Have you ever wondered “If I wanted to change my personality, would I be able to?” Or have you ever wondered if it was possible for someone else to truly change their personality?
This was a question that today’s guest wondered about herself and so she went on a journey to find out whether it was really possible to change your entire personality!
Joining the podcast today is Olga Khazan. Olga is a writer for The Atlantic, and the author of the new book Me, But Better: The Science and Promise of Personality Change. Olga spent a year experimenting with her own personality to see if she could become more extroverted, a lot less neurotic, and a little more agreeable.
We speak about:
- Exactly why you might like to change your personality
- How much of our personality is ‘hard wired’
- The ‘big 5’ personality traits: extroversion, neuroticism, agreeableness, conscientiousness, openness.
- How different aspects of our personality affects our relationships
- Making friends when you’re not particularly extroverted
- Can you change someone else’s personality?
- Do certain life stages encourage a personality change?
- What things can you do to change your personality?
You can get Olga's new book Me, But Better
You can watch us on Youtube
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hi guys, and welcome back to another episode of Life
on Cut.
Speaker 2 (00:02):
I'm Laura and I'm Key Shack, and I'm so excited
to do a bit of a deep dive on whether
we can change our personality.
Speaker 3 (00:09):
Okay, so I found this one really interesting because often
we seem to and I would say it to something
that comes up and ask uncut quite a bit, this
idea of being in a relationship with someone and wanting
to change their personality or them wanting to change your personality.
But rarely do I think that we have enough self
awareness or introspection to really consider whether or not we
(00:29):
can change our own personality and whether we want to.
And I think it's also because often like we and
I say we as a very general thing, but often
I think we struggle to see fault in ourselves. The
reason why we're so excited to have this conversation is
because it's very much based around whether it is possible
to or whether you could if you desired to make
(00:49):
changes to your personality that might make you more likable,
that might make you more social, might make you more datable, who.
Speaker 2 (00:56):
Knows, might make you better at work. Maybe this conversation,
Laura is delivered had me on.
Speaker 3 (01:01):
Yes, Quijha, this is for you. Okay, we'll joining the
podcast today is Olga Hazan Now. Olga is a writer
of the Atlantic. She's the author of a new book,
Me But Better, The Science and Promise of Personality Change.
Speaker 1 (01:12):
Olga spent a.
Speaker 3 (01:13):
Year experimenting with her own personality to see if she
could become more extroverted, a little bit less neurotic, and
also more agreeable. So all of these things that we've
just spoken about in terms of I guess being perceived
is more likable.
Speaker 1 (01:26):
Olga, Welcome to the pod.
Speaker 4 (01:28):
Yeah, thanks so much for having me.
Speaker 3 (01:29):
Firstly, before we get into like how you've gone about
this and why it was something that you kind of
took on as your personal endeavor, how did personality and
exploring personality become a focus of interest for you.
Speaker 4 (01:42):
Yeah, so it does.
Speaker 5 (01:43):
I admit it sounds kind of strange because it's like personality.
I don't want to change my personality, Like I like
who I am. You know, personality is just who I am.
It's what I like and dislike. But when you think
about it, personality is actually at the root of a
lot of different things that we might want to improve
about ourselves. So if you want to make more friends,
or get organized, or stop running late, or even just
(02:04):
be less anxious or less depressed, those are all examples
of personality change. Because personality traits encompass so much of
who we are and what we do, it's really hard
to change yourself without changing your personality, if that makes sense.
Speaker 3 (02:18):
Do you think it would kind of live in a
bit of a time when people I mean, and I
even think about that Marilon Munroe quote, which is like,
if you can't handle me at my worst, you don't
deserve me at my best. Like, we almost expect that
the way we show up in the world, we should
be accepted for exactly the type of people that we
are and exactly the way that we are. But sometimes
that might not be the best version of what we
(02:40):
could be.
Speaker 5 (02:41):
Yeah, and I mean, maybe that's true. Like there definitely
should be people in your life who accept you, you know,
even when you are having a really terrible day and
you're in a really shitty mood and you like are
just a pain to be around.
Speaker 4 (02:53):
That's not really what I'm talking about.
Speaker 5 (02:54):
The point of personality change is not so much for
you to come off better, Although that certainly can be
one of the effect. It's actually for you to be
happier or even just to enjoy your life more, or
to appreciate what you have and kind of go through
life a little bit more smoothly. It is kind of
an external thing, but it's also kind of a selfish thing.
Personality change is for you, not for everyone else.
Speaker 2 (03:15):
I mean, I think the common thought about personalities that
you get given one at birth and that's just how
you're hardwired, Like that's just who you are. How malleable
do you think personality is?
Speaker 4 (03:27):
That's not untrue.
Speaker 5 (03:28):
Part of our personality is just given to us at
birth and basically stays the same. It's about half, so
thirty to fifty percent of our personality is genetic or
it's inherited, so that means it's in your genes. That
doesn't mean you're exactly like your parents. That just means
that that part is hereditary. The rest of your personality
is kind of up to this thing that scientists call environment,
(03:48):
which just means the way you were raised, your friends,
whether you go to college, what kind of job you have,
who you get married to, whether you have kids, who
your friends are. Those things all kind of combine and
they exert a force on your personality and tend to
kind of move your personality in different directions, even if
you don't especially try to change.
Speaker 4 (04:10):
So an example of.
Speaker 5 (04:11):
This is if you knew someone who was like a
crazy partier in college. You know, they just love to
go drinking, never did their homework whatever, just like always
off having fun. And then they get a job that's
like a total dream job for them, and suddenly they're
like never partying anymore. They're always working, they're super conscientious,
they've got two iPhones, they're always working on, you know,
emails on the weekend or whatever. That's an example of
(04:34):
personality change that's driven by the fact that someone experienced
a life change, they got a really important job, and
they became different. That is also personality change.
Speaker 3 (04:43):
Oh go, what was happening in your life when you
decided to undertake this self growth or experiment on yourself?
Like what were you experiencing? And like why was it
that you wanted to explore personality change?
Speaker 5 (04:54):
So what I found was that I really was getting
worn down by small bs that would happen to me
every day, Like my life wasn't bad, and in fact,
I opened the book with a story about a day
that is objectively not bad, but so many small things happened,
and it just like ate away at me and ate
away at me, I guess to summarize, I was in
(05:14):
Miami in the middle of winter, so yay, perfect weather,
perfect everything. I had to get professional photos taken.
Speaker 4 (05:22):
On the way to get these photos.
Speaker 5 (05:24):
Taken, I got a really bad haircut, so I'm like,
on the way, I go like, go get the photos taken.
The photos look bad to me.
Speaker 2 (05:31):
Because of the bad haircut.
Speaker 5 (05:33):
Yeah, but also just I don't like the angle. I
don't like the lighting. My angles were off, you know
how it is. And I was like, okay, whatever, try
to move on. I like get stuck in horrible traffic.
I end up running even later because as I'm trying
to get out of traffic, I somehow go the wrong
way and end up on a highway I'm not supposed
to be on. Then I'll get to the store and
I buy groceries, and then my shopping cart gets stuck
(05:54):
in the parking lot because I'm out of range of
the store and they think I'm trying to steal the
shopping cart, and so I have to drag the shopping
cart to my car because I can't carry.
