinking about the current moment:  What’s making that ticking sound (that I wouldn’t even notice!), or what he needs to buy when he goes to Home Depot.  Now that I understand he’s really not holding out on me, I’ve left off asking him to share his every waking thought.  To which he is very relieved.  Being very N also explains why I never, ever notice anything or anyone when I am out and about in the world.  I’m really not lost or dumb, my mind is just somewhere else–introverted intuition does that to you.

Being a Feeler (F) versus being a Thinker basically means I feel my way through things, instead of weighing factual pros and cons to arrive at a decision.  I like to trust my intuition and ‘follow my heart.’  I genuinely care very deeply for people, and can feel hurt rather easily based on others actions toward me.  I use feeling in an extraverted way however, mainly toward others.  It is my auxiliary function (my second most comfortable way of being, after introverted intuition), so it really defines who I am; I am at home listening to and connecting with others, preferably on a one-on-one scenario.

Finally, the ’J’ means I am a judger.  The opposite is a ‘perceiver’ or ‘P.’  This doesn’t mean I necessarily judge people.  It means that my judging function, F,  is extraverted.  I prefer to make judgments about the world rather than internally, whereas I prefer to perceive information internally (Ni), rather than use my intuition in the world.  My J makes me more likely to like to plan things, rather than be spontaneous.  It also makes me more directive in my relating with people and things.  I don’t mince words, and I am pretty good with finishing things, or deciding NOT to finish something.  These traits are loose however.  Indeed this last letter was added later in the personality testing schemata by a mother/daughter team named Myers-Briggs, who developed the first assessment for personality type in the 1960s.  They followed up Carl Jung’s work on psychological type theory.  As a Swiss psychiatrist he invented Jungian psychology, and proposed the first 3 ‘letters’ or dichotomies of type theory.

I encourage you to take this good free test.  The real Myers Briggs test can be obtained fairly easily online, for a small fee.  Feel free to comment about what your type is.  As a personality forum junkie, I like hearing about others’ personality types!   

http://www.humanmetrics.com/cgi-win/JTypes2.asp

I made a presentation to the regular monthly meeting of the Inland Empire chapter of the Project Management Institute last night. As always, it was a pleasure – you’re a great group!

The “comment of the night” came when we were talking about the fact that there is no room in team building and team relationships for sarcasm. One of attendees mentioned a 16-year old son whose answer was, “I was only kidding.” Baloney! Sarcasm in any context, family or work, is aimed at one thing – making the person feel/look better at someone else’ expense. Is there a creature on this planet that is more insecure than a 16 year-old boy? (It’s been a long time, but I remember what I and my brothers were like at that age.) Ask yourself this, “Is there any benefit from letting that kind of insecurity run rampant in a business environment?”

Team Building, the subject last night, uses all of the skill sets used in negotiation, conflict resolution and relationship management. And we discussed the finer points of applying those in the context of building a team. Please feel free to post a comment or question here. For those of you with “real life” questions or examples, send me an email or post here. I’ll take a good one, change the names to protect the guilty and make separate posts for comments by others.

The webinar I did a few weeks ago for ExecSense is apparently finished. I received a copy of the final product over the weekend. (I have to confess that I haven’t listened to it – like many people, I really do not like to listen to my own voice. In any event, I loaned it to my aunt who was interested in hearing it.) I understand that it will be fully released to the subsribers and for purchase within two weeks.

For those of you who have listened to it, thank you! Please feel free to post a comment, question, or a real-life question here.

For the attendees of the Riverside, CA, workshop on Conflict Resolution in the Workplace on Nov. 4 & 6: I am sorry for not opening up this comment sooner. Any of you are invited to leave comments on real or hypothetical issues related to the workshop.

And thanks to all that attended! While I hope you got a lot out of it, Fred and I really enjoyed giving the workshop.

I mentioned in a previous post that understanding temperaments really helped me.

As I started to unravel and become weaker, I realised that I had to understand myself a bit better and focus on the things that I was wired to do and develop my team a bit better to compensate and shore up the areas I was weak in.

For those that are a bit skeptical about “boxing” people just suspend judgement for a bit. Marcus Buckingham in his “Discover your strengths” book talks about the synapses that we are born with – basically a bazillion. Then over the first few years of our life, these dissolve leaving us with comparatively a few connections. Because there seems to be no rhyme nor reason as to which dissolve, we each have strengths (neural pathways) and weaknesses as a result. We tend to be naturally good at some things, and drawn to some things as opposed to others.