Speaker 4 (06:07):
All the bags myself.
Speaker 5 (06:08):
And while all of this is happening, my boss is
like messaging me to make edits to a story, and
it's just adding to my stress and my kind of frustration.
So I get back and I just have this huge meltdown.
But then after the smoke clears, I sort of started thinking, like,
was that day.
Speaker 4 (06:25):
Really that bad?
Speaker 5 (06:26):
Or was I sort of making it bad by taking
every little thing and sort of making it the worst
thing ever? And I kind of had a tendency to
do that a lot. That negative viraling thinking is associated
with the trait of neuroticism, and that's something I scored
really high on when I started taking these personality tests.
So part of it was I just wanted to be
(06:48):
less anxious and less kind of frustrated by everything, you know.
I wanted to have more resilience in the face of
big things, but also in the face of just small things.
So that's kind of where it all started.
Speaker 2 (06:59):
I think it's really interesting that you were presented with
a situation like that, we had that realization and you
immediately went to the thought of, maybe I need to
change my personality. I think at the moment, particularly we
make a joke that I'm a bit of a biohack bro.
I love icepas, I love shit like that. But I
would to assume that if any of us came to
that realization, my immediate thought would be like, Okay, well,
(07:20):
maybe I need to learn to meditate, maybe I need
to learn.
Speaker 1 (07:22):
To do yoga.
Speaker 2 (07:23):
Like I think, I would look external rather than internal.
And I find it really interesting that you were like, hmm,
this must be connected to my neuroticism like that. That,
to me is very interesting that you had so much
insight into the fact that it would be connected to
something like that. For anyone who doesn't know about the
Big five personality types, I don't even know if that's
(07:45):
actually the label that you would use. Do you mind
explaining what they are and whether you would like to
be high or low on the scale, and kind of
where they came from.
Speaker 5 (07:53):
So there are five personality treats. You can remember them
with the acronym ocean OH for openness to experiences, which
is like imaginativeness and creativity, s for conscientiousness, which is
like getting places on time and being super organized and
diligent E for extraversion, which is being sociable and outgoing
and active. A for agreeableness, which is like warmth and
(08:15):
empathy and trust, and then N for neuroticism, which is
depression and anxiety. And you want to be really high
on all of them except for neuroticism, and you want
to be low on that one. And it's funny that
you should mention meditation because most of what I did
to help with my neuroticism is meditate. So even though
it seems like personality change is just sort of like
(08:36):
thinking really hard, it's mostly about action. It's mostly about
things that you do in order to change your personality traits,
not just sitting on a mountain and like deciding your
personality should be.
Speaker 3 (08:46):
Hoping, I mean, knowing that you are high in neuroticism,
where did you score on the other full personality traits? Yeah?
Speaker 5 (08:52):
I scored low on extraversion, especially the part of extroversion
that's associated with being cheerful. Just a little at a
twist there, I scored like kind of medium on agreeableness,
medium low, I would say I did, And I always
have scored really high.
Speaker 4 (09:07):
On openness and on conscientiousness Olga.
Speaker 3 (09:10):
This feels like the epitome of having a Taylor Swift
moment where you're like, I'm the problem.
Speaker 1 (09:14):
It's me, Like, Okay, I'm going to make some changes.
Speaker 3 (09:17):
Had you felt as though your personality was affecting any
of your relationships or how you showed up either at
work or in your romantic life or with your friends.
Speaker 5 (09:26):
Yeah, so one thing that would happen. My extraversion was low,
and I didn't have a lot of friends. But I
also like didn't go out and try to make a
lot of social connections. And the reason is that I
had always taken like i'd taken or I don't know,
not even personality tests, but just I just always thought
I'm an introvert, and whenever I was feeling bad or
(09:47):
like sad, I would spend more time by myself. I
thought that that is what I would want as an introvert.
I spent all day by myself. But I'm still feeling sad,
so I need to spend even more time by myself.
I think what I didn't realize that some of the
personality change techniques kind of tell you is that sometimes
it's more about doing the opposite thing. So for me,
(10:09):
one thing that became really important or just like a
kind of a big moment for me was in realizing
that sometimes when I'm having that withdrawn or lonely feeling,
it actually makes more sense to go out and seek
connection with other people rather than to spend even more
time by myself. So that was like a big change
that I noticed pretty much right away.
Speaker 3 (10:27):
Did you find that challenging though? To do it when
you're someone who's like conditioned to being an introvert and
when you have these feelings of wanting to sort of
spend time on your own, Like, I can only imagine
that that's a very hard mold to break.
Speaker 4 (10:39):
It was.
Speaker 5 (10:40):
It was really hard, especially since for extroversion I signed
up for improv. That was like one of the first
activities that I did, and I actually have really bad
stage right. I'm not a natural performer, and I especially
don't like being silly in public, and this is like
all that improv comedy is for those who aren't familiar.
Speaker 4 (10:57):
So it was.
Speaker 5 (10:58):
Something where like I would feel a lot of dread
and anxiety before I would go, and then as I
was there, I would loosen up progressively. And then what
I found is that at the end of every class
I was always pretty happy. It always was kind of
a mood boost. I don't know, I can almost compare
it to people who exercise, you know, before they go
for that run at five am or whatever, they're like, oh,
(11:20):
I just want to stay in bed, I don't want
to go, uh, like, can I skip today? And then
they're like going for their run whatever. They're getting into it,
listening to their Taylor's swift or whatever, and then they
get back and they have like that runners high. That's
like a very similar thing as what happened to me
with a lot of these kind of activities that I did.
Speaker 3 (11:38):
What is some I mean you mentioned it that there's
some tools if anyone's listening to this and they're wanting
to change aspects of their personality, Like, how do people
go about this? What is like a tangible way to
set out to make tweaks to what your personality is.
Speaker 4 (11:51):
It's tricky to.
Speaker 5 (11:52):
Like say what specifically to do because they're different for
every trait. So for extraversion, you're gonna want to go
out a lot. For neurotus's you're going to want to
do a lot of mindfulness type work and sort of
like yoga and meditation could be two things that you
start doing for agreeableness. What I did is I did
a lot of work on deepening my friendships and my relationships,
(12:12):
like how to have deeper conversations or how to set
better boundaries with friends, sort of not just like getting
out there and meeting people, but actually like establishing those
those deep friendships. The things you're going to want to
do are different for every trait. But I would just start, honestly, like,
I mean, buy my book, but if you don't buy
my book, just think about people in your life that
(12:32):
have the traits that you want and ask them what
they do. That is to some extent what I did
as well, Like I just would ask people who were
already really good at the stuff that I wanted to
get good at, how do you do that? And then
I would kind of do versions of that.
Speaker 2 (12:45):
What were some of those things all go?
Speaker 4 (12:47):
So I have a.
Speaker 5 (12:48):
Friend who is very good at meeting people and just
like be friends everyone everywhere she goes.
Speaker 2 (12:54):
If you need any types for some reason, I'm like
the pied Pie file.
Speaker 4 (12:58):
I just clicked people alone away everyone.
Speaker 3 (13:02):
Well, we'll do an interview with some person and then
like I would never have spoken to them again, and case,
she's just like still texting them three years later and
they're like best friends. Now she's going out for coffee
and I'm like, how did this happen?
Speaker 1 (13:11):
And she's like, I don't know. I go to WhatsApp number. No,
we're best friends.
Speaker 2 (13:15):
I promise I won't bumpbost you with messages all go please.
Speaker 5 (13:19):
Do because I want this friend Kathy, who's like very
good at making friends. And I basically just texted her
and I was like, how do you make friends? Like
I was a little robot and she was like, oh yeah,
I just text people who she'll like meet acquaintances you
know that seem cool, and she'll just text them to
hang out a lot, and you know, eventually they become
friends or she'll like ask them to lunch or ask
(13:40):
them for beers, or just ask if she can, you know,
come over and chat for a while. And I didn't
realize that a lot of friendship is just making an interest,
like kind of showing an interest in like you know,
not being aggressive or lounding people, but yeah, kind of
being like, hey, let's do something, kind of being the
instigator a lot.
Speaker 2 (13:58):
Can I touch it with something that I think I've
come to the realization this year in particular, that actually
has really helped me maintain friendships. Because we've had quite
a particularly busy year work wise and some things in
my personal life, I don't have a lot of free
time to actually maintain physical connections with friendships. But I've
found this really easy way to maintain like that you know,
(14:20):
we would speak at least once a week, and it's
if I see something on Instagram that is funny. You know,
for each of my friends, I will have a bit
of like a topic that I think we have as
a connection. For example, one of my friends loves his cat,
like is obsessed with his cat. So if ever I
see a funny cat reel, I'll send it to him.
One of my other friends is really funny in terms
(14:41):
of like social interaction, and so if there's ever a
real a meme or something that is quite funny about
being like, oh, there's nothing better than when someone cancels plans,
I will send.
Speaker 1 (14:50):
That to her.
Speaker 2 (14:51):
And I've realized that that's kind of the way that
I've been maintaining a lot of these connections.
Speaker 1 (14:56):
It's through memes.
Speaker 2 (14:57):
It's like it's actually through this like shared funny in
because it's really low effort. It's not like this big
message of tell me everything you've been up to for
the last three weeks, because that can get really exhausting,
like and you kind of just bouncing it back and forth.
My suggestion in that is that if you have a
desire to like maintain these connections with friends, start with
the small stuff that's just like light and fun and
(15:19):
it's not much.
Speaker 1 (15:20):
Effort for either of you.
Speaker 5 (15:21):
Yeah, oh yeah, I love that. I love that suggestion.
I've tried doing that more of that too. It's great
for people who are pressed for time.
Speaker 3 (15:28):
So O got Like I kind of mentioned at the start,
it's something that we do experience in terms of like
ask guncut questions, and I think it's something that we
can be guilty of in relationships when we feel as
though our partners aren't being the version of themselves we
want them to be. Is it possible to change someone
else's personality or encourage someone else to change their personality
or is it something that's like impossible task.
Speaker 5 (15:49):
So I have been trying to make my husband more conscientious,
but it's like my secret and not so secret goal.
He's now conscientious, and I'm very conscientious, and it's like
the source of a lot of our fates.
Speaker 2 (15:59):
Conscientious is the one where it's like on time and organized.
Speaker 5 (16:01):
Right yeah yeah, And he's just like super messy, doesn't
know what's going on, like doesn't have a Google calendar,
come what may.
Speaker 3 (16:08):
Just try to put it all in his brain and
then like remember some and forget some.
Speaker 1 (16:12):
That's me. Yeah, I'm like I don't need a calendar,
I just remember it all. But polling, yeah exactly.
Speaker 4 (16:18):
Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 5 (16:19):
So I would say that personality change works best when
the person really wants to do it, like when they
have some reason or some project that they're working toward
that helps them change their personality. So the people that
I talked to that became more conscientious, one of them
really wanted to start a business, one of them really
wanted to go to graduate school for psychology, and one
(16:41):
of them really wanted to drink less. So they have
these big quests that they were on and then the
personality change was like what helped them achieve that quest.
So it's hard for a different person because unless whatever
the goal is is like a shared goal for both
of you. If you and your partner want to have
a child together, and it's really important for both of
(17:01):
you to, I don't know, become more organized before the
child comes. Then you know, that's something where your partner
might be inspired to become more conscientious for that reason.
But it's really hard to just like foist personality change
on someone else because it does require them to behave
differently pretty much every day.
Speaker 2 (17:18):
Although on this with the having kids thing, are there
certain times of our lives or certain things that can
happen to us over the course of our life that
naturally will shift our personality.
Speaker 5 (17:29):
Yeah, it seems like starting a new job and starting
a romantic relationship are the two big ones that do
seem to change personality. Starting a new job makes you
a little more conscientious, and starting a new relationship tends
to bring down your neuroticism a little.
Speaker 1 (17:44):
Bit, depending on how toxic the relationship is, right.
Speaker 5 (17:46):
Right, right, Yeah, Yeah, those researchers in a while ago
before tender. But I will say that especially at the
time of life that's like your early twenties, is a
time of great change, and a lot of people find
their personalities changing a lot during that time frame, just
because that is a time when you're kind of figuring
out who you are in the world. You're getting a job,
you're developing a career, you're developing a friend group, you're
(18:07):
figuring out where you're.
Speaker 1 (18:08):
Going to live.
Speaker 5 (18:09):
So it's a lot of those factors that change your
personality are coming into place around that time. But they've
also done a lot of research that looked at all
sorts of different life events like having a baby and
ask people did this change your personality? And the answers
are kind of all over the place. I wrote an
article about this, but it's basically like, it's really hard
to tell how any given life event will change you specifically.
(18:32):
It's not totally clear.
Speaker 3 (18:34):
I definitely like if I was to look at the
sort of Big five personality traits and think about, like
how I've changed after having kids, I would say that
my extrovertedness has gone down, even like risk taking behavior
has gone down. Things that I would have done before
having kids in terms of like being super social or
like having energy to do things, but also going skydiving,
(18:55):
or like going bungee jumping or things like that, like
things that I would say I would have had a
higher propensity to do before having kids. Now I'm like, no,
that seems unnecessary and really dangerous. So I think I
say no to a lot more stuff.
Speaker 1 (19:08):
I don't know.
Speaker 3 (19:08):
Sometimes I'm like, maybe that's like a natural progression of
getting older when you're more aware of things that can
go wrong as well. But it definitely has had an
impact on me.
Speaker 4 (19:16):
Oh yeah, I mean I.
Speaker 5 (19:17):
Think it's made me more agreeable. Like I before I
had So, I had a baby. Interestingly, in the middle
of writing the book, So, before I had Evan, I
really thought I would not enjoy the baby phase of
having a baby, like a baby talk and the giggling
and the cuddling were like not gonna appeal to me, really,
But that's actually been.