Now, to temperament typing. I’ve done some very simple temperament tests, and they were helpful. But the most comprehensive that I’ve found is the Myers Briggs. I filled out the Myers briggs and my results came back as INTJ.

I don’t want to dwell too much on what those letters mean at this stage, but for me here’s how it panned out:

I’m introverted. That means I need time alone to recharge my batteries. That’s not to say I don’t love being with people, it just means it will eventually drain me. Therefore I need to schedule “alone” time or slowly I’ll run out of energy and crash and burn. Better to be proactive than always trying to catch up.

I’m intuitive. This was a biggie for me. I learned that intuitives tend to define their reality, more through imagination, vision and dreams and not so much on facts and figures and the five senses. Intuitives are really future oriented. The present is more of a means to an end. This means I didn’t have a good handle on concrete reality and needed others to give me reality checks.

I’m a thinker (as opposed to a feeler) when it comes to relationships. In other words, I tend to relate to people logically (that is according to my logic, which whilst subjective is logic nonetheless) rather than emotionally. What that means, is I’m not great at “reading” people and adjusting to their emotional state or cues. I tend to take what they’re saying on face value and focus on the content and information rather than body language and non verbals. I’m fairly analytical. That means I miss a lot. I needed “feelers” in meetings to pick up the cues when dealing with difficult situations.

Lastly it meant that I was organised and planned in my approach to time as opposed to going with the flow – or going with feelings. I preferred structure, goals, time management and objectives rather than keeping my options open and seeing how things pan out. I had to realise that there are a lot of people out there who operate on the “go with the flow” so I
needed to manage that better and not expect everyone to be like me.

In short, the INTJ is nicknamed “The Analyst, The Mastermind, The Scientist, The Free-Thinker”

In short “At work, INTJs use their conceptual strengths to analyze situations and then develop models to understand and anticipate through relentlessly to reach their goals. They will continue on with their plans, even in the face of adversity and data that might suggest to other more practical types that their goals are no longer feasible.”

That’s me. I think you can see how this stuff could really help someone build a strong life, and compensate for their weaknesses.

I mentioned I was a big fan of Treacy & Wiersema’s “The Discipline of Market Leaders” back in the late 1990’s. There was a few other books published around that time that I also found useful. One was Why Teams don’t work by Harvey Robbins & Michael Finley. The title, like all good hooks, vividly describes the contents of the book.

Essentially the thrust of their argument was about how team culture and the composite personalities of the team players determined the probability of success when delivering a project.

One of the key discussions was this idea of personality types. It included the popular 16 Myers Briggs Type Indicators plus a 4 quadrant model developed by David Merrill and Roger Reid based on the practical orientation and natural response of the individual to any given situation.

So I was left wondering. What if the dominant personalities in a team could determine the overall team personalities and… What if dominant team personalities could determine the overall group personality… etc up to the point where the dominant divisional personalities could shape the overall corporate personality.

Now what if we take that idea and cross fertilise it with Treacy & Wiersema’s Value Propositions from “The Discipline of Market Leaders”?

What do we end up with? Is there a correlation between the Brand and the Culture at the most granular level of the Organisational: The Project Team? and does it matter?

So should project teams reflect the organisation’s value proposition?

The simple answer, at least in my experience is yes.

All to often I have walked into organisations expressing an image of product leadership or customer intimacy only to find the projects teams struggling with rigorous project management methodologies like PMBOK and Prince2. Organisations that promote customer intimacy should be embracing agile and JAD delivery methodologies that reflect their ability to respond to customer demands.

While those organisations who prize product leadership should embrace  the RAD and iterative prototyping methodologies that allow them to fail fast and fail often in their search for that elusive competitive edge.

So what would the Value Cultures of these project teams look like?

They would reflect the value proposition of the organisation.