Speaker 4 (19:36):
My favorite part. Uh. I really like being.
Speaker 5 (19:39):
Silly and like making him laugh and playing with him.
But the part that I thought I would be really
good at, which is figuring out like how many ounces
and like what time, and like how many diapers and
how often, that part has not been as fun for me.
Like it hasn't been I like do it, and I'm
pretty good at it, but that part, it hasn't been
as enjoyable as I thought it would be.
Speaker 1 (19:59):
That's so that's interesting.
Speaker 2 (20:01):
Another part of the lifespan that I'm curious about is
when you get into older age. You know, I know
that politically we tend to say that as you get older,
you become more conservative, and younger people tend to be
slightly more progressive. Is that related to openness to experience?
And do you see a change as people age, like
into their you know, seventies and eighties, People.
Speaker 5 (20:22):
Do tend to become less open to experiences as they
get older, And that could be one reason why older
people become more conservative as they get older, because openness
is generally associated with political liberalism.
Speaker 4 (20:36):
It's sort of the like, yeah, whatever you want to do.
Speaker 5 (20:39):
Like kind of free to be you and me type thing,
So that kind of declines as you get older. Also
as you get older, like other things happen too, Like
you tend to become less neurotic, you tend to become
more conscientious. So there are positive changes and I mean
negative changes depending on how you look at it, and
also depending on like how open you start out as
Because if you're protester in the you know, seventies, as
(21:04):
a young person, like, you'll probably still be pretty liberal
even in old age.
Speaker 3 (21:08):
In terms of your experience, and like the changes you
saw in yourself when you originally did this kind of
like you know, personality testing. Vers after having these different
experiences of trying to change your personality, what was the
end result, Like where are you at now in terms
of your testing and how you show up for these
personality types.
Speaker 5 (21:26):
The end result was that my extraversion did increase a lot.
I think I just found that I was sort of
unnecessarily isolating myself kind of with the excusive introversion. I
still think I'm an introvert in that I do need
a lot of downtime and alone time and just like
time to process. But I also I think I found
that I get a lot more out of social interaction.
Speaker 4 (21:47):
That I was maybe thinking that I did.
Speaker 5 (21:50):
I also found that my neuroticism went down, but I
thought I was working on the anxiety component and that
did go down a little bit. But mostly what went
down was my depression, and I chalked that up to
meditation actually and just some of the I guess learnings
about Buddhism that I encountered while I was taking this
intensive meditation class. My agreeableness did go up slightly, and
(22:12):
I mostly chalk that up to the fact that I
did so much with other people, Like I did an
anger management program and I went to London for this
conversation workshop, and I just I was like constantly around
other people and like hearing other people's stories, and that
I think helped boost my own levels of empathy or
kind of like this realization that a lot of times
(22:33):
you're sharing a struggle with a lot of other people.
I don't know, so that did increase my agreeableness.
Speaker 2 (22:38):
Can I ask about the anger management class? I read
that you were the only person in it that wasn't
forced to be this, Yeah, what happens in an anger
management class? And how does that help with neuroticism?
Speaker 5 (22:49):
Well, it was supposed to help me with agreeableness. I
found the anger management class not that helpful because it
was kind of telling me stuff that I already knew.
It was the teachers walking you through like take a
deep breath, right, you know, try to focus on something positive,
you know, go to the other room.
Speaker 2 (23:08):
You know.
Speaker 5 (23:09):
It was kind of like very generic advice. But one
thing that was helpful there is hearing what made other
people angry and why some of us were able to
avoid anger triggers sometimes. So like at one point they
brought up traffic, and none of us said that traffic
makes us angry, even though I know it did make
me angry in that story that I told earlier. But
usually it's not traffic that upsets us. We live in
(23:31):
a very high traffic area where there's always traffic, and
kind of the reason why we figured out that traffic
doesn't make us angry is that it's beyond our control,
Like we didn't cause the traffic, and there's nothing we
can do about it. So in some ways, that is
like a healthier way to think about stuff that makes
you angry, is this isn't within my control, Like if
(23:53):
it's something that happens at work or something that someone.
Speaker 4 (23:56):
Does to you.
Speaker 5 (23:59):
Yeah, like one way that I I've kind of tried
to process it, it's just this isn't up to me,
you know, this isn't in my hands.
Speaker 2 (24:03):
This is kind of along the lines of the let
them theory that Mel Robbins has written a book about.
It's going very very very viral at the moment. Kind
of the concept is if something happens outside of your control,
you have to let them, You have to let them
do it in that way. I mean, I'm not quite
at that point in traffic. Yet I am probably my
worst version of who I am in a car yelling
at people for doing stupid things or what I need
(24:26):
to be stupid. But I think that what you're referring
to is kind of along those same lines of what
you don't have control over you can't change.
Speaker 4 (24:33):
Yeah, yeah, exactly.
Speaker 5 (24:34):
I mean it's a concept is all the time, but yeah,
some people we need to hear it.
Speaker 3 (24:39):
Yeah, but also on this, I mean, like we've spoken
about how school wise your personality changed, but did you
feel it in yourself?
Speaker 1 (24:46):
Could you tell that there was changes that have been made.
Speaker 5 (24:48):
I definitely felt less depressed, Like I felt happier throughout
working on the project, and I definitely felt more extra
Like I found myself like looking forward to things with
other people that I would do with other people, like
my sailing class or improv class. Even I found myself,
oh yeah, I can't wait for that, or like that'll
be so fun, and like that's not really a thought
(25:09):
that I had had before. Like my mentality before the
book was much more like get home on Friday, pop
a bottle of wine, thank god the week is over,
what's on TV? Kind of a lot more just trying
to get through and survive as opposed to looking out
and seeing hope and like something to look forward to.
Speaker 2 (25:27):
I'm interested in kind of the dichotomy of these personality traits.
And you know, we said that you want to be
high on the scale in everything other than neuroticism, But
are there positives to being the opposite? You know, let's
say that you are high on neuroticism like you were.
Is there an environment that that is a good thing.
Speaker 4 (25:45):
Yes.
Speaker 5 (25:46):
Importantly, you don't want to be all the way over.
They're all a spectrum, right, and you don't want to
be all the way over to the end for any
one of them. Because we do need a little bit
of anxiety.
Speaker 4 (25:56):
Like if you.
Speaker 5 (25:56):
Didn't have anxiety, you wouldn't have shown up for work today,
and you wouldn't you know, you wouldn't do anything, you
wouldn't make doctor's appointments. That people would just languish, they
wouldn't move through life. So you do need anxiety to
like get up and go in the morning. But the
trick is not letting it get the best of you
and not letting it spiral out of control. So having
a little bit of that nervousness or those jitters is
(26:18):
totally normal and adaptive and healthy. But the trick is,
you know, at the same time, not being like all
the way over on neuroticism so far that you can't
cope and you're you know, you also don't do anything
because you're too anxious. And some of it might be situational, right,
It might be like changing your personality from moment to
moment where you know, maybe you're an introvert one day
(26:38):
because you really got to buckle down and study for
something or prepare for something, and then you're an extrovert
the next day because you have to give a huge
speech for tons and tons of people. That kind of
switching between traits or like trying on different traits is
also a version of personality change.
Speaker 3 (26:54):
Oh God, thank you so much for coming and being
a part of the pod, and for anyone who is
or has considered potentially maybe changing their own personality might
make themselves happier. Please we'll link the book and everything
about it in the show notes as well. It is
called Me but Better, The Science and Promise of Personality Change.
Thanks for coming and being a part of the pod.
Speaker 4 (27:12):
Yeah, thanks so much for having me
Hi guys, and welcome back to another episode of Life
on Cut.
Speaker 2 (00:02):
I'm Laura and I'm Key Shack, and I'm so excited
to do a bit of a deep dive on whether
we can change our personality.
Speaker 3 (00:09):
Okay, so I found this one really interesting because often
we seem to and I would say it to something
that comes up and ask uncut quite a bit, this
idea of being in a relationship with someone and wanting
to change their personality or them wanting to change your personality.
But rarely do I think that we have enough self
awareness or introspection to really consider whether or not we
(00:29):
can change our own personality and whether we want to.
And I think it's also because often like we and
I say we as a very general thing, but often
I think we struggle to see fault in ourselves. The
reason why we're so excited to have this conversation is
because it's very much based around whether it is possible
to or whether you could if you desired to make
(00:49):
changes to your personality that might make you more likable,
that might make you more social, might make you more datable, who.
Speaker 2 (00:56):
Knows, might make you better at work. Maybe this conversation,
Laura is delivered had me on.
Speaker 3 (01:01):
Yes, Quijha, this is for you. Okay, we'll joining the
podcast today is Olga Hazan Now. Olga is a writer
of the Atlantic. She's the author of a new book,
Me But Better, The Science and Promise of Personality Change.
Speaker 1 (01:12):
Olga spent a.
Speaker 3 (01:13):
Year experimenting with her own personality to see if she
could become more extroverted, a little bit less neurotic, and
also more agreeable. So all of these things that we've
just spoken about in terms of I guess being perceived
is more likable.
Speaker 1 (01:26):
Olga, Welcome to the pod.
Speaker 4 (01:28):
Yeah, thanks so much for having me.
Speaker 3 (01:29):
Firstly, before we get into like how you've gone about
this and why it was something that you kind of
took on as your personal endeavor, how did personality and
exploring personality become a focus of interest for you.
Speaker 4 (01:42):
Yeah, so it does.
Speaker 5 (01:43):
I admit it sounds kind of strange because it's like personality.
I don't want to change my personality, Like I like
who I am. You know, personality is just who I am.
It's what I like and dislike. But when you think
about it, personality is actually at the root of a
lot of different things that we might want to improve
about ourselves. So if you want to make more friends,
or get organized, or stop running late, or even just
(02:04):
be less anxious or less depressed, those are all examples
of personality change. Because personality traits encompass so much of
who we are and what we do, it's really hard
to change yourself without changing your personality, if that makes sense.
Speaker 3 (02:18):
Do you think it would kind of live in a
bit of a time when people I mean, and I
even think about that Marilon Munroe quote, which is like,
if you can't handle me at my worst, you don't
deserve me at my best. Like, we almost expect that
the way we show up in the world, we should
be accepted for exactly the type of people that we
are and exactly the way that we are. But sometimes
that might not be the best version of what we
(02:40):
could be.
Speaker 5 (02:41):
Yeah, and I mean, maybe that's true. Like there definitely
should be people in your life who accept you, you know,
even when you are having a really terrible day and
you're in a really shitty mood and you like are
just a pain to be around.
Speaker 4 (02:53):
That's not really what I'm talking about.
Speaker 5 (02:54):
The point of personality change is not so much for
you to come off better, Although that certainly can be
one of the effect. It's actually for you to be
happier or even just to enjoy your life more, or
to appreciate what you have and kind of go through
life a little bit more smoothly. It is kind of
an external thing, but it's also kind of a selfish thing.
Personality change is for you, not for everyone else.
Speaker 2 (03:15):
I mean, I think the common thought about personalities that
you get given one at birth and that's just how
you're hardwired, Like that's just who you are. How malleable
do you think personality is?
Speaker 4 (03:27):
That's not untrue.
Speaker 5 (03:28):
Part of our personality is just given to us at
birth and basically stays the same. It's about half, so
thirty to fifty percent of our personality is genetic or
it's inherited, so that means it's in your genes. That
doesn't mean you're exactly like your parents. That just means
that that part is hereditary. The rest of your personality
is kind of up to this thing that scientists call environment,
(03:48):
which just means the way you were raised, your friends,
whether you go to college, what kind of job you have,
who you get married to, whether you have kids, who
your friends are. Those things all kind of combine and
they exert a force on your personality and tend to
kind of move your personality in different directions, even if
you don't especially try to change.
Speaker 4 (04:10):
So an example of.
Speaker 5 (04:11):
This is if you knew someone who was like a
crazy partier in college. You know, they just love to
go drinking, never did their homework whatever, just like always
off having fun. And then they get a job that's
like a total dream job for them, and suddenly they're
like never partying anymore. They're always working, they're super conscientious,
they've got two iPhones, they're always working on, you know,
emails on the weekend or whatever. That's an example of
(04:34):
personality change that's driven by the fact that someone experienced
a life change, they got a really important job, and
they became different. That is also personality change.
Speaker 3 (04:43):
Oh go, what was happening in your life when you
decided to undertake this self growth or experiment on yourself?
Like what were you experiencing? And like why was it
that you wanted to explore personality change?
Speaker 5 (04:54):
So what I found was that I really was getting
worn down by small bs that would happen to me
every day, Like my life wasn't bad, and in fact,
I opened the book with a story about a day
that is objectively not bad, but so many small things happened,
and it just like ate away at me and ate
away at me, I guess to summarize, I was in
(05:14):
Miami in the middle of winter, so yay, perfect weather,
perfect everything. I had to get professional photos taken.
Speaker 4 (05:22):
On the way to get these photos.
Speaker 5 (05:24):
Taken, I got a really bad haircut, so I'm like,
on the way, I go like, go get the photos taken.
The photos look bad to me.
Speaker 2 (05:31):
Because of the bad haircut.
Speaker 5 (05:33):
Yeah, but also just I don't like the angle. I
don't like the lighting. My angles were off, you know
how it is. And I was like, okay, whatever, try
to move on. I like get stuck in horrible traffic.
I end up running even later because as I'm trying
to get out of traffic, I somehow go the wrong
way and end up on a highway I'm not supposed
to be on. Then I'll get to the store and
I buy groceries, and then my shopping cart gets stuck
(05:54):
in the parking lot because I'm out of range of
the store and they think I'm trying to steal the
shopping cart, and so I have to drag the shopping
cart to my car because I can't carry.
Speaker 4 (06:07):
All the bags myself.
Speaker 5 (06:08):
And while all of this is happening, my boss is
like messaging me to make edits to a story, and
it's just adding to my stress and my kind of frustration.
So I get back and I just have this huge meltdown.
But then after the smoke clears, I sort of started thinking, like,
was that day.