Operational Efficiency

• Approach:   Doing what you do best through efficient and effective processes
• Innovation: Controlled, top down rules based approach
• Time: Sequential Time and Resources
• Cultural Bias: Loyalty, conformity, systematic, risk averse, stability, disciplined, cost focused, measured, be better, aristocracy
• Time: The Future is the ends. Today is the means
• Team Hook: Everybody is replaceable so you need to work harder
• Value Proposition: Operational Excellence
• Leadership Style: Authoritarian
• Rewards: Hierarchical
• Ideology: “Get the Plan right” (Plan = Method of Process Execution)
• Mission Statement: Stick to the game plan and we will win
• Risk Profile: Low Risk and Low Return
• Sports: Football (all Codes)
•  Customer thinks – “I have confidence in you because…”

Product Leadership

• Approach:   Being the very best by producing the best, most innovative, leading product in the market place
• Innovation: Give the individual players their autonomy and they will perform at their best
• Time: Pooled Time and resources individually focused on the goal
• Cultural Bias: Self reliant, situational, diversity, risk embracing, expressive, entrepreneurial, innovative, adding value, surprising, be different, meritocracy, laissez-faire
• Time:  The Future is the means. Today is the ends
• Team Hook:  Work Smarter not harder
• Leadership Style: Ideas and Talent Champion
• Rewards: Individualistic
• Ideology: “Get the Talent right” (Process = What process?)
• Mission Statement: Any one of us can win the day on our own
• Risk Profile: High Risk and High Return
• Sports: Baseball, Bowls, Golf and Cricket
• Customer thinks – “I’m Excited by you because…”

Customer Intimacy

• Being close by identifying customers needs and matching services and products to those needs
• Innovation: Cooperation and sharing of ideas
• Methodology: Synchronised Shared Time and Resources
• Cultural Bias: Cooperation, compatibility, spontaneous,
  risk accepting, stimulating, belonging, synergy,
  new patterns, flexibility, be intimate, democracy
• Time: Today is the ends and the means
• Team Hook:  Make it easy and enjoyable
• Value Proposition: Customer Intimacy
• Leadership Style: Facilitative
• Rewards: Mutualistic
• Ideology: “Get the Dynamic right” (Process = Team Dynamic)
• Mission Statement: Together as a team we can win
• Risk Profile: Low Risk and High Return
• Sports: Basketball, Volleyball & Beach Soccer
• Customer thinks – “I like doing business with you because…”

During the first few weeks of work at a new company I witnessed the two highest ranking Sales people in our division get into a heated argument about Starbucks and Dunkin Doughnuts. As strange as it is, the disagreement really came down to a difference in type. Working in a small organization is a  great opportunity to observe type differences within the highest levels of a company. One of the biggest differences I saw on a day-to-day basis is the interaction between the ESTJ National Sales Director and the ENFP VP of Sales.

Both individuals are long-time employees and are not afraid to share their opinion (E), although usually they are on opposite sides of every interaction. For example during our monthly sales meeting, a discussion broke out on the importance of using analogies outside of our industry to better explain our solution to customers.The ESTJ Sales Director begins to point out, we must all use the same analogy of Dunkin Doughnuts and Starbucks because it makes the most sense. Besides, he continues, if we try to make one up of our own we could screw it up and the customers will be confused.

The ENFP VP butts in… “Not so fast Chris, although I definitely think we should use an analogy, I think we should leave it up to each sales person to decide what makes sense for them and the customer they are talking to. I don’t care what is said, as long as the proper idea is conveyed”They continued to go back and fourth debating if there should be one established, practiced, and structured analogy (SJ) or a variety of different analogies each individual can choose, based off of the conversation they are having at the moment (NP).

This is typical behavior of an SJ wanted to follow an established proven method of explaining something, and the NFP wanting to give each person the freedom to describe things how they choose (as long as the overarching idea is conveyed). What both parties couldn’t understand is that this disagreement arouse from their personal preferences of established routine vs. spontaneous individual expression arouse from differences in type, NOT differences in best practice.

Most types will typically project their type on others because it is the thing they are most comfortable with themselves. The SJ, feeling more comfortable wish established routines insists that this way is how everyone should do it, because he is most comfortable with it. On the other hard the NP can find the single explanation limiting and boring, why not come up with a NEW idea on the spot! Now THAT is something you and your customer will be excited about!

MBTIguy Tip: Don’t establish routines and standards based on one type preference.

Wow!  I am very impressed with the accuracy of this Personality Test.  Now you can find out what is your type description for free, courtesy of Similar Minds. Just click the picture or link below!

Click here to TAKE THE FREE TEST NOW!!!

PERSONALITY TEST:  http://sminds.com/mbti/

COMPATIBILITY TEST: http://similarminds.com/match/

CAREER TEST:  http://similarminds.com/career.html

MORE TESTS:  http://similarminds.com/personality_tests.html

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Victoria Vives

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I have been depressed a lot this week, mostly yesterday and today though.  I have been praying a lot and thinking and talking to the hub… it hasn’t been the best of days but it hasn’t been the worst of days.  I am really glad to have a healed relationship with my hub now… I would never be able to press on without it.  It is now one area of my life that I feel confident and secure in and trust will be ok.  Anyway, I have had some breakthrough with my personal growth…

so I have come to realization that I AM A VERY PASSIONATE PERSON!!!  I just didn’t notice how…  I am always sitting around trying to find out what I am passionate about and getting so angry or depressed when I can’t find anything… well, HELLO!!! Stop right there!  That’s a sign in itself.  I am an extremely emotional person and you can’t be extremely emotional without passion! Duh!  So I started thinking… why do i get so emotional?  What do I get emotional about?  As i continue to do that I know the answers will keep pouring in with God’s guidance.

Also, I decided to take a personality test again… it’s been a while and I am really trying to do whatever I can to spring myself fwd in my life right now…  Well, I took the Myers Briggs and it came out INFP- The Healer.  http://www.personalitypage.com/INFP.html

Upon reading the description I quickly realized why I struggle so much, lol.  With things like, “Their primary goal is to find out their meaning in life” and “INFPs have very high standards and are perfectionists” and “INFP is driven to help people and make the world a better place” listed there, you can see how I get trapped in these emotional places…

I have taken personality tests a million times, constantly trying to define myself (just like it says up there, lol) and this time I think I actually agree with so much of what it says and am beginning to understand myself better from it.  Thanks to my mentor for suggesting I try it again!  I did so with an open mind and am feeling a bit better now!  Not that it had all the answers or even the bulk of what I am looking for… but it is a start and I can go from there…

I am now smiling… it feels good to smile!

In a recent New York Times article author Nancy Ancowitz recalls learning she was an introvert after taking the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI).

She learned that, “introverts perfer to think before they speak, while extroverts tend to think as they speak.”

The MBTI is a questionnaire designed to measure psychological preferences in how you perceive the world and how you make decisions.

Ancowitz learned to attach her name to her accomplishments,

“strike a balance between the culture of hubris that dominated Wall Street and my own natural inclination toward modesty…Succumbing to the modesty meant being relegated to the margins as a worker bee instead of the more privileged ranks as a core contributor.”

Interested in finding out what your own personality profile is? Are you an ENFJ? Or an INFP? Or how about an ESTJ? Learn more about the Myers-Briggs here!

Sue Frederick is a career intuitive. Frederick used to be a traditional career counselor, but now she helps her clients find their ideal work by leveraging numerology and intuitive guidance. Her book, I See Your Dream Job: A Career Intuitive Shows You How to Discover What You Were Put on Earth to Do, is an interesting read. While I don’t agree with all of Frederick’s methods (e.g. numerology), I agree with many of her assertions about the best way to find your passion.

For example, Frederick is not a fan of using career aptitude or personality tests. There are a lot of tests out there that career counselors will use to help you determine your ideal career. I’ve taken a lot of these tests, like the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator and the Kolbe Index, and the results can be very interesting. These tests can often explain your ideal work environment, your temperament, and the types of people you work best with. This is important and I am all for using these tests for these purposes. However, they don’t tell you a damn thing about your passions. Nor do they help you figure out what really makes you happy (which can be different than what you are good at).

I also agree with Frederick that once “your work is in alignment with your true mission…, your work will be successful and attract abundance–against all odds.”

My take is that you already know what you are passionate about. You just need to listen to your intuitive mind and your body. REALLY listen.

Ready to be your own career intuitive? Read these posts:

• The intuitive decision making process
• Calling all extroverts…

Think this sounds interesting and want to work on it together? Contact me.

We had our first “official” meeting with the Reverend on Thursday night. By “official” i mean, the meeting where he asks you questions about whence you came.. the dirty laundry and discovery session so to speak. We already had two prior meetings to discuss wedding day details.