Speaker 4 (06:25):
Really that bad?
Speaker 5 (06:26):
Or was I sort of making it bad by taking
every little thing and sort of making it the worst
thing ever? And I kind of had a tendency to
do that a lot. That negative viraling thinking is associated
with the trait of neuroticism, and that's something I scored
really high on when I started taking these personality tests.
So part of it was I just wanted to be
(06:48):
less anxious and less kind of frustrated by everything, you know.
I wanted to have more resilience in the face of
big things, but also in the face of just small things.
So that's kind of where it all started.
Speaker 2 (06:59):
I think it's really interesting that you were presented with
a situation like that, we had that realization and you
immediately went to the thought of, maybe I need to
change my personality. I think at the moment, particularly we
make a joke that I'm a bit of a biohack bro.
I love icepas, I love shit like that. But I
would to assume that if any of us came to
that realization, my immediate thought would be like, Okay, well,
(07:20):
maybe I need to learn to meditate, maybe I need
to learn.
Speaker 1 (07:22):
To do yoga.
Speaker 2 (07:23):
Like I think, I would look external rather than internal.
And I find it really interesting that you were like, hmm,
this must be connected to my neuroticism like that. That,
to me is very interesting that you had so much
insight into the fact that it would be connected to
something like that. For anyone who doesn't know about the
Big five personality types, I don't even know if that's
(07:45):
actually the label that you would use. Do you mind
explaining what they are and whether you would like to
be high or low on the scale, and kind of
where they came from.
Speaker 5 (07:53):
So there are five personality treats. You can remember them
with the acronym ocean OH for openness to experiences, which
is like imaginativeness and creativity, s for conscientiousness, which is
like getting places on time and being super organized and
diligent E for extraversion, which is being sociable and outgoing
and active. A for agreeableness, which is like warmth and
(08:15):
empathy and trust, and then N for neuroticism, which is
depression and anxiety. And you want to be really high
on all of them except for neuroticism, and you want
to be low on that one. And it's funny that
you should mention meditation because most of what I did
to help with my neuroticism is meditate. So even though
it seems like personality change is just sort of like
(08:36):
thinking really hard, it's mostly about action. It's mostly about
things that you do in order to change your personality traits,
not just sitting on a mountain and like deciding your
personality should be.
Speaker 3 (08:46):
Hoping, I mean, knowing that you are high in neuroticism,
where did you score on the other full personality traits? Yeah?
Speaker 5 (08:52):
I scored low on extraversion, especially the part of extroversion
that's associated with being cheerful. Just a little at a
twist there, I scored like kind of medium on agreeableness,
medium low, I would say I did, And I always
have scored really high.
Speaker 4 (09:07):
On openness and on conscientiousness Olga.
Speaker 3 (09:10):
This feels like the epitome of having a Taylor Swift
moment where you're like, I'm the problem.
Speaker 1 (09:14):
It's me, Like, Okay, I'm going to make some changes.
Speaker 3 (09:17):
Had you felt as though your personality was affecting any
of your relationships or how you showed up either at
work or in your romantic life or with your friends.
Speaker 5 (09:26):
Yeah, so one thing that would happen. My extraversion was low,
and I didn't have a lot of friends. But I
also like didn't go out and try to make a
lot of social connections. And the reason is that I
had always taken like i'd taken or I don't know,
not even personality tests, but just I just always thought
I'm an introvert, and whenever I was feeling bad or
(09:47):
like sad, I would spend more time by myself. I
thought that that is what I would want as an introvert.
I spent all day by myself. But I'm still feeling sad,
so I need to spend even more time by myself.
I think what I didn't realize that some of the
personality change techniques kind of tell you is that sometimes
it's more about doing the opposite thing. So for me,
(10:09):
one thing that became really important or just like a
kind of a big moment for me was in realizing
that sometimes when I'm having that withdrawn or lonely feeling,
it actually makes more sense to go out and seek
connection with other people rather than to spend even more
time by myself. So that was like a big change
that I noticed pretty much right away.
Speaker 3 (10:27):
Did you find that challenging though? To do it when
you're someone who's like conditioned to being an introvert and
when you have these feelings of wanting to sort of
spend time on your own, Like, I can only imagine
that that's a very hard mold to break.
Speaker 4 (10:39):
It was.
Speaker 5 (10:40):
It was really hard, especially since for extroversion I signed
up for improv. That was like one of the first
activities that I did, and I actually have really bad
stage right. I'm not a natural performer, and I especially
don't like being silly in public, and this is like
all that improv comedy is for those who aren't familiar.
Speaker 4 (10:57):
So it was.
Speaker 5 (10:58):
Something where like I would feel a lot of dread
and anxiety before I would go, and then as I
was there, I would loosen up progressively. And then what
I found is that at the end of every class
I was always pretty happy. It always was kind of
a mood boost. I don't know, I can almost compare
it to people who exercise, you know, before they go
for that run at five am or whatever, they're like, oh,
(11:20):
I just want to stay in bed, I don't want
to go, uh, like, can I skip today? And then
they're like going for their run whatever. They're getting into it,
listening to their Taylor's swift or whatever, and then they
get back and they have like that runners high. That's
like a very similar thing as what happened to me
with a lot of these kind of activities that I did.
Speaker 3 (11:38):
What is some I mean you mentioned it that there's
some tools if anyone's listening to this and they're wanting
to change aspects of their personality, Like, how do people
go about this? What is like a tangible way to
set out to make tweaks to what your personality is.
Speaker 4 (11:51):
It's tricky to.
Speaker 5 (11:52):
Like say what specifically to do because they're different for
every trait. So for extraversion, you're gonna want to go
out a lot. For neurotus's you're going to want to
do a lot of mindfulness type work and sort of
like yoga and meditation could be two things that you
start doing for agreeableness. What I did is I did
a lot of work on deepening my friendships and my relationships,
(12:12):
like how to have deeper conversations or how to set
better boundaries with friends, sort of not just like getting
out there and meeting people, but actually like establishing those
those deep friendships. The things you're going to want to
do are different for every trait. But I would just start, honestly, like,
I mean, buy my book, but if you don't buy
my book, just think about people in your life that
(12:32):
have the traits that you want and ask them what
they do. That is to some extent what I did
as well, Like I just would ask people who were
already really good at the stuff that I wanted to
get good at, how do you do that? And then
I would kind of do versions of that.
Speaker 2 (12:45):
What were some of those things all go?
Speaker 4 (12:47):
So I have a.
Speaker 5 (12:48):
Friend who is very good at meeting people and just
like be friends everyone everywhere she goes.
Speaker 2 (12:54):
If you need any types for some reason, I'm like
the pied Pie file.
Speaker 4 (12:58):
I just clicked people alone away everyone.
Speaker 3 (13:02):
Well, we'll do an interview with some person and then
like I would never have spoken to them again, and case,
she's just like still texting them three years later and
they're like best friends. Now she's going out for coffee
and I'm like, how did this happen?
Speaker 1 (13:11):
And she's like, I don't know. I go to WhatsApp number. No,
we're best friends.