I have my mixed feelings about this meeting, so i will be upfront.. #1 it’s made me a bit insecure in my relationship, primarily because it rehashed a lot of the BS i had to endure in the beginning of the relationship. #2 it opened my eyes to yet another lie, which is a part of the BS i had to endure in the beginning of the relationship. #3 i learned that i am an introvert and he is an extrovert which explains a lot of why we do the things we do. That was cool, even refreshing to discover.

I realized after the meeting, that i used to be an extrovert. I NEEDED to be around people to recharge my batteries. After work i HAD to have plans with a group of people. That all ended after i was married to the former, but is it who i truly am today??

Because it has been almost 8 years since i took the Meyers-Briggs test, i decided to take a shorter form of it (besides i’m not dropping $150.00+ bucks for a test to tell me something i already know). It’s a REALLY simple version which i found on www.personalitypathways.com. The end result: i am ISTJ. Well, what does that mean you ask? It means i am very introverted with a kick ass memory, thrifty, and likes security. I will argue on the memory part lol, but here’s the definition:

ISTJ

Dependable, reliable and trustworthy, they like to belong to solid organizations that are reasonable in their ambitions and loyal to their employees(so true). They feel useful when their roles and responsibilities are clearly established and they can monitor their activities and productivity in tangible ways(yep). They tend to be rather modest, traditional and conventional, to like sensible clothing, to be thrifty, careful and wise with both money and possessions(i’m cheap in other words, and that’s true).

Once they accept a project, they will see it to the end(yep). They manage their time well and are realistic about how much time and resources will be needed(i have ocd when it comes to time).

They tend to like to stay in one neighborhood, often choosing to live close to where they were themselves raised (so true). They are often involved with volunteer organizations and have a developed sense of citizenship and accountability(i did the volunteering thing, now i do it from the sidelines). When they purchase something, it is after careful consideration; rarely will they buy something without having a known need or use for it(yep!). They may keep possessions for a lifetime and treasure those that were given to them(absolutely).

They tend to have a good memory for specific facts that are necessary in their day-to-day life at work and at home(argumentative lol). They accumulate facts and details to orient themselves, relying on repeated experiences that have been proven trustworthy. A fact once experienced may be the product of circumstance and happenstance; it is not in and of itself reliable(yep). When an introverted sensing type hears an idea, they rummage through reams of archived facts to find an experience that provides information for the relevance and realism of an idea(on point). When an introverted sensing type utters, “It’s never been done!” they are saying that no information about the relevance or usefulness of the idea is available to them(yep). They tend to shy away from surprises and what is perceived as unnecessary change(i hate surprises).

I love reading about what i already know, helps justify my thought processes. I also love learning things about myself that i may not have a reason or definition for. Like that whole archived in the brain thing. Whenever someone starts talking about something, though i am paying attention, my brain starts going through the internal filing cabinet and tries to identify through something i have experienced. Once found i ALWAYS make a verbal comparison to my experience.  A lot of people find that annoying as hell, but it’s the way my brain works, sorry.

I don’t know exactly what his corresponding letters are, but he definitely is a part of the Extrovert team. He likes to go out and do things (which is completely opposite from what he was when he met me- i guess you can say i brought out his E side.) He likes to hang with his cousins (so do i cause it’s fun), he likes to hang with the guys from work (so do i cause it’s fun, but i usually don’t because it’s the “guys”-whatever).

When we DO go out together to a party or something similar, i get tired and agitated very quickly, and it seems the more people, the more booze, and the more noise there is drains me even faster. i start getting cranky, and i want to go home where it is quiet. Is this a bi-product of my anxiety disorder? or is this truly me? THAT has yet to be determined (the wedding reception should be a BLAST! lol).

Having this knowledge helps us understand each other. It became as apparent as the sun once the Rev. pointed it out to us. Now i just wish that the lying would cease, but that’s a whooole other issue.

Yesterday I had lunch with some friends. I was feeling guarded about one of them, who will often fly off the handle in the passion of presenting his positions on things. I have quite an even temperament and I don’t always do so well with people who are the opposite from me in that regard. I tend to feel overwhelmed by their emotions and lose track of myself. So before we met I felt uneasy considering what I might do about this. But as I observed him talking to another member of our group I noticed what an emotional person he is–and I let it in that this has nothing to do with me. I think I’ve been seeing him as intimidating me all too readily. As it turned out, he never did go into a rage that day. Now that I have greater insight into myself, I have time to work on my own attitude before we meet again in a few weeks. I will try to accept him as a person who is unlike me; he is emotionally based. Hopefully I have tender feelings, but I would never express them so dramatically. Either it’s not my in-born style or maybe I’m too timid. He probably represents my shadow.

As often happens, this breakthrough (I call it a breakthrough because I had been struggling with this person’s temper for a long time) didn’t come out of the blue. It comes on the heels of a much larger breakthrough concerning a family member. Being mindful was a help to me in both cases. After receiving a wrongfully accusing letter from a relative, I had plunged into a negative feeling state and started to obsess about how to react. Several times I considered pushing my feelings away and trying to forget the whole thing, but my energy was so intense I decided something productive might be percolating inside of me. I had felt similarly when in on the verge of creative breakthroughs in the past. Sure enough, in another couple of weeks I had solved a big puzzle. After trying to be open and waiting, things came together and the story of this tangled relationship started to make sense. I was glad I had stuck it out, including working hard on the dreams I had during this period, and able to make more progress on this situation than I ever expected. So taking the “positive” route doesn’t always achieve the best results. Sometimes hanging out in an uncertain or even negative place turns out to be the best in the long run.

I’m a bit of a nut when it comes to personality tests. I’ve done the Enneagram, Myers-Briggs, some sort of colour test, and a whole variety of others.

I’ve done so many tests, in fact, I’d be darned if I were able to remember any of the results. I think I’m an intuitive blue-green shark or something. You may know better than me.

I’m so weary of confusing and accurate personality tests, I’ve been testing out my own system which does not require any lengthy questionnaires (do you disagree, agree, or are you neutral?). Gone are the zany typologies and acronyms (for instance, you will never find yourself uttering the words: “I’m a purple ostrich too!”).

In my experience, you need only look at your inbox. There are a variety of email personalities:

The Clutterbox: Your inbox is stuffed full of messages (1000+). You read only the important messages, leave the rest unread. You don’t care. You may not know how to customize your wallpaper theme (but why bother?).

• Strengths: You’re good at tuning out the background noise and prioritizing. You accomplish many of your goals, and cut your losses when others don’t pan out.
• Weaknesses: You struggle at keeping things in proportion. Also, your old friends and co-workers have long given up on trying to get a hold of you. You’re something of a dabbler (and not a renaissance man/woman like you sometimes tell yourself).

The Goalsetter: You keep your inbox filled to a targeted, typically round number. You face the facts: you’re not going to read all those emails, but you’re not giving up on important relationships. 100 unread emails? Manageable, at least until things slow down. Problem is, they never do and your inbox tends to slowly creep up. You may have customized your inbox theme, preferably with a galactic or pebbly theme.

• Strengths: You have a pretty good social awareness and a positive outlook on life. You value relationships and are usually excellent at keeping up with people.
• Weaknesses: You can be a bit of a people-pleaser and you occasionally get overwhelmed.

The Checklister: Keeps inbox tidy with ZERO unread messages whenever possible, let alone any unsightly junk mail. The sight of an untended email account causes you to shudder. You may use a tidy-looking alternative theme (checks, patterns) to differentiate yourself from the unwashed masses, but not something too flashy (unicorns, really?).

• Strengths: You are punctual, generally very courteous (except when someone forwards you messages you are obliged to check as read), and deferential to a fault.
• Weaknesses: Despite your best efforts, life tends to be difficult to control. You tend to avoid conflict, often at your own detriment. You may have some anger issues.

The Forwarder: You love getting messages with jokes, impassioned political pleas, or funny pictures/videos. You enthusiastically send emails to any or all like-minded individuals.

• Strengths: You are giving and free with yourself. You love life, laughs, and thoughts.
• Weaknesses: You may not realize your emails ANNOY your friends, unless your friends are like-minded (which they most probably are).

Well, that’s all I could come up with. Do you have any way of improving my test? Let me know.

I am I. That’s all whom I’ve ever been. I give the benefit of the doubt. I try to be understanding. I try to be sure of myself and accepting of others. But I am not easy to read. I am not easy do devise understanding of. I would never assume someone would be able to pick up on all the little quirks and subtleties that make me uniquely me.