Speaker 2 (13:15):
I promise I won't bumpbost you with messages all go please.
Speaker 5 (13:19):
Do because I want this friend Kathy, who's like very
good at making friends. And I basically just texted her
and I was like, how do you make friends? Like
I was a little robot and she was like, oh yeah,
I just text people who she'll like meet acquaintances you
know that seem cool, and she'll just text them to
hang out a lot, and you know, eventually they become
friends or she'll like ask them to lunch or ask
(13:40):
them for beers, or just ask if she can, you know,
come over and chat for a while. And I didn't
realize that a lot of friendship is just making an interest,
like kind of showing an interest in like you know,
not being aggressive or lounding people, but yeah, kind of
being like, hey, let's do something, kind of being the
instigator a lot.
Speaker 2 (13:58):
Can I touch it with something that I think I've
come to the realization this year in particular, that actually
has really helped me maintain friendships. Because we've had quite
a particularly busy year work wise and some things in
my personal life, I don't have a lot of free
time to actually maintain physical connections with friendships. But I've
found this really easy way to maintain like that you know,
(14:20):
we would speak at least once a week, and it's
if I see something on Instagram that is funny. You know,
for each of my friends, I will have a bit
of like a topic that I think we have as
a connection. For example, one of my friends loves his cat,
like is obsessed with his cat. So if ever I
see a funny cat reel, I'll send it to him.
One of my other friends is really funny in terms
(14:41):
of like social interaction, and so if there's ever a
real a meme or something that is quite funny about
being like, oh, there's nothing better than when someone cancels plans,
I will send.
Speaker 1 (14:50):
That to her.
Speaker 2 (14:51):
And I've realized that that's kind of the way that
I've been maintaining a lot of these connections.
Speaker 1 (14:56):
It's through memes.
Speaker 2 (14:57):
It's like it's actually through this like shared funny in
because it's really low effort. It's not like this big
message of tell me everything you've been up to for
the last three weeks, because that can get really exhausting,
like and you kind of just bouncing it back and forth.
My suggestion in that is that if you have a
desire to like maintain these connections with friends, start with
the small stuff that's just like light and fun and
(15:19):
it's not much.
Speaker 1 (15:20):
Effort for either of you.
Speaker 5 (15:21):
Yeah, oh yeah, I love that. I love that suggestion.
I've tried doing that more of that too. It's great
for people who are pressed for time.
Speaker 3 (15:28):
So O got Like I kind of mentioned at the start,
it's something that we do experience in terms of like
ask guncut questions, and I think it's something that we
can be guilty of in relationships when we feel as
though our partners aren't being the version of themselves we
want them to be. Is it possible to change someone
else's personality or encourage someone else to change their personality
or is it something that's like impossible task.
Speaker 5 (15:49):
So I have been trying to make my husband more conscientious,
but it's like my secret and not so secret goal.
He's now conscientious, and I'm very conscientious, and it's like
the source of a lot of our fates.
Speaker 2 (15:59):
Conscientious is the one where it's like on time and organized.
Speaker 5 (16:01):
Right yeah yeah, And he's just like super messy, doesn't
know what's going on, like doesn't have a Google calendar,
come what may.
Speaker 3 (16:08):
Just try to put it all in his brain and
then like remember some and forget some.
Speaker 1 (16:12):
That's me. Yeah, I'm like I don't need a calendar,
I just remember it all. But polling, yeah exactly.
Speaker 4 (16:18):
Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 5 (16:19):
So I would say that personality change works best when
the person really wants to do it, like when they
have some reason or some project that they're working toward
that helps them change their personality. So the people that
I talked to that became more conscientious, one of them
really wanted to start a business, one of them really
wanted to go to graduate school for psychology, and one
(16:41):
of them really wanted to drink less. So they have
these big quests that they were on and then the
personality change was like what helped them achieve that quest.
So it's hard for a different person because unless whatever
the goal is is like a shared goal for both
of you. If you and your partner want to have
a child together, and it's really important for both of
(17:01):
you to, I don't know, become more organized before the
child comes. Then you know, that's something where your partner
might be inspired to become more conscientious for that reason.
But it's really hard to just like foist personality change
on someone else because it does require them to behave
differently pretty much every day.
Speaker 2 (17:18):
Although on this with the having kids thing, are there
certain times of our lives or certain things that can
happen to us over the course of our life that
naturally will shift our personality.
Speaker 5 (17:29):
Yeah, it seems like starting a new job and starting
a romantic relationship are the two big ones that do
seem to change personality. Starting a new job makes you
a little more conscientious, and starting a new relationship tends
to bring down your neuroticism a little.
Speaker 1 (17:44):
Bit, depending on how toxic the relationship is, right.
Speaker 5 (17:46):
Right, right, Yeah, Yeah, those researchers in a while ago
before tender. But I will say that especially at the
time of life that's like your early twenties, is a
time of great change, and a lot of people find
their personalities changing a lot during that time frame, just
because that is a time when you're kind of figuring
out who you are in the world. You're getting a job,
you're developing a career, you're developing a friend group, you're
(18:07):
figuring out where you're.
Speaker 1 (18:08):
Going to live.
Speaker 5 (18:09):
So it's a lot of those factors that change your
personality are coming into place around that time. But they've
also done a lot of research that looked at all
sorts of different life events like having a baby and
ask people did this change your personality? And the answers
are kind of all over the place. I wrote an
article about this, but it's basically like, it's really hard
to tell how any given life event will change you specifically.
(18:32):
It's not totally clear.
Speaker 3 (18:34):
I definitely like if I was to look at the
sort of Big five personality traits and think about, like
how I've changed after having kids, I would say that
my extrovertedness has gone down, even like risk taking behavior
has gone down. Things that I would have done before
having kids in terms of like being super social or
like having energy to do things, but also going skydiving,
(18:55):
or like going bungee jumping or things like that, like
things that I would say I would have had a
higher propensity to do before having kids. Now I'm like, no,
that seems unnecessary and really dangerous. So I think I
say no to a lot more stuff.
Speaker 1 (19:08):
I don't know.
Speaker 3 (19:08):
Sometimes I'm like, maybe that's like a natural progression of
getting older when you're more aware of things that can
go wrong as well. But it definitely has had an
impact on me.
Speaker 4 (19:16):
Oh yeah, I mean I.
Speaker 5 (19:17):
Think it's made me more agreeable. Like I before I
had So, I had a baby. Interestingly, in the middle
of writing the book, So, before I had Evan, I
really thought I would not enjoy the baby phase of
having a baby, like a baby talk and the giggling
and the cuddling were like not gonna appeal to me, really,
But that's actually been.
Speaker 4 (19:36):
My favorite part. Uh. I really like being.
Speaker 5 (19:39):
Silly and like making him laugh and playing with him.
But the part that I thought I would be really
good at, which is figuring out like how many ounces
and like what time, and like how many diapers and
how often, that part has not been as fun for me.
Like it hasn't been I like do it, and I'm
pretty good at it, but that part, it hasn't been
as enjoyable as I thought it would be.
Speaker 1 (19:59):
That's so that's interesting.
Speaker 2 (20:01):
Another part of the lifespan that I'm curious about is
when you get into older age. You know, I know
that politically we tend to say that as you get older,
you become more conservative, and younger people tend to be
slightly more progressive. Is that related to openness to experience?
And do you see a change as people age, like
into their you know, seventies and eighties, People.
Speaker 5 (20:22):
Do tend to become less open to experiences as they
get older, And that could be one reason why older
people become more conservative as they get older, because openness
is generally associated with political liberalism.
Speaker 4 (20:36):
It's sort of the like, yeah, whatever you want to do.
Speaker 5 (20:39):
Like kind of free to be you and me type thing,
So that kind of declines as you get older. Also
as you get older, like other things happen too, Like
you tend to become less neurotic, you tend to become
more conscientious. So there are positive changes and I mean
negative changes depending on how you look at it, and
also depending on like how open you start out as
Because if you're protester in the you know, seventies, as
(21:04):
a young person, like, you'll probably still be pretty liberal
even in old age.
Speaker 3 (21:08):
In terms of your experience, and like the changes you
saw in yourself when you originally did this kind of
like you know, personality testing. Vers after having these different
experiences of trying to change your personality, what was the
end result, Like where are you at now in terms
of your testing and how you show up for these
personality types.
Speaker 5 (21:26):
The end result was that my extraversion did increase a lot.
I think I just found that I was sort of
unnecessarily isolating myself kind of with the excusive introversion. I
still think I'm an introvert in that I do need
a lot of downtime and alone time and just like
time to process. But I also I think I found
that I get a lot more out of social interaction.
Speaker 4 (21:47):
That I was maybe thinking that I did.
Speaker 5 (21:50):
I also found that my neuroticism went down, but I
thought I was working on the anxiety component and that
did go down a little bit. But mostly what went
down was my depression, and I chalked that up to
meditation actually and just some of the I guess learnings
about Buddhism that I encountered while I was taking this
intensive meditation class. My agreeableness did go up slightly, and
(22:12):
I mostly chalk that up to the fact that I
did so much with other people, Like I did an
anger management program and I went to London for this
conversation workshop, and I just I was like constantly around
other people and like hearing other people's stories, and that
I think helped boost my own levels of empathy or
kind of like this realization that a lot of times
(22:33):
you're sharing a struggle with a lot of other people.
I don't know, so that did increase my agreeableness.
Speaker 2 (22:38):
Can I ask about the anger management class? I read
that you were the only person in it that wasn't
forced to be this, Yeah, what happens in an anger
management class? And how does that help with neuroticism?
Speaker 5 (22:49):
Well, it was supposed to help me with agreeableness. I
found the anger management class not that helpful because it
was kind of telling me stuff that I already knew.
It was the teachers walking you through like take a
deep breath, right, you know, try to focus on something positive,
you know, go to the other room.
Speaker 2 (23:08):
You know.
Speaker 5 (23:09):
It was kind of like very generic advice. But one
thing that was helpful there is hearing what made other
people angry and why some of us were able to
avoid anger triggers sometimes. So like at one point they
brought up traffic, and none of us said that traffic
makes us angry, even though I know it did make
me angry in that story that I told earlier. But
usually it's not traffic that upsets us. We live in
(23:31):
a very high traffic area where there's always traffic, and
kind of the reason why we figured out that traffic
doesn't make us angry is that it's beyond our control,
Like we didn't cause the traffic, and there's nothing we
can do about it. So in some ways, that is
like a healthier way to think about stuff that makes
you angry, is this isn't within my control, Like if
(23:53):
it's something that happens at work or something that someone.
Speaker 4 (23:56):
Does to you.
Speaker 5 (23:59):
Yeah, like one way that I I've kind of tried
to process it, it's just this isn't up to me,
you know, this isn't in my hands.
Speaker 2 (24:03):
This is kind of along the lines of the let
them theory that Mel Robbins has written a book about.
It's going very very very viral at the moment. Kind
of the concept is if something happens outside of your control,
you have to let them, You have to let them
do it in that way. I mean, I'm not quite
at that point in traffic. Yet I am probably my
worst version of who I am in a car yelling
at people for doing stupid things or what I need
(24:26):
to be stupid. But I think that what you're referring
to is kind of along those same lines of what
you don't have control over you can't change.
Speaker 4 (24:33):
Yeah, yeah, exactly.
Speaker 5 (24:34):
I mean it's a concept is all the time, but yeah,
some people we need to hear it.
Speaker 3 (24:39):
Yeah, but also on this, I mean, like we've spoken
about how school wise your personality changed, but did you
feel it in yourself?
Speaker 1 (24:46):
Could you tell that there was changes that have been made.
Speaker 5 (24:48):
I definitely felt less depressed, Like I felt happier throughout
working on the project, and I definitely felt more extra
Like I found myself like looking forward to things with
other people that I would do with other people, like
my sailing class or improv class. Even I found myself,
oh yeah, I can't wait for that, or like that'll
be so fun, and like that's not really a thought
(25:09):
that I had had before. Like my mentality before the
book was much more like get home on Friday, pop
a bottle of wine, thank god the week is over,
what's on TV? Kind of a lot more just trying
to get through and survive as opposed to looking out
and seeing hope and like something to look forward to.
Speaker 2 (25:27):
I'm interested in kind of the dichotomy of these personality traits.
And you know, we said that you want to be
high on the scale in everything other than neuroticism, But
are there positives to being the opposite? You know, let's
say that you are high on neuroticism like you were.
Is there an environment that that is a good thing.
Speaker 4 (25:45):
Yes.
Speaker 5 (25:46):
Importantly, you don't want to be all the way over.
They're all a spectrum, right, and you don't want to
be all the way over to the end for any
one of them. Because we do need a little bit
of anxiety.
Speaker 4 (25:56):
Like if you.
Speaker 5 (25:56):
Didn't have anxiety, you wouldn't have shown up for work today,
and you wouldn't you know, you wouldn't do anything, you
wouldn't make doctor's appointments. That people would just languish, they
wouldn't move through life. So you do need anxiety to
like get up and go in the morning. But the
trick is not letting it get the best of you
and not letting it spiral out of control. So having
a little bit of that nervousness or those jitters is
(26:18):
totally normal and adaptive and healthy. But the trick is,
you know, at the same time, not being like all
the way over on neuroticism so far that you can't
cope and you're you know, you also don't do anything
because you're too anxious. And some of it might be situational, right,
It might be like changing your personality from moment to
moment where you know, maybe you're an introvert one day
(26:38):
because you really got to buckle down and study for
something or prepare for something, and then you're an extrovert
the next day because you have to give a huge
speech for tons and tons of people. That kind of
switching between traits or like trying on different traits is
also a version of personality change.
Speaker 3 (26:54):
Oh God, thank you so much for coming and being
a part of the pod, and for anyone who is
or has considered potentially maybe changing their own personality might
make themselves happier. Please we'll link the book and everything
about it in the show notes as well. It is
called Me but Better, The Science and Promise of Personality Change.
Thanks for coming and being a part of the pod.
Speaker 4 (27:12):
Yeah, thanks so much for having me
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