I am a virgo. I don’t know what that really means… I don’t even know that I necessarily buy a lot into signs in general, but, I know, from myself and my friends who are, there are some very distinct common personality traits that are puzzlingly brutal and lie in complete parallel in our lives. Some of these excerpts were sent by friends who are the same sign and get the same giggle as I, some from wicken practitioners who have more experience in this and thought these were fun ways to help me understand their beliefs, and some were things I’ve come across over time:

VIRGO- The Lover For Life (8/23-9/22) Spontaneous. High appeal. Rare to find. Great when found. Loves being in long relationships. So much love to give. Not one to mess with. Very pretty. Very romantic. Nice to everyone they meet. Their Love is one of a kind. Silly, fun and sweet. Have own unique appeal. Most caring person you will ever meet! Amazing in the you know where..!!! Not the kind of person you wanna mess with because the fuse may be long but when it runs through the detonation is truly explosive.”

And then there is the Myers Briggs. The truly psychological interpretation of the person, and the terrible test you are forced to sit through by your HS guidance councilor to figure out the best career path for you. Needless to say, spend as much time soul searching and job hunting as I have and you take this test over and over and you get not only great interpretations of what the result is when you look it up but also a greater understanding of how the test is actually figuring out the subtle natures of your personality (like me, being the extroverted-introvert for example)

“You are the perfect portrait of the INTJ… self-confident, independent, full of values, respectful of others, reflective of the world around you, inventive, passionate, ardent, intelligent, perfecting, sincere and enlightening. It also means you are a pain-in-the-ass for some people to deal with since you make up about 2% of the worlds population and the balance don’t appreciate you in the first place” Yep, that about says it all!

“Congrats, you are an INTJ – To outsiders, INTJs may appear to project an aura of “definiteness”, of self-confidence. This self-confidence, sometimes mistaken for simple arrogance by the less decisive, they simply need to figure you out, where, you’ve already done that! INTJs are perfectionists, with a seemingly endless capacity for improving upon anything that takes their interest. INTJs apply (often ruthlessly) the criterion “Does it work?” to everything from their own research efforts to the prevailing social norms. This in turn produces an unusual independence of mind, freeing the INTJ from the constraints of authority, convention, or sentiment for its own sake. INTJs can be unsparing of both themselves and the others on the project. Anyone considered to be “slacking,” including superiors, will lose their respect — and will generally be made aware of this — On the other hand, they do tend to be scrupulous and even-handed about recognizing the individual contributions that have gone into a project. Personal relationships, particularly romantic ones, can be the INTJ’s Achilles heel. This happens in part because many INTJs do not readily grasp the social rituals; for instance, they tend to have little patience and less understanding of such things as small talk and flirtation. To complicate matters, INTJs are usually extremely private people, and can often be naturally impassive as well, which makes them easy to misread and misunderstand. Perhaps the most fundamental problem, however, is that INTJs really want people to make sense. And people, generally speaking, don’t take sense!” On that last statement especially, I wholeheartedly agree.

Ode to the INTJ: You’ll annoy people because they don’t “get” you. Paradoxes, antinomies, and other contradictory phenomena aptly express who you are the way other people will “see” yo. Outgoing yet introspective as Extroverted Thinking while Introverted Feeling. Anything is possible; everything is negotiable. Willing to work hard for anything you enjoy with a perfectionist’s drive, a pragmatist’s ethic and an optimist’s view. Opinionated, but emotionally close to the vest – expect inexhaustible reasonability; directness without a complete divestiture of the private. “do” what you “know” and make it “work.”

this one just plain made me giggle! – INTJ – The Crackpot – you’re pretty damn clever and you know it. You love to flaunt your potential. Heard the word “arrogant” lately? How about “jerk?” Or perhaps they only say that behind your back. How about this- “stubborn?” Hrm? Heard that lately? All those facts which don’t fit your theories must just be wrong, right? I mean, really, the vast amounts of time you spend with your head in the clouds…you’re just plain strange. That’s right. I know I can say this cause you’re not going to cry. You’re not exactly the most emotional person. You’d rather spend time with your theoretical questions and abstract theories than with other people. Trust me, your inflated ego is a complete turnoff with the opposite sex and I am telling you, you’re not that great with relationships as it is. You’re never going to be a dude or chick magnet, purely because you’re more concerned with yourself than others. Meh. They all hate you already anyway.

I took a cooking personality test and got this: You are Sage is a very classic herb. You tend to use intelligence in making decisions instead of brute force, just as sage uses its noble flavor in a convincing, yet complimenting way. You are the type of person that people want to get to know and be friends with. You don’t feel as if you have to impress people because you tend to be very self assured. At a party you would be happy to just sit in the corner and watch people, or perhaps find someone to have an intelligent conversation with. You prefer to think before you act, as you are rather analytical. You can be both dazzling and graceful. People tend to notice you without you trying to make it happen. You may not be religious, but you are very spiritual. You desire relationships that last rather then passing ones.” Who would have thought answering questions about food would warrant this?

WARNING:  If you are not familiar at all with the MBTI or the 16 personality types, this may be a little confusing and boring.

In my last post on this topic, I left off about to talk about the differences between introverted functions and extroverted functions. In this post, I’m going to talk about the first and last letters.

Now, if you remember, the second letter in your Myers-Briggs type is your perceiving function and the third letter is your judging function. 

With that in mind, your last letter can either be a P (perceiving) or a J (judging). What this tells you is which letter is extroverted, and which letter is introverted. For instance, an INFP’s perceiving function (N) would be extroverted, and an INFJ’s judging function (F) would be extroverted. Now, if your perceiving function is extroverted, then your judging function is introverted. So, an INFP would have Ne (extroverted intuition) and Fi (introverted feeling). An INFJ would be the opposite: Ni and Fe. 

What the FIRST letter tells you is which function is your primary function. If your first letter is “I”, then your primary function would be the introverted function. For example, I’m INFJ. This means I mostly use Ni and Fe. However, since my first letter is I, my primary mode of living is Ni. An ENFJ would also have Ni and Fe, but an ENFJ’s primary mode of living would be Fe. 

Hmmm… I hope this post made sense.

I am an ENFP.

And as much as I love Myers-Briggs types and other such personality analysis frameworks, I don’t normally use them as my lens through which to see the world and make sense of it. This morning, though, I experienced one of those moments when the abstract becomes tangible.

My co-worker had a run-in with the security guard company last night. Evidently, the alarm keypad in her house keeps sticking so she can’t properly disarm the alarm. And when your alarm goes off, the security company sends over a guard to check and make sure everything is ok. The poor girl has repeatedly set off the alarm due to the faulty keypad and has told the security company repeatedly to fix the keypad. Naturally, they haven’t yet.

Last night, she tripped the alarm and the security company sent over a guy, who very rudely inquired of my co-worker, “Why do you keep failing?” That question alone would have been enough to set me off. But it gets worse. After she explained that she’s repeatedly requested a repair on her keypad, this security guard shoved open her front door, pushed past her, and entered her house.

I repeat: I am an ENFP. As soon as I heard her story up to that point, I immediately reacted with shock and horror, proclaimed that he had no right to enter her house without permission, that this was a safety violation and that it should be reported. My co-worker, an INFP, looked a little skeptical and a little doubtful. So I picked up the phone, called our office administrator who deals with the security company for the office and for our homes, and had her come over to listen to the story. She said she’d talk to the security company.

After all this, the INFP tells me that our third co-worker, an ESTJ, had reacted entirely differently. The ESTJ suggested that maybe there was a cultural difference to account for the guard’s behavior, and disclaimed that she wasn’t there to really see how the events played out, so she couldn’t really say whether the INFP should report what happened.

Whoa. I mean, we were like textbook Myers-Briggs archetypes. And it made me realize how important it really is to have different people with their different personalities, thought processes, and reactions. Depending on the situation, you may want someone like me who goes with the gut intuition and makes a decisive move. Or you may want the ESTJ who wants to get the facts before leaping ahead. Or the INFP who wants to do right by everyone and keep the peace. Granted, having these personalities in one group might also mean a whole lot of conflict.

Thankfully, the three of us manage to work hard in our small, shared office, laugh a lot, commiserate and sympathize with each other, bounce ideas off each other and just all around work really well together. And we hang out socially, whether eating out at the Indian restaurant (cuz there’s only one in Maseru), or making tacos and watching a Glee marathon. They keep me sane, this INFP and ESTJ, and I’m glad for it!

Wanna know your Myers-Briggs type? Go here and answer the 72 yes/no questions. It’ll only take 2 minutes. Then, drop me a note/comment and let me know your type